N.C. Central hires auditor

DURHAM -- N.C. Central University finally has an internal auditor.

The university on Friday filled a job that has been vacant for years with the hiring of Najla Shareef, who most recently was a senior internal auditor at Alliance One International in Morrisville.

She starts Monday, and her hiring is expected to help stabilize an office that university officials say has long been understaffed and led by interim directors.

Chancellor Charlie Nelms said Friday Shareef’s role won’t be to police the university as much as it will be to help workers follow guidelines.

“It’s not just to correct things, it’s to prevent things,” he said.

NCCU has had a string of embarrassing audit findings of late, including the discovery that some workers were using NCCU software to illegally download pornography and other media. But Nelms pointed out that auditors on campus discovered the malfeasance and properly reported it.

“We’ve had good people, but we haven’t had a full-time director,” he said.

Discussion following that and other discoveries, however, did illustrate a low staffing level within the audit office, where until Shareef’s hiring, just two of six positions were filled.

Nelms said he expects other new hires in the office as well, but isn’t sure yet when those new employees will be hired, or how many.

Shareef will earn $80,000 annually, a university spokeswoman said. She was formerly the senior internal auditor at both Duke Medicine and the Sara Lee Corp. She is a graduate of N.C. A & T University and has a master’s in business administration from Webster University.