DEAR Editor,-
Your story entitled ‘Audit not clean’, which appeared on the front page of the South Coast Herald dated January 31 bears reference.
Whilst the municipality respects the editorial independence of any publication, we also believe that media houses should observe the principles of objectivity and fairness in their reporting, which was sadly lacking in your report.
It would be proper for me to move from the premise that says an audit opinion may be categorised as adverse, qualified, unqualified with matters of emphasis or unqualified with no matters. The former two represent a situation where the Auditor- General finds that financial statements are not accurate, or there is no proper record to form an opinion upon.
The latter two represent a finding that the financial statements of an organisation have been properly captured according to accounting standards, and the Auditor- General is satisfied that regulations of treasury and related prescripts have been met.
What differentiates the two however is that where there are matters of emphasis, the Auditor-General will draw the attention of the organisation to those issues, which must be rectified before an unqualified report with no matters of emphasis can be issued.
The other possible scenario is when the Auditor-General issues a disclaimer and this is when Auditor General is unable to express the opinion on the financial position because he could not complete examinations or assessments of financial records due to discrepancies or records that were not available for auditing purposes.
The Hibiscus Coast Municipality has been consistently working towards receiving an unqualified audit opinion with no matters of emphasis. To this end there are clear systems which have been put in place to achieve this, and Irene Samson from the Auditor- General’s office affirmed this in her presentation to Council.
She is on record acknowledging that there has been noticeable improvement in our performance over the years, and we are not sure how the Herald came to the position that her remarks were to the contrary. In fact, when Her Worship, the Mayor Councillor Nomusa Mqwebu made the remark that is quoted in the same article, she was merely reiterating what Ms Samson had said herself.
Whilst the matters which have been quoted by your newspaper remain a challenge, their extent has been reduced in most instances. The municipal manager has been on record to say that whilst the municipality faces some challenges, but is on course to deal with them.
The transformation is taking place, but it must be appreciated that it is a process, not an event. We are confident that we remain on course to achieve our objective of an unqualified audit opinion with no matter of emphasis for the current financial year and beyond.
SIMON M SOBOYISA
Hibiscus Coast Municipality spokesman
