South African parliament accounts qualified
Third successive qualified report
The ability of the South African parliament to properly manage its money has
been questioned after its accounts were qualified for the third successive year.
The 2005-06 accounts were qualified by auditor-general Shauket Fakie, who
said parliament failed to meet the required financial standards.
According to Fakie , the major weakness in Parliament’s financial statements
related to asset management.
‘Assets included in the asset register amounting to R2.9m (£200,000) could
not be physically verified due to incomplete details reflected on the asset
register,’ he said.
Furthermore, there was no evidence that staff performance evaluations had been
undertaken, the debt- recovery policy was deficient and no risk-management
policy was submitted for audit, Business Day reported.
The government opposition leapt on the news with Democratic Alliance chief
whip Douglas Gibson calling for action to be taken against the secretary to
parliament, Zingile Dingane, and its audit committee for their failure to
properly manage public money.