Tshwane receives qualified audit with more than R5bn in irregular spend

The City of Tshwane has received a qualified audit opinion with findings for the 2024/2025 financial year.

This comes as the metro’s unauthorised, irregular, fruitless, and wasteful expenditure climbed to more than R5 billion.

A qualified audit opinion means there are misstatements in the entity’s financial statements.

The Auditor-General (AG)'s report is expected to be tabled before the Tshwane council on Thursday.

A clean audit continues to be elusive for the municipality, with its last unqualified audit opinion recorded in the 2020/2021 financial year.

The latest audit report presents a mixed bag of results for the metro.

The AG commended the municipality for reducing its qualification areas from six to two. However, some historical problems continue to persist in the capital city.

The AG said the municipality currently does not have an effective system for internal control of its assets.

It noted that the municipality failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the more than R5 billion in unauthorised, irregular, fruitless, and wasteful expenditure.

Some of this was attributed to overspending on non-cash items, incurring interest on late payments, and contracts awarded without compliance with municipal legislation.

The AG’S office said it’s concerned that the City of Tshwane is not doing enough to hold its employees accountable for financial misconduct.

Speaking before the council, Xolani Zicwele from the AG’s office said there’s a lack of consequence management in the metro.

"The main concern here is that irregular, fruitless and unauthorised expenditure - the length of time they remain unaddressed negatively impacts the culture within the city, and we want to implore all role players within the accountability ecosystem, including council, to attend to this particular aspect. To aid the improvement and building of the right culture within the city."