ActionSA has urged Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta), Velenkosini Hlabisa, to establish independent disciplinary boards to address widespread dysfunction and mismanagement in municipalities.
ActionSA Member of Parliament Alan Beesley said this is to promote accountability and transparency.
Beesley highlighted the need for consequence management at local government level. He said the failure to enforce accountability has allowed a culture of zero consequences to persist, ultimately depriving South Africans of basic services.
“This urgent call follows a briefing by the Auditor-General (AG) to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) in Parliament on Wednesday regarding municipalities that have failed to submit their annual financial statements,” Beesley stated.
In breach of the Municipal Finance Management Act
As of January 2025, he said, 10 municipalities across the Free State, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape, North West, and KwaZulu-Natal were in breach of the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA).
Mafube Municipality and the Thaba Chweu Local Economic Development Agency have yet to submit their financial statements for the year ending March 31 2024.
Beesley questioned why both National and Provincial Cogta had not stepped in to rectify the situation.
No consequences
“Serious questions must be asked about the failure of both national and provincial Cogta to intervene in this debacle. Despite clear evidence of non-compliance, these departments have failed to take meaningful action. Thus allowing financial mismanagement and service delivery failures to persist,” said Beesley.
He said the AG’s report confirmed material findings in predetermined service delivery objectives. This for all the municipalities listed, except Matjhabeng Municipality.
However, in most of these municipalities, service delivery has “all but collapsed. And this has left residents without essential services”.
Self-preservation to blame
Beesley pointed to a deep-rooted culture of self-preservation among municipal leadership as a major barrier to accountability.
“One of the core reasons behind the lack of consequence management is that many in leadership have their own ‘skeletons in the closet’, making them unwilling to hold others accountable. This widespread culture of self-preservation must be dismantled,” he said.
“Those responsible for financial mismanagement must face real consequences. Without accountability, corruption and incompetence will persist unchecked.”
