SCOPA flags deepening crisis at Mangaung Metro Municipality

By Alicia Mmashakana

The Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) has raised serious concerns over persistent governance failures and service delivery challenges at the Mangaung Metro Municipality in the Free State.

This follows a briefing on Friday by the Auditor-General on the municipality’s 2023/24 audit outcomes, which revealed a continued pattern of mismanagement and inefficiency.

According to the Auditor-General’s report, Mangaung’s Integrated Development Plan, Service Delivery and Budget Implementation Plan (SDBIP), and its overall budget remain misaligned.

Mangaung Metro has now received three consecutive qualified audit opinions, for 2021/22, 2022/23, and 2023/24.

“We observed that they would budget and plan to do things, conduct public participation, and collate the information, but when you look at their performance focus, there is misalignment,” said Odwa Duda, Business Unit Leader at the Auditor-General’s Office.

SCOPA pointed out a lack of skilled personnel and ineffective contract management in the infrastructure unit as key contributors