Deputy Public Protector (PP) Advocate Kholeka Gcaleka on Tuesday warned Gauteng local government authorities that submitting to accountability processes was not optional, calling for their cooperation with investigations.

The Office of the PP is currently investigating 173 service delivery and conduct failure complaints against ten municipalities in Gauteng: 86 complaints are against the Tshwane metropolitan municipality, 36 against Ekurhuleni metropolitan municipality and 30 against the City of Johannesburg metropolitan municipality.

Gcaleka was addressing a virtual strategic session, where she complained that some municipalities in the province tend to cancel crucial scheduled meetings and Alternative Dispute Resolution sittings at the eleventh hour, causing disruptions to investigations.

“Others had the penchant to take extraordinarily long to respond to investigators’ enquiries, submitted responses that were scant on detail and were worrying poor at record-keeping. The latter problem was more prevalent at municipalities that were under administration and those that had been amalgamated,” she added.

Over the last four years, the Public Protector has issued 17 formal investigation reports against Gauteng municipalities, covering issues such as improper awarding of contracts, irregular appointments, illegal occupations of RDP houses owing to improper management of allocation processes, amongst others.

The implementation of remedial action remains outstanding in nine of the 17 reports.