R1.3-billion worth of procurement could not be audited

The Auditor-General was unable to audit procurement worth R1.3-billion due to missing or incomplete information at 52 municipalities.

These municipalities made up 22% of the municipalities audited for the 2016/17 financial year.

Most of this procurement was in Gauteng where R830-million worth of procurement could not be audited. Gauteng was followed by North West with R155-million and Mpumalanga with R106-million worth of procurement.

In his report released in Cape Town on Wednesday‚ Auditor-General Kimi Makwetu highlighted that at 22 municipalities‚ tenders worth R7.92-million were given to councillors. The values of these tenders ranged from R4‚200 to R4.07-million per councillor.

At 26 municipalities‚ officials awarded tenders to close family members and this was not disclosed in financial statements as required.

Auditors found that there was uncompetitive and unfair procurement processes used by municipalities.

Some of the issues the auditors found included: 

• three quotations were not invited; 
• competitive bidding not invited; 
• preference point system not applied or incorrectly applied; 
• declaration of interest not submitted; 
• performance of contractors not monitored on a monthly basis; 
• tax affairs of the suppliers appointed were not in order; and 
• inadequate contract performance measures and monitoring.

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