GMM cashiers in Bethal accused of stealing service money
Zuma asked the councillors how the municipality is going to be sustainable while they have employees, who are getting paid, stealing from their employer.
Some Govan Mbeki municipal officials in the financial department in Bethal are allegedly telling customers to use cash instead of a debit card when paying their consumer accounts, and then they pocket the money.
Mayor Nhlakanipho Zuma revealed such a shocking detail when addressing the council on March 29.
Zuma asked the councillors how the municipality is going to be sustainable while they have employees, who are getting paid, and stealing from their employers.
“These are some of the things we need to defeat. It shows that the administration is undermining the council and resolutions are not implemented.”
Zuma said the council previously resolved that a forensic investigation was necessary to probe some decisions that led to the municipality losing a lot of money.
“Up to today, nothing has happened,” said Zuma.
He said the municipality has 5 000 electricity meters, but they cannot install the meters due to the municipality’s insufficient staff in the department of energy.
According to Zuma, it might take the current municipal workers about a year to complete the work.
“As a council, we must ask our community to pay for services, but we have to give them good services.”
Late last year, the municipality suspended three of its employees from the finance department after R90 000 disappeared from its coffers in the Bethal offices.
According to a source who wanted to remain anonymous, this is not the first time the municipality suspended employees for cash that has disappeared.
In 2021, they also suspended two employees in the financial offices in Bethal when the money disappeared.
The outcome of the investigation and the suspension are still unknown.
When the newspaper sent an enquiry to the communication department about what had happened to those officials, Donald Green, acting communications manager, said that the suspension of staff was an employer-employee matter on which he was not at liberty to comment.
