COPE, DA Calls for Administrative Systems Upgrade Following R128 Million Corruption Saga

• The Democratic Alliance and the Congress of the People in Polokwane called for the municipality to upgrade its administrative system
• This was after a forensic report revealed that the municipality bled over R100 million in excessive overtime, ghost employees and employees with multiple positions
• The DA and COPE spoke to Briefly News and lamented that Polokwane still uses an outdated manual system for its administration

With over seven years at Daily Sun and Vutivi Business News, Tebogo Mokwena, a Briefly News current affairs journalist, offered insights into South African politics, national, provincial and local governance, the Government of National Unity, political parties and Parliament.

POLOKWANE—Opposition parties in the Polokwane Municipality have called for an urgent upgrade to the administration system after over R100 million was leaked through the state coffers due to maladministration. They also called for the municipality to take stern action against those implicated in the corruption.

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Opposition slams outdated system

Briefly News spoke to the Democratic Alliance and the Congress of the People in the city after a forensic report revealed that the city lost R128 million to workers excessively applying for overtime, ghost workers and employees with more than one position. The DA's Jacques Joubert told Briefly News that the Auditor General raised issues of poor record keeping and internal control

Maladministration nightmare: DA

Joubert said that the biggest concerns with the ghost employees were that physical verifications of employees were not conducted, the SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) systems have not functioned since 2010, and the municipality has a manual system for overtime and no proper record-keeping for leave approval.

"There was abuse of these poor control measures on all fronts. The problem all boils down to poor management and poor political will to adequately address these issues," he told Briefly News.

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Upgrade is needed

COPE's Erick Mohlapamaswi told Briefly News that an upgrade is urgently needed. He slammed the City for being stuck with the manual administrative system even though it aspires to be a metro city. He also called for disciplinary action to be instituted and brought before the law.

"The Polokwane Municipality must employ an electronic administrative system linked with the Department of Home Affairs for ease of verification of employees. The use of artificial systems will end the duplication of payments and eliminate the Ghostgate scandal," he said.

Joubert said the municipality must implement an electronic system with payroll software and proper oversight and monitoring mechanisms.

Implement report's recommendations: DA

Joubert also said the municipality should implement the Bowman Gilfillan Forensic Report's recommendations. This will reduce the re-occurrence of the systemic issues and the potential further deterioration of financial control measures.

"If this is not done, it will have a further massive impact on service delivery," he said.

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SIU investigates 1200 ghost PRASA employees

In a related article, Briefly News reported that the Special Investigating Unit announced that it was investigating 1200 ghost employees at the State-Owned Entity Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA).

President Cyril Ramaphosa's proclamation gave the SIU the power to probe the ghost employees. This is after 1000 employees disappeared from the payroll after PRASA launched an earlier internal investigation.

Source: Briefly News