The Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) and the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) on Wednesday called on the City of Matlosana and Ditsobotla Local Municipality to move beyond corrective plans and demonstrate measurable improvement in governance, financial management and service delivery.
This call follows a joint oversight engagement with the two North West municipalities to assess their progress on matters the committees have previously raised through parliamentary oversight, audit findings and investigations. Both municipalities were among the 69 municipalities whose July 2026 equitable share transfers were temporarily withheld by National Treasury as part of measures to enforce financial discipline.
Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on COGTA, Dr Zweli Mkhize, said Parliament’s focus is now on whether corrective measures are producing results. “What we now require is a report that demonstrates the impact of all the actions that are being taken,” he said.
The committees acknowledged the efforts of the Matlosana municipality to act on the concerns they raised previously but stressed that the municipality must now show that interventions are improving conditions in communities. The committees directed the municipality’s leadership to provide them with updated and properly reconciled information on outstanding creditor obligations and payment arrangements with Eskom and Midvaal Water. This report must also outline the interest charges on the outstanding debt and whether debt-relief arrangements are making a difference. The committees also want to see evidence of improvement in revenue collection and the resolution of unauthorised, irregular, fruitless and wasteful expenditure (UIFWE), procurement and contract management.
The leadership of Matlosana must further provide a report on sewage and water pollution, road maintenance and other service-delivery concerns, as well as outstanding discrepancies relating to infrastructure projects. The committees stated that they want to see actions taken against officials or politicians implicated in wrongdoing.
Another area of concern for the committees was Matlosana’s reliance on consultants. Dr Mkhize indicated that the committees would like to receive from Matlosana a valid strategy to develop its internal capacity as opposed to outsourcing services that fall under the purview of Matlosana’s administration. The 2024/25 municipal audit outcomes indicated that 225 of 257 municipalities used consultants to prepare their financial statements at a total cost of approximately R1.6 billion.
Ditsobotla has received disclaimer audit opinions for over ten years and is now subject to a national intervention in accordance with Section 139(7) due to ongoing failures related to governance, financial instability and failure to deliver services. The municipality is required to submit to Parliament a time-bound financial recovery plan, a programme to end the disclaimer audit outcome, an analysis of its debtor’s book and a clearly defined programme to process and reduce the UIFWE. The analysis submitted by the municipality is expected to identify which funds are recoverable and irrecoverable. It must also explain how revenue collection will be enhanced.
The committees directed the municipality to provide a consolidated report on all investigations into allegations of impropriety, including procurement irregularities, which are currently being investigated. The report should indicate which cases have been referred for prosecution or to the Special Investigating Unit for investigation, their status as well as all the disciplinary actions that have been taken so far.
The committees agreed that the municipalities must share reports every quarter to all the relevant national, provincial and executive structures tasked with local government. This will enable all oversight structures to monitor the corrective programmes and their compliance with set performance indicators. “No municipality can turn around on its own. We have to do it together,” said Dr Mkhize.
“Parliament will not measure progress in terms of plans drawn up or the number of meetings convened but in terms of achievements on the ground,” he said. In the case of Matlosana, this means revenue collection must be improved, UIFW expenditure must be brought under control and there must be visible improvements in services such as water, sanitation and roads. As for Ditsobotla, it means improved governance as well as turnaround in financial management, by sanctioning those found guilty of wrongdoing and finally putting an end to the disclaimer audit.
The Chairperson of SCOPA, Mr Songezo Zibi, agreed and said that the joint oversight should ensure that findings and investigations lead to action. “This joint oversight must ensure that we close the loop between audit findings, investigations and consequence management. We cannot in future continue to have poor audit findings and our communities suffering with no action being taken. The committees will be looking into this matter, and we expect to see improvement in audit findings, internal control systems and service delivery,” said Mr Zibi. “The committees will track these commitments, and we expect measurable improvement in audit outcomes, financial controls and service delivery.”
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