As part of our continued efforts in relationship-building with key players in our Dolphin Coast area, DOCRRA has been in communication with the senior manager of the Auditor General (AG) who is responsible for both the KwaDukuza and iLembe district municipality audits. The AG is obliged to investigate all matters reported to him/her and respond on such matters. We raised an issue with the AG regarding fleet management in the 2021 KDM audit wherein several deficiencies were found and reported on in the audit report.
The final audit for the June 2022 year is about to commence, and on 16 August 2022, we met with the AG again to raise issues relating to Unauthorised, Irregular, Fruitless and Wasteful expenditure, known as UIFW. Our focus was specific expenditure items as well as inquiring as to whether the Municipal Public Accounts Committee (MPAC) properly investigates those expenditures.
As residents, we have little to no transparency about how these are investigated by MPAC. We also noted, that in the past number of years, there has been no fruitless or wasteful expenditure identified, which seems odd and unusual. Unauthorised and irregular expenditure are items that may be written off by MPAC whereas fruitless or wasteful expenditure must be repaid by the official(s) responsible. We are hopeful there is specific focus on this, and feedback will follow to give us confidence of the process.
In addition to the concerns about UIFW, we also asked the AG to review several other projects and report back to us on items from last year.
We are grateful for this relationship with the senior manager of the AG and for the opportunity to openly discuss areas of concern.
For more information, please contact us on admin@docrra.co.za.
