Auditor-General blasts stingy depts

WRITER THE AUDITOR-General, Kimi Makwetu, has made a scathing finding against the government after failing to use more than R700 million to fix the backlog of access to water and building new toilets.

Makwetu said in a report on the rural household infrastructure grant that the Department of Human Settlements had over three years failed to fully use R1.2 billion to address the backlog of water access and toilets.

He said between 2010 and 2013, the department used only R501 million of the R1.2 billion allocated for this project.

But the Department of Human settlements yesterday referred all enquiries to the Department of Water and Sanitation. It said the project now fell under this portfolio.

However, the Department of Water and Sanitation did not respond to written enquiries at the time of going to print.

In his audit report on the rural household infrastructure grant Makwetu said the Department of Human Settlements did not use all of its budget on this programme.

“Between 2010 and 2013, the department budgeted R1.2 billion to eradicate the backlog of access to water and sanitation for all households by 2014. However, the department only spent R501.4 million over these three financial years,” said Makwetu.

There were a number of problems identified by Makwetu on the failure to meet this target.

He said one of the major problems was around the issue of tenders.

Some of the suppliers appointed to assist the department with its capacity problems did not meet the target.

There was also “collusive behaviour” between some of the companies appointed with people in the department, he found.

“The management consultant did not demonstrate an ability to effectively manage the rural household infrastructure programme,” Makwetu said.

He added that there were a lot of issues on non-compliance with standards.

“Limited expenditure was incurred during the first three quarters of the financial year of the project span,” he said.

“The pattern of expenditure was 100 percent during the last quarter in 2010/11, 72.6 percent in 2011/12 and 74.4 percent in 2012/13.”

“This pattern is indicative of poor planning that impacted on service delivery,” added the Auditor-General.

He said figures from Statistics South Africa showed that 2.6m houses still did not have access to sanitation.

“It was the government’s objective to eradicate this backlog of access to water and basic sanitation for all households by December 2014.”

Makwetu added that sanitation was the basic service that needed to be met.

This would improve the quality of life of the people still in need of these basic services.