The Gauteng Provincial Treasury has drastically reduced adverse audit findings and strengthened its capacity to implement robust accounting practices in the province, with the aim of bringing about clean government in South Africa’s economic hub.
This was revealed by Finance MEC Mandla Nkomfe when he tabled the 2012/13 annual report of Gauteng Provincial Treasury to the Legislature today. A total of eight clean audits and twenty-three unqualified audits were achieved by the provincial government in 2012/13 with no disclaimers, a significant improvement on the previous year’s audit outcomes.
“The audit outcomes show that we have done a lot since 2009 to move towards clean government. Amongst other things, we intervened decisively to effectively implement action plans to address recurring audit findings, continuously improved financial management capacity and practices, and demonstrated a strong political will to succeed through regular interactions between the Executive Council, Audit Committee Chairpersons and the Auditor-General,” Nkomfe said.
This observation is underscored by the Auditor-General’s comment that the information provided by the provincial government for annual performance audit was useful and consistent with the planned programmes. Furthermore, the information was found to be well defined, verifiable, specific, and measurable and time bound.
“This indicates a clear path towards achieving clean audits. But in order for us to realise the objective, we must do much more on key areas of internal controls and compliance with rules and regulations,” he said
The Gauteng Provincial Treasury’s intervention in the Department of Health through Section 18 of the Public Finance Management Act resulted in the achievement of a qualified audit opinion with far less findings. Also the department has not overspent its budget for the first time in years.
The presence of an Administrator to re-engineer business processes will ensure that the department is turned around with the necessary urgency to focus on fulfilling its mandate, which is the provision of efficient and effective public health services to the people of Gauteng.
2013/14 audit action plans
The Gauteng Provincial Treasury is focused on sustaining clean audits achieved, and improve audit outcomes of other departments and entities.
- Emphasis is placed on the entities to improve financial performance and audit outcomes. In this regard the Gauteng Provincial Treasury has deployed additional personnel to focus specifically on supporting and advising entities on issues of financial management;
- Active monitoring to ensure that departments implement action plans developed to address the findings arising from the 2012/13 audits;
- Assist Chief Financial Officers to improve deficiencies in the key control environment;
- Training and development of staff in the Offices of Chief Financial Officers;
- Auditing interim financial statements;
- Monthly monitoring of expenditure against budget to assist departments in anticipating unauthorised expenditure and putting measures to prevent same.
The following provincial departments received clean audits:
- Office of the Premier
- Provincial Legislature
- Provincial Treasury
- Social Development
- Sport, Arts, Culture and Recreation
The following provincial entities received clean audits:
- The Gauteng Partnership Fund
- The Gauteng Funding Agency
- The Gautrain Management Agency.
Note to editors:
- Unqualified opinion indicates the auditor’s endorsement of the accuracy and adequacy of the disclosed information and of the department’s financial picture as presented.
- Qualified opinion may indicate a limited scope of examination, or that the auditor was unable to directly verify certain information.
- Adverse opinion indicates serious problems with the audit, and can be very damaging in its effect on the department’s reputation and financial position.
