NELSPRUIT – Mbombela’s municipal public accounts committee this morning tabled its oversight report to council. Ms T.M. Charles, chairperson of the committee, read the committee’s findings and recommendations on the municipality’s 2012/13 audited financial reports during the special council meeting, which was called especially for the occasion.
The report was supposed to be tabled two weeks ago, but special permission was obtained from the speaker of provincial legislature, Mr William Lubisi, after the report was delayed when the executive failed to stick to her deadlines of submitting answers to questions posed by the committee.
The report commended the municipality for having “managed to obtain an unqualified audit opinion from the Auditor-General and committee commends all the involved stakeholders for this achievement”.
It recommended that the municipal manager and executive mayor, Cllr Cathy Dlamini, in future include, in their forewords to the financial reports, include the administrative performance of the municipality and Mbombela’s alignment with the province’s development strategy, respectively.
It noted that since the new households provided with water and Mbombela’s plan to address water and refuse removal backlogs were not included, the information should be included next year.
The outstanding revenue owed to the municipality by its own councillors was also not included and a plan to recoup the money should be included in the 2013/14 annual report.
The chief whip of the opposition DA in council, Mr Jo Koster, noted with dismay that the report was terribly watered down. “The only recommendations the committee makes is for the mayor to adjust her foreword? What does that even mean?”
The committee did however note that it was concerned over bottlenecks in supply chain management, the non-sitting of bid committees, the underspending of conditional grants and critical positions going unfilled.
“The committee noted this matter with discontent, as by implication (the underspending of conditional grants) reflects on the elvel of the municipality to provide basis infrastructure services.”
The chief financial officer has been in an acting position for 14 months, while the contract for the acting municipal manager comes to an end at the end of May.
