The Limpopo district municipality has received a disclaimer audit opinion from the Auditor General of South Africa (AGSA) for the second financial year in a row.
For the past 18 years since 2009, the Mopani District municipality in the Norman Mashanane region has received either a disclaimer or an adverse audit opinion from AGSA.
From 2019 to 2022, the board received one qualified audit opinion and two denials.
During last year’s provincial address, prime minister Stan Mathabatha declared Limpopo a denial province – where none of the province’s 27 municipalities will receive a denial audit opinion.
Historical findings
Speaking to The Citizen yesterday, the municipality said it was disappointed.
“We are dealing with historical findings around illegal, irregular, wasteful and fruitless expenditures, many of which date back as far as 2009,” he said immediately after the release of the audit results.
Municipal spokesperson, Odas Ngobeni said the council is committed to thoroughly investigating and addressing every finding.
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“We are busy strengthening our internal control system as well as our record management system, which has been a weakness that directly contributed to the negative audit findings,” he said.
The Council is working hard to ensure better spending and accountability in every transaction to ensure better performance in the future.
The municipality should clean it up
Speaking on behalf of the South African Local Government Association (Salga) – the state organ that governs local municipalities and districts linked to the Limpopo provincial government – the provincial chairman, John Mpe, said Salga was deeply disappointed by Mopani’s poor performance.
“We don’t expect the municipality to continue to do this, especially knowing the department of cooperative governance, human settlement and traditional affairs has been working with the municipality to improve the game.”
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Mpe said something needs to be done urgently so that the municipality receives a healthy financial record, which will speak to the services it provides.
“We must start by implementing the right system and process; select people with the right skills and experience to protect the municipal purse; take action for those who snore in the project and apply the management of consequences, as suggested by the AG.
“We also need to ensure that we can improve people’s skills through proper training, and ensure accountability for every cent we spend.”
Mpe also advises municipalities that still outsource services to ensure that there is a transfer of skills from service providers to municipal officials. This, he said, would reduce the use of consultants, who do work that could be done by officials.
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He praised the Waterberg and Capricorn district municipalities for doing well in their audits, calling them “the cream of Limpopo”.
“Both municipalities received a clean audit opinion in the 2021-22 financial year.”