AG flags systemic governance failures in Mangaung, Ekurhuleni, Tshwane and eThekwini

By Simon Nare

The office of Auditor-General Tsakani Maluleke has painted a grim picture of governance failures across four major metros, with audit outcomes presented to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) in the National Assembly of South Africa on Tuesday.

The presentation, covering Mangaung, Ekurhuleni, Tshwane and eThekwini, revealed recurring issues of weak accountability, wasteful spending, irregular expenditure and critical skills shortages.

Maluleke also raised concerns about water quality in some municipalities, warning that it poses a health risk to residents.

“I could not verify water revenue from conventional meters due to unreliable consumption data. Additionally, incomplete billing caused a material understatement of revenue. I could not verify water distribution losses due to unreliable units sold,” she told SCOPA.

She highlighted widespread non-compliance in areas including misstatements in submitted financial statements and annual reports, weak consequence management, poor revenue controls, and deficiencies in procurement, contract and environmental management.

Maluleka identified the root causes as systemic failures in internal controls, which are not embedded as a performance responsibility.

This results in controls being applied reactively during audits rather than continuously.

She further noted that user departments are not held accountable for preparing and safeguarding supporting evidence, leading to unreliable information only being tested at audit stage. Legislative compliance, she added, is treated as a reactive exercise rather than an operational duty.

Unauthorised expenditure declined to R1.36 billion from R1.81 billion in the previous financial year.

However, irregular expenditure increased to R324 million from R277 million, while fruitless and wasteful expenditure decreased to R67 million from R130 million.

In Mangaung, audits of water, electricity, roads and housing projects revealed a breakdown in internal controls, weak leadership accountability, chronic late payments, severe skills shortages and failure to safeguard completed assets, many of which were vandalised.

Maluleka recommended tighter controls over overtime