The City of Ekurhuleni is one of 53 municipalities in the country that has showed consistent improvement in its audit outcomes, the Auditor-General, Thembekile Makwetu, said.
Gauteng MEC for Co-operative Governance, Traditional Affairs and Human Settlements, Paul Mashatile, attributed the success – recorded from the 2011/12 to 2014/15 financial year – to strong and capable institutions that were managed and governed efficiently.
Ekurhuleni has been basking in the glory after achieving four successive unqualified reports, two clean audits as well as receiving a prime credit rating upgrade to Aaa.za on a national scale from the Moody’s rating agency.
However, the metro’s city manager, Khaya Ngema, said these achievements were not a point of arrival, saying the city would pay special attention to wasteful expenditure.
Ngema’s commitment reflects the concern of the Auditor-General, who noted an increase in irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure.
“Now that we have achieved clean audit status, we are concerned about the issue of wasteful and fruitless spending. While we have made great gains in this area over the years, we are prepared to do more to change the status quo,” Ngema said.
Ngema said Ekurhuleni would deal with the Auditor-General’s concerns. This has been demonstrated when the city reduced wasteful expenditure from R20.8-million in the 2013/14 financial year to R1.8-million in the past financial year.
The city has also reduced its irregular spending from R235-million to R68-million in the last financial year, reducing it by R187-million.
Ngema believes the dawn of a new era in the city’s finances can be attributed to, among other interventions, improved quality of management in the different departments, not just on governance and risk, but more crucially, in operations and project management.
