OPINION| Liability of municipal officials for unauthorised, irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure

By Vincent Manko, Imraan Abdullah, Kelo Seleka and Charles Green

Municipalities have original constitutional powers and are directly responsible for the management of their affairs. They are required to comply with the norms and standards imposed on them by national legislation.

The Municipal Finance Management Act 56 of 2003 (MFMA) was enacted to “secure sound and sustainable management of the financial affairs of the municipalities”, and “to establish treasury norms and standards for the local sphere of government”.

One of the ways it does this is by recognising the possibility that expenditure may not occur in a manner that illustrates sound and sustainable management and by creating liability and recovery mechanisms around that recognition to minimise financial exposure for municipalities.

In particular, section 32 imposes liability on municipal officials and political office bearers, and creates an obligation on municipalities to recover money that through expenditure that