Dear Editor
During the latest in a series of briefings to the Western Cape Provincial Parliament’s Standing Committee on Local Government, the Auditor-General (AG) tackled the issue of Material Irregularities (MIs) in Western Cape municipalities. In the few MIs that were found in the Western Cape, the Auditor-General did not see fit to pursue any further investigation.
While the Western Cape accounted for more than half of the country’s clean audit, it also accounted for only 3.6% of the country’s MIs. The Auditor-General investigated seven possible MIs, finding four. One of these originated from municipal revenue which was not billed , while another three came from payments that were made prematurely to contractors. The Auditor-General’s representatives indicated that the organisation did not believe that any further investigation was necessary in any one of these instances.
These results indicate that the Western Cape is not only home to the majority of the country’s financially healthy municipalities, but also that the province exhibits a high level of responsiveness in rectifying financial discrepancies.
MPP Derrick America said: “I have always said that perfection should be the goal in municipal financial management, and that, despite the Western Cape’s sterling audit reports, we should aim to rectify any discrepancies. Today’s briefing was an important part of this, and showed that the AG is entirely satisfied with the Western Cape Government’s approach to rectifying those few financial issues in the province’s municipalities. I share this assessment, and am confident that next year’s municipal audits will bring us even closer to achieving our goals of clean audits across the board.”
Regards
Derrick America, MPP
DA Western Cape Spokesperson on Local Government
