Cape Town - There were fireworks during a local government standing committee briefing on under-performing municipalities when Freedom Front Plus MPL Peter Marais lambasted the provincial department of local government and political parties for being soft on delinquent municipalities.
The committee was being briefed on the Auditor-General’s 2019/20 Local Government (MFMA) Audit Outcomes which revealed that 25 municipalities out of the 30 in the province received unqualified audit outcomes, and four municipalities are currently in arrears with Eskom to the tune of R125 million.
The department said it would provide support and corrective action to the ANC-led municipalities of Beaufort West, Kannaland and Laingsburg.
Marais said that the current system of choosing leaders took the best candidates and appointed them to the national parliament and provincial legislature while dumping those who couldn’t make those lists in municipalities.
“We then expect to get “A” reports from these municipalities, yet, with such people, we know we’ll only get “F”s. How do we solve this? A political solution is required.”
“I am concerned that these presentations just go through the paces with the department briefing the committee with flowery language, high falutin’ vocabulary about all the things they are doing, but the problems of delinquent municipalities such as Kannaland, Laingsberg, Beaufort West and Bitou are never resolved.”
Accusing political parties of shielding their local government deployees, Marais suggested a provincial round table meeting of all parties where the axe would be taken to delinquent municipalities, was the way to resolve the issues at local government level for once and for all.
Committee chairperson Derrick America (DA) said: “We share the goal that audit outcomes must improve in the future, regardless of party affiliation.
“Moving forward, I will be asking MEC Bredell what progress is being made with respect to further refining these monitoring and evaluation processes.”
Municipal performance monitoring and support chief director Eda Barnard said the Province had resolved to put Kannaland under mandatory intervention and issued a financial recovery plan.
She said that there had been ongoing instability experienced in the council and that a number of irregular and unlawful decisions were taken, forcing the MEC to institute urgent court proceedings against the Municipality and that the litigation was ongoing.
She said the impact of the instability on the council had been “A dysfunctional administration, a number of resignations and negative morale of staff and this had all had a direct impact on service delivery.”
Provincial treasury financial governance and accounting head Adenaan Hardien said that following the issuing of the final audit report by the AG, every municipality prepares an audit action plan with copies for the department of local government and the provincial treasury.
“Each plan is tailor-made to address the findings of the AG in a given year. The exact finding is highlighted, the root cause for each finding is unpacked, and any recommendations by the AG is detailed, where applicable,” said Hardien.