The National Library of South Africa (NLSA) has received an unqualified audit outcome from the Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) after 12 years, a significant milestone for the institution.

The achievement comes within Dr Ralph Links’ first year as CEO and underscores the institution’s progress in strengthening financial management, governance and accountability.

According to Seeiso Tlali, CFO of the NLSA, the focus now is to maintain this status.

“This unqualified audit outcome is a significant milestone for the NLSA and reflects the collective effort of our staff and management. Our priority now is to sustain these improvements and strengthen our controls,” Tlali said.

To do so, different units had to examine their processes, respond to audit findings, improve documentation and ensure that controls were operating effectively.

This process required closer attention to controls, reconciliations, records, approvals, reporting and compliance, as well as greater collaboration between financial and operational teams.

According to the NLSA, a good audit outcome should not be viewed simply as a favourable annual result. Instead, it should be seen as evidence that the organisation has established systems that can withstand scrutiny and support responsible decision-making throughout the year.

One of the most significant areas of institutional work has been managing and accounting for the NLSA’s documentary heritage assets in accordance with GRAP 103 – Heritage Assets.

The NLSA has extensive collections of national significance, making accurate asset information and effective controls particularly important.

Appointing a dedicated Heritage Asset Manager strengthened the organisation’s capacity in this area and provided focused attention to asset records, verification, valuation, documentation and related controls.

This work required co-operation between different professional and operational areas of the NLSA.

Finance, Heritage and Knowledge, Supply Chain Management, Human Resources, ICT, and Facilities all played distinct roles in strengthening the institution’s control environment.

Strengthening heritage asset management is one important example of how financial management and operational expertise must work together.

Senior Manager for Communications and Stakeholder Relations, Jolene Bhadais, said for such an institution, sound financial management is not an administrative exercise in isolation; rather, it underpins the responsible use of public resources and the effective delivery of the NLSA’s mandate.

“The NLSA recognises that the unqualified audit outcome should not create complacency. The real test will be whether the NLSA can maintain and improve upon the result in future audit cycles. Plans are already in place to sustain the improvements, strengthen preventative controls, improve processes and address emerging risks,” Bhadais said.

“The organisation must also continue ensuring that policies and procedures are understood and consistently applied across both campuses. The objective is to make compliance and accountability part of the NLSA’s everyday institutional culture, rather than activities that intensify only during the audit period.”

She added that the result belongs to the entire NLSA management and staff in Pretoria and Cape Town, finance and operations, and professional and support services, showing the value of bringing people together around a shared institutional objective.

The NLSA is a national public entity of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture. It is responsible for access to knowledge, reading and literacy promotion, research support and the management of South Africa’s documentary heritage.

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