A bark, but no bite

26 November 2015 - 02:38 By Penwell Dlamini and Graeme Hosken

"My hands are tied, there is not much I can do," Auditor-General Kimi Makwetu said when he presented his report on the finances of provincial and national government departments yesterday. Makwetu said that, for the entire state machinery to perform better "the big three" sectors had to be fixed. These are education, health and public works, both at provincial and national levels, together with their entities.The big three have 30 entities that are audited and took 37% (more than R411-billion) of the R1.1-trillion spent in the 2014-2015 financial year. A total of 468 entities were audited.Only three of the 30 entities obtained a clean audit and 11 received a qualified audit opinion.In the reporting period, irregular expenditure decreased by 27% to R25.7-billion. Fruitless and wasteful expenditure declined from R1.2-billion in the previous financial year to R936-million. Unauthorised expenditure dropped from R2.6-billion to R1.6-billion.Speaking of the sectors that he believed held the key to reducing wastage, Makwetu said: "These ought to receive priority attention because they are in areas that matter. If the governance and transparency of their financial management is as poor as it is, they have to be given much attention."Audit outcomes in education, health and public works were disappointing overall. These are the departments that [account for] the bulk of the budget. They are key in delivering on the priority programmes of the government and they are still failing to achieve financial reporting in a transparent manner."The director of the Institute for Accountability in Southern Africa, Paul Hoffman, said the constitution needed to be amended urgently to create an integrity commission, which would be a chapter nine institution, to prevent and combat corruption.He said the Hawks, which were meant to be independent, were failing in their mandate of investigating corruption and other priority crimes."The public protector and auditor-general are achieving their constitutional mandates in uncovering corruption and maladministration, but the problem comes in with the Hawks."Hoffman said the minister of police had revealed in a parliamentary response that the number of arrests had plummeted in recent years.They had decreased from 14793 in 2010-2011 to 1038 arrests between April 1 and September 11 this year."Until such time as parliament develops the political fortitude to create an anti-corruption entity such as an integrity commission that matches the scope of the activities of the auditor-general and public protector and is able to operate without fear, favour or prejudice, the culture of impunity will continue, with people breaking the rules because no one holds them to account," Hoffman said.Though Makwetu raised concerns about accountability he said this was changing.Of the 468 entities audited, 355 received an unqualified audit opinion. But he had to make corrections to 131 for them to move into a better outcome.Makwetu lamented the weak internal controls in departments and a lack of consequences for not complying with the law.But all that his office could do was to raise the red flags on things that were not going right. "I can only flag transactions. I cannot investigate the people. It is the duty of officials to investigate and take action," he said."The specific action ... we leave in the hands of respective ministries ... We are sometimes misunderstood as an investigative agency. We help those who are investigating to do their work properly."..

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