Nelson Mandela Bay’s financial oversight committee and the city’s administration are locked in a standoff over the failure of senior officials to submit crucial reports for scrutiny.
Municipal public accounts committee (Mpac) chair Luxolo Namette has taken aim at the city manager’s office, saying its failure to present the documents was causing meetings to be cancelled and stalling investigations.
The simmering dispute came to a head on Tuesday when an Mpac meeting was abruptly cancelled, despite being listed on the city’s official calendar.
In a letter to committee members, Namette said despite a council resolution in December requiring Mpac to receive reports for scrutiny, none had been submitted.
“The office waited in vain with the secretariat reporting that there are no reports that have been referred to their office from the city manager’s office per the resolution of the December 9 meeting.”
Namette said an email was sent to former acting city manager Lonwabo Ngoqo two months ago, advising that a meeting scheduled for April 7 was unlikely to proceed due to the absence of reports and requesting clarity on the cause of the delay.
“There was no response to this email,” he said.
“On April 9, after establishing from the secretariat that there are still no reports submitted, the office wrote to the city manager again, seeking clarity on why there are still no reports submitted while the next scheduled meeting was on April 16.
“No response was received on this email as well.
“On May 26, another email was written to the city manager registering the frustration they are putting this office under due to non-submission of reports to the secretariat despite committing to do so.
“The chair then requested an urgent meeting with the city manager.”
The meeting took place on May 28.
“It was established that there are eight reports that were submitted to the city manager’s office but still had to go for final vetting to the technical committee.
“On June 1, those reports were declared ready for interrogation at Mpac, but they were late for the scheduled meeting of June 2,” Namette wrote.
On Wednesday, Namette told The Herald he suspected “foul play”.
“Based on my analysis, officials are dragging their feet in submitting the Section 32 documents.
“You can see there’s an element of foul play. I’ve exhausted all steps and am taking this to the council.
“I’m busy drafting a motion that will go to council and for council to take a decision based on the fact that there are directorates that don’t want to submit Section 32 reports.”
Section 32 of the Municipal Finance Management Act governs the handling and recovery of unauthorised, irregular, or fruitless and wasteful expenditure in municipalities.
It mandates municipalities to recover these improperly spent funds directly from the liable officials unless formally written off or authorised by the council.
The metro’s unauthorised, irregular, or fruitless and wasteful expenditure stands at more than R30bn, the highest among SA municipalities.
Namette said councillors had, on more than one occasion, raised concerns about outstanding documents required by Mpac, meetings that failed to proceed, and officials not attending scheduled sittings.
The metro’s ballooning irregular expenditure has been repeatedly flagged by the auditor-general and National Treasury.
Namette said the failure by officials to submit documents should be treated as an offence.
“This means you’re hiding information of the institution, and that is equal to non-accountability, and those who don’t want to submit reports should be charged.
“Mpac has bite, but the person who’s supposed to implement it is the accounting officer.
“Mpac can only give an instruction, and the person who’s meant to carry the instruction is the accounting officer.
“But you know the problem we have. We’ve [had a succession of acting city managers] who have weakened that office,” Namette said.
Bay city manager Noxolo Nqwazi has been on suspension since 2024. Six senior officials having acted in the position since then.
Municipal spokesperson Sithembiso Soyaya referred questions to Namette.
ACDP councillor Lance Grootboom said Mpac was collapsing and that this was not caused by councillors but by the administration.
“The administration’s inability to produce these reports that have to come to us.
“We have a lot that still has to be processed, and National Treasury gave us timelines and percentages that we should finalise.
“Mpac can’t investigate if the reports are not forthcoming, so we did inform the chair to engage with the city manager and inform the city manager that she should take action against directors that are failing to submit reports.
“That’s why we encourage the chair to call an urgent meeting on June 15, so that we can debate these issues, because it is unacceptable that the city is known as the highest for [unauthorised, irregular, or fruitless and wasteful expenditure] in the country, and we are unable to process it because some departments don’t want to send the stuff.”
Grootboom said Mpac last had an ordinary meeting, to discuss the 2024/2025 annual report, at the beginning of January.
DA councillor Gert Engelbrecht said: “The city manager needs to take accountability and force the directorates to bring through items.”
EFF councillor Siya Mosi accused officials of not taking Mpac seriously.
“We have done almost everything.
“We have interacted with the [previous] acting city manager [Lonwabo Ngoqo]. We are yet to engage with the current one, Charity Sihunu.
“We need intervention. We are ready to avail ourselves,” Mosi said.
Sihunu’s brief secondment to Nelson Mandela Bay as acting city manager is expected to end on June 8.
Follow The Herald WhatsApp channel today and stay connected to the stories shaping our world.
The Herald
