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Treasury releases Q2 report on local govt revenue and expenditure

Source: South African government National Treasury (NT) has released the local government revenue and expenditure report for the second quarter of the 2023/24 financial year. The report, which applies to the second quarter of the municipal financial year ending on 31 December 2023, covers the performance against the adopted budgets of local government and includes Read more >

AG offers little comfort to long-suffering municipal residents

By Kwazi Dlamini Lack of accountability in local government continues to impede on service delivery and leads to the deterioration of municipalities, says Auditor-General (AG) Tsakani Maluleke in her recently released  2021/2022 audit outcomes of the Municipal Finance Management Act. Reporting to Parliament on 31 May 2023, Maluleke said that most municipalities are struggling to Read more >

Ditsobotla is a symptom of SA’s ignored local govt problem

The local municipality of Ditsobotla in the North West’s Ngaka Modiri Molema District has made news headlines over the past few months for the wrong reasons. From being placed under administration in September 2022, to its financial challenges leading to failure in paying contract workers’ salaries – the latter problem led to said workers invading Read more >

MSAA: An Act in good faith, but will it work?

President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the long-awaited Municipal Systems Amendment Act (MSAA) into law on 19 August – an important legislative change in the administrative management of local government. The Act seeks to regularise the appointment and performance of municipal managers and the decision-makers around them to ensure cleaner local administrations.   But while political agendas Read more >

Auditor-General: 2020-2021 MFMA outcomes show continuing decline

Capable leaders should demonstrate change by strengthening transparency and accountability. This is the call from Auditor-General (AG) Tsakani Maluleke, who earlier today tabled the 2020-21 Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA) audit outcomes in the National Assembly. The usual five-year comparison period encompasses the entirety of the administration that took office in 2016, with local government Read more >

Auditor-general: local government on the brink of collapse

By Kwazi Dlamini Auditor-General (AG) Tsakani Maluleke has called on leadership at both political and administrative level to make a determined commitment to tackling the scourge of corruption and irregular expenditure in local government. The consequences will be dire otherwise. Delivering her consolidated annual Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA) report on local government for the Read more >

Municipalities avoid explaining irregular procurement

In part two of our local municipality mini-series, we describe investigations relating to some municipalities which were reported to us for irregular procurement processes. Part one dealt with the 2019 Government Performance Index, released recently by Good Governance Africa. Corruption Watch gets most of its reports from people wanting to expose corruption in provincial government Read more >