While the rest of South Africa’s metros are caught in a storm of financial mismanagement, the City of Cape Town has once again emerged as the only one to keep its books spotless.
The Auditor-General’s latest findings for the 2024/25 financial year revealed that Cape Town is the only metropolitan municipality in the country to earn a clean audit, an honour it’s now held for three straight years.
Auditor-General Tsakani Maluleke released the report in Parliament, where she took aim at the shocking state of local governance nationwide.
Only 41 of South Africa’s 257 municipalities met the standard for a clean audit. Among the country’s eight major metros, Cape Town stood alone.
Maluleke didn’t mince her words, expressing disbelief that the country’s biggest cities, despite their resources, continue to flounder when it comes to basic financial controls.
‘These metros handle nearly half of all local government spending and serve almost half the population. They sit in the heart of the economy and should have no trouble attracting skilled professionals,’ she said.
Yet most of them failed to even meet fundamental accounting benchmarks, as reported by BusinessTech.
According to the report, municipalities collectively spent close to R1.5 billion on consultants to help them prepare financial statements. Despite that, 103 of them still submitted documents full of elementary errors.
Johannesburg, South Africa’s largest city and financial capital, was among those singled out for providing substandard financial statements at the beginning of the audit process.
Maluleke said there was no excuse for this level of incompetence, especially in metros with the budgets and capacity to do better. The report flagged widespread non-compliance with legislation, ongoing conflicts of interest, and massive irregular expenditures, totalling more than R33 billion since 2021.
Worryingly, many municipalities failed to act on previous audit findings or to monitor progress on improvement plans.
‘The lack of follow-through shows a serious failure in leadership and accountability,’ Maluleke said.
The report also warned of a growing collapse of internal controls across the majority of metros, something that directly affects service delivery and governance at local levels.
In the midst of this, Cape Town’s consistent performance has set it apart. The city has maintained transparency, solid financial systems, and strong institutional discipline, something none of the other metros could replicate.
With the rest of the country’s cities grappling with corruption, poor oversight, and mismanagement, Cape Town’s clean track record doesn’t just stand out, but it exposes the failures of the others.
Also read:
Update: Police shoot and kill prime suspect in Olorato Mongale murder in KZN
Picture: Gallo Images
