1. Competence 1.1 The professional accountant must be fully conversant with

• Accounting and Book-Keeping;

• Auditing;

• Taxation Law and Practice;

• Internal Control and Accounting Systems;

• Company Law;

• Information Technology;

• Management and Financial Consultancy;

• Valuation;

• Liquidation, Receiverships and Bankruptcy proceedings;

• Economic environment, policies and trends.

1.2 Ability to communicate both orally and in writing

• To his staff in giving instructions and directions;

• To the management and employees in obtaining evidence;

• To shareholders in reporting his findings;

• To other third parties in reporting his findings and obtaining evidence.

1.3 Judgement

• The accountant must be able to make sound judgements, not only in professional matters but also of people.
• He must therefore not only possess the skill and have the experience but he must also have imagination and the ability to differentiate between material and non-material items and to recognise apparent inconsistencies and abnormalities.

2. Integrity

• The accountant must be and be seen to be honest, a follower of the ethical code of the institute, a person of discretion and tact and a person aware of his or her wider responibility to the community at large. The synonyms for integrity include honesty, uprightness, probity, rectitude, moral soundness.
• When an accountant has ethical difficulties or is unsure of what course of conduct to follow, he must consult the institute or seek legal advice.

3. Independence

• The accountant's "reason to be" is independence. A dependant accountant is a contradiction in terms. The rule is that the accountant must approach every assignment with objectivity. He must approach his work in a spirit of independence of mind. Again not only must he be independent, he must be seen to be independent. Any interest which might diminish an accountants' objectivity of approach or which might appear to do so must be avoided.