Cape Town - The provincial Department of Cultural Affairs and Sport stands to make substantial savings by amending the Western Cape Museums Ordinance Act to allow for province-aided museums to appoint their own auditors instead of using the offices of the auditor-general (A-G).
Officials told the standing committee on cultural affairs and sport that the key reason for the amendment was that according to section 29 of the ordinance, province-aided museums were funded through subsidy, which meant they must be audited by the A-G.
There are three categories of museums in the province – five provincial museums run by management committees, 20 province-aided museums run by boards of trustees, and six local museums run by a control board.
Department of Cultural Affairs and Sport’s deputy museum services director Michael Janse van Rensburg said the collective fees owed to the A-G for 19 of the 20 province-aided museums in the 2018/19 financial year were R2.32 million and in the 2019/20 financial year increased to R2.5m.
“Amending the ordinance to allow the museums to look for their own auditors and negotiate their own audits would alleviate the financial burden of annual financial audits by the A-G by up to R100 000 per museum.”
Responding to queries from committee members Ayanda Bans (ANC) and Riccardo Mackenzie (DA) who wanted to know whether the department had discussed the high fees with the A-G’s office, chief cultural affairs director Guy Redman said: “We’ve had a discussion with the A-G; this is a matter for discussion every year with the A-G.”
“The A-G is in support of our decision to get auditors other than the A-G to audit these institutions because he agrees these are very small institutions and they also takes up quite a lot of the A-G’s time, even though they are not part of the department but only linked to it by the act,” Redman said.
Committee chairperson Reagen Allen said: “Many of our cultural institutions have suffered immensely as a result of prolonged lockdown restrictions, and we need to do what we can to lift that pressure.
“Museums play a key role in shaping the cultural discourse in a diverse society such as the Western Cape. It is thus important that we find innovative ways to help sustain our cultural institutionalism.”
Cape Argus