The Auditor General (AG) has withheld an opinion on the 2010/11 financial statements of the Free State’s newly-established Mangaung metro municipality.
“I have not been able to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to provide a basis for an audit opinion,” the AG said in a report that was before the Mangaung metro council on Monday.
Mangaung spokesman Qondile Khedama said the city had put in place all the necessary systems to stop the spread of “non-adherence” with its financial system.
“We are busy strengthening our finance department with particular emphasis to supply chain” he said on Tuesday.
The AG report indicated irregular expenditure of R148,765,509
and R108,427,595 which occurred in the current and previous financial years mainly because of contracts awarded to suppliers without authorisation.
Money spent, but not budgeted for, came to R67,711,892 for the 2010/11 financial year.
Answers were also still outstanding on investigations into previous unauthorised expenditures of R466,793,278 by June 30 last year.
Khedama said the city management would study the audit report and advise the council on corrective measures.
Democratic Alliance councillor Werner Horn said the AG’s refusal of an opinion was a indication of the ANC’s bad management style, money wasting practices and even possible corruption.
Horn said executive mayor Thabo Manyoni and newly-appointed municipal manager Lindiwe Mazibuko would have to implement drastic steps to stop the squandering of public money.
The DA said the municipality’s computer and IT-system were inadequate for the job and there were no proper collection processes.
City management said the process of cleaning the customer database and its indigent registers had started.
Khedama said other parallel processes had also started with the aim of improving the integrity of the city’s billing system.
Horn said his party would make urgent recommendations to Manyoni to immediately stop all non-budgeted payments. - Sapa