“Only 30 of the 319 municipalities have clean audits” — Auditor General
District Mayor, Salga in talks to assist failing municipalities.
West Rand District Municipality executive mayor Mpho Nawa who is also the deputy chairman of the South African Local Government Association (Salga) say despite the fact that only 30 of the 319 municipalities got clean audits, local government was functioning and that performance was improving as well.
This was said on 31 July at the Salga municipal audit support programme event in Newtown, Johannesburg and comes after the Auditor General released a report on the outcomes of the municipal audits for the 2012/13 financial year.
During this time, the association committed itself to assisting those municipalities that are struggling to get their ducks in a row financially.
According to media reports, Salga would work from bottom up to assist the worst-performing municipalities and would spend a whopping R40 million to do this.
In an interview with the herald, Nawa has said that they note and appreciate the Auditor General’s report, but were quick to argue that the report reflected on the twelve-month period only.
“Yes, of course stories abound of inefficiency, mismanagement, corruption and the like. However, by and large our country is operating like a well-oiled machine through the efforts of municipalities. When we hear horror stories about our municipalities in the press, we tend to forget that life would not have been the way it is if our municipalities were completely dysfunctional,” Nawa said.
“So without taking anything away from legitimate criticism about local government shortfalls, let us equally acknowledge that the system is viable and functioning,” Nawa added.
Meanwhile, it is worth noting that the Randfontein Local Municipality and the Westonaria Local Municipality that both are under Nawa’s wing are said to be struggling financially, with both entities individually owing more than R50 million to power utility Eskom.
This is just one of controversial issues Nawa’s municipalities face amid the imminent merging of both municipalities.
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