Cape Town to write off cash irregularly spent on De Lille’s security gates

Money irregularly spent on security upgrades at Patricia de Lille’s home is set to be written off by the City of Cape Town.

A report to Thursday’s council meeting says R140‚140 spent on Trellidor security gates at the mayor’s home in Pinelands should be “ratified as irrecoverable as the goods were received and services rendered and no one person could be assigned blame as there were many roleplayers”.

The security gates were installed after De Lille made alterations to her home in 2017.

The Auditor General said in June that the expenditure was irregular because it was incurred without an updated threat and risk analysis by the police. He said the council had broken municipal supply chain management regulations and failed to comply with the Remuneration of Public Office Bearers Act.

The municipal public accounts committee set up a task team to investigate the security gate affair. It found there was no negligence and no one had been enriched as a result of the irregular expenditure. But it said the errors could have been avoided if the council legal services department had been consulted.

Council probity manager Lindiwe Ndaba said: “Using an old SAPS threat and risk analysis is a control failure.”

The task team concluded: “No single person could be assigned blame as there were a number of roleplayers with devolved functions‚ outdated processes and legal interpretation challenges.”

It said the council supply chain management policy had now been updated‚ and a new checklist included "a confirmation by line departments that all other non-supply chain management legislation had been complied with”.

Meanwhile‚ the policy on councillors’ security is under review.

A year ago‚ the ANC’s Dullah Omar region lodged a criminal complaint against De Lille over the security upgrades.