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The Democratic Alliance (DA) will use Sol Plaatje’s poor audit outcomes to guide oversight actions aimed at whipping the municipality back into shape.

Sol Plaatje once again received a Qualified audit opinion for the 2021/2022 Financial Year. This should come as no surprise to the residents of Sol Plaatje, who continuously bear the brunt of poor service delivery due to financial mismanagement and a lack of consequence management.

Water losses have increased year on year from 61.69% to 64.63%. Longstanding leaks and broken meters, reported on numerous occasions by residents and councillors, are not attended to. According to the assessment report for 2022/23, “the municipality has no maintenance plans and only responds to emergencies”.

Electricity losses have increased year on year from 26.42% to 29.69%. Poor revenue collection and streetlights burning all day are some of the causes.

The municipality is grant dependent and barely has enough funds on hand for one week’s operations. Despite promises to rectify ongoing revenue losses, the situation has worsened.

The Auditor General placed emphasis on the responsibilities of the Accounting Officer and their role in compiling the report. There are many instances where the Municipal Finance Management Act and Supply Chain Management regulations were ignored.

Reasonable steps were not taken to prevent fruitless and wasteful expenditure of over R50 million and irregular expenditure of over R150 million. Irregular expenditure was also not investigated to determine if funds could be recovered or the responsible individual held liable.

The DA has asked for deviations, as well as possible irregular debt write offs, to be referred to committees for investigation.

In addition, we will request a report on the irregular donation and sale of capital assets belonging to the municipality, without council approval. We will also call for an investigation into the conduct of the accounting officer, or officers, to assess whether further steps are needed.

As the official opposition party in Sol Plaatje, the DA will do our utmost to save this sinking ship from going under.

Issued by Chris Whittaker, Cllr - Sol Plaatje Municipality