The Democratic Alliance (DA) has requested the Northern Cape Provincial Legislature’s Portfolio Committee on COGHSTA to intensify oversight inspections to municipalities, as the Auditor General’s 2023/24 audit outcomes confirm that service delivery at local governments, struggling with basic financial management, is crumbling.
While residents suffer the frustrations of water outages, dysfunctional wastewater treatment works, broken streetlights, and dilapidated roads:
• More than R150.51 million was spent on consultants instead.
• Nearly R82 million was spent on consultants hired to prepare and review financial statements, which is supposed to be the responsibility of chief financial officers and staff in the municipal financial units.
• Salaries account for 68% of municipal revenue, excluding grants, which is neither sustainable nor fiscally responsible, as we find the situation where equitable share funding is increasingly used to pay salaries rather than to fund services to the poorest of the poor.
With money needed for repairs and maintenance being paid in exorbitant consultants’ fees and wage bills, the quality and credibility of financial statements remains problematic as many municipalities do not have the required recordkeeping in place. The Northern Cape’s municipal audit outcomes worsened from 15 qualified audits in 2018 to 20 qualified audits in 2024. The province also only achieved 2 municipal clean audits in 2024 after achieving 5 in 2020.
As members of the Portfolio Committee, we’ve been requesting specific oversight to troubled municipalities since the start of the 7th Administration. We’ve asked for targeted oversight interventions to areas struggling with water and sanitation services, like Kgatelopele, Emthanjeni, and Kamiesberg. We’ve also asked for briefings on areas where financial distress could disrupt service delivery and for greater monitoring of the Eskom municipal debt relief programme.
Some of these visits have already been approved in principle by the committee. There can be no reason to delay any further.