More than a month has passed since the revelation that a group of municipal cashiers had allegedly stolen money
in the municipality yet no criminal case has been opened yet.
In a press release issued on 22 August, the Merafong City Local Municipality responded to complaints by residents,
saying that some of its pay points had been closed due to a shortage of staff. This followed allegations of misconduct against the cashiers who manned the pay points.
Although the municipality refused to give more information, saying the issue was still under investigation, the Herald has seen an internal report in which more details about the alleged theft are provided.
Four cashiers, the names of whom are known to the Herald, ran short on the amounts of money that were supposed
to have been banked from their cash registers in May and June this year. In the highest single amount reported,
one of the cashiers was more than R45 000 short on 5 June. Only two days later, the same cashier was more than R25 000 short.
Some harrowing accounts of financial wrongdoing at the municipality have been revealed in the report. In one instance, a supervisor who went to Kokosi to investigate the missing monies found the empty money bags inside a microwave. The cashier, who was later suspended, said she had used the money for her father’s funeral.
Despite these wrongdoings, the communications officer of the Police in Carletonville, WO Peter Masooa, told the Herald during the past week that the municipality had not yet opened a case at any of the police stations in Merafong. All the cashiers were still on suspension this week.
A knowledgeable source within the municipality says the chances are slim that the cashiers will lose their jobs as
the local government has a bad track record when it comes to dismissals.
One of the reasons many cases failed was that there is a history of only light action taken against offenders. Two
former cashiers who were previously investigated for alleged theft are still working in the finance department.
One of them who is named in the current report was allegedly also investigated previously for a similar wrongdoing.
