Polokwane Muni: ‘not billions wasted’
Mayor John Mpe expressed his dismay at the headline and content by the Polokwane Observer, 'Billions Wasted' as malicious and portraying the municipality as careless.
POLOKWANE – Polokwane Observer’s lead story on February 1, with the headline ‘Billions Wasted’ referred to an amount of R1,6bn that was highlighted in a report from the municipality’s Audit and Performance Audit Committee (Apac) that was tabled in council on January 30.
The report read as follows: “The summary of the unwanted expenditure as at end of December 2023 is as follows: (refer below for detailed breakdown):
4.15.1. Unauthorised Expenditure R1 631 926 187
4.15.2. Irregular Expenditure R480m
4.15.3. Fruitless and Wasteful Expenditure R17 125 046 (currently with financial misconduct board).”
After the story was published, Polokwane Mayor John Mpe called a media briefing and expressed his dismay at the headline and content of the article, describing it as malicious and portraying the municipality as careless and wasteful where public funds are concerned.
“This report further paints a picture that such wasteful expenditure was incurred only in the single year of 2023, which is also misleading. The information out there is that the municipality has incurred billions of wasteful expenditure in a single year for the period between January to December 2023,” Mpe stated and added that the report further states that all of this expenditure is wasteful expenditure, while the fact of the matter is that only R17m of this amount is wasteful expenditure and this is also already under investigation.
According to the mayor, the information is based on a misinterpretation of the Apac report.
“The fact of the matter is that Polokwane Municipality has reviewed the findings of Apac and has taken decisive action based on its recommendations. Council has officially adopted these recommendations, marking significant progress in addressing previous concerns highlighted by the Auditor-General,” Mpe said and added that one of the notable improvements is the reduction in findings raised by the AG compared to previous years, indicating a positive trend towards stronger internal controls within the municipality and this has resulted in an unqualified audit opinion.
Mpe explained that irregular expenditure includes expenditure incurred by a municipality in contravention of a requirement of the supply chain management policy of the municipality or its by-laws and has not been condoned in terms of such policy or by-laws.
“As of December 31, 2023, the cumulative balance for irregular expenditure amounted to R480 792 173. The amount is accumulated from as far back as 2020 and emanates from non-compliance with supply chain management regulations, payments made after the expiry of contracts and possible irregular expenditure due to the allocation of work to a panel of bidders,” Mpe stated.
Fruitless and wasteful expenditure, he said, means expenditure that was made in vain and would have been avoided had reasonable care been exercised. Mpe elaborated and further explained that as of December 31, 2023 the cumulative balance for fruitless and wasteful expenditure amounted to R17 125 046 and that this emanates from interest on payments to Eskom and payments for buses that were not delivered.
‘Unauthorised expenditure’ means any expenditure incurred by a municipality and includes overspending of the total amount appropriated in the approved budget or expenditure from a budget item unrelated to the department or functional area covered by the budget. The cumulative balance for unauthorised expenditure since 2019 amounted to R1 631 926 187 as at December 31, 2023 Mpe said, and explained that the unauthorised expenditure emanates from items such as insufficient budget for non-cash items such as depreciation, impairment loss, provision for bad debts that were written off, inventory issued, interest on landfill site provisions and unapproved conditional grant roll-over spent/not cash-backed, loss on disposal of assets and liabilities.
The conclusion is that the billions referred to in the article was not wasted, he said, and the headline could have created an inaccurate impression of the true state of affairs.
Polokwane Observer is committed to adhering to the Code of Ethics for Print and Online Media which prescribes that our reporting be truthful, accurate and fair. We regret any misconceptions inadvertently created by the article.
