Municipalities 'continue to struggle with transparency, compliance'
An expert says financial governance remains a challenge for many municipalities in the country.
On Tuesday, Auditor-General Tsakani Maluleke revealed that out of 257 municipalities, just 34 received clean financial management audit outcomes in the 2022/23 financial year.
One-hundred-and-ten municipalities received unqualified audits.
Governance expert Harlan Cloete, from the University of the Free State, says what we must do is celebrate the 110 municipalities that have improved.
"It will be important to look at whether they are sustaining that improvement and whether they are shifting the needle in terms of excellence."
She says despite various interventions, most municipalities continue to struggle with transparency, compliance, and effective service delivery.
READ: Stats SA says 2.6 million households burgled in past five years
The report revealed that about 75% of metros are still grappling with providing service delivery reports.
Cloete says consequence management can help bring about better audit outcomes.
"But it's a very important aspect. We got the institutional governance framework, it's about the application and applying that when ensuring we got better audit outcomes."
