City of Tshwane slammed for missing financial deadline

The DA in Tshwane has accused the City of Tshwane of dropping the ball after missing the deadline to submit an important financial report to council last month.

Mayor Nasiphi Moya is required to submit a report on the budget and financial performance before the end of the term.

Former MMC of finance Jacqui Uys said the mayor did not understand what was legally required of her, adding that it was the first legislative deadline she had missed.

Tshwane mayor doesn’t understand what is legally required of her – Uys

Uys said the mayoral team was reminded of the deadline but still missed it.

“The most concerning of it all was that you were using this opportunity to set up the Section 56 manager for failure so that you could come back and say it was the Section 56 manager that dropped the ball. Let me make this clear, this is your ball that was dropped,” she told a council meeting on Tuesday.

Uys said everything was submitted to the mayor, the MMC of finance and council on time.

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DA Tshwane caucus leader Cilliers Brink said last week that his party chief whip, Ofentste Mazebatela, had warned the speaker and the mayor’s representative that they had failed to load the financial report on the City slated over missed deadline council agenda.

“He did so again at the council meeting, emphasising that it is the mayor’s duty to submit this financial report. She then falsely claimed in open council, in front of the auditor-general, that the report was on the agenda,” he said.

Brink said the mayor was dodging accountability and this was a major red flag. Last week, Moya announced the city’s implementation of key remedial steps to address the auditor-general’s report findings for the City of Tshwane for the 2023-24 financial year.

Moya dodging accountability

“While the reports were submitted to National Treasury and provincial Treasury on 14 January in compliance with legislative deadlines, they were not tabled at the council meeting on 30 January due to delays in the internal committee system.

To address this oversight, the city has written to the MEC for finance, Lebogang Maile, outlining the circumstances that led to the delay and detailing corrective measures to strengthen internal reporting mechanisms,” she said.

Moya said the mayoral executive took compliance issues seriously, particularly in light of concerns raised by the auditor-general regarding inadequate oversight over regulatory processes.

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