Government

These are the biggest money wasters in government

Staff Writer

 ·22 Nov 2018

The Auditor General of South Africa has published his annual audit outcomes report, showing how the country’s government entities have racked up a wasteful and irregular expenditure bill exceeding R51 billion.

This figure doesn’t include South Africa’s two biggest money wasters – Eskom and Transnet – which have amassed a combined R28 billion. Both companies have their auditing done by private firms.

As part of the Auditor General’s report, a spreadsheet with all the audit outcomes was also released, showing the values attached to wasteful and irregular expenditure across hundreds of government entities.

According to the AG, the departments of education, health and public works that are responsible for just over half of the departmental budgets and for implementing key programmes to improve the health and welfare of citizens, continued to have the poorest outcomes of all departments.

“The financial health of the provincial departments of health and education needs urgent intervention to prevent the collapse of these key service delivery departments. In comparison with other departments, these sectors were in a bad state,” the Auditor General said.

The unauthorised expenditure by provincial education departments stood at almost R1 billion and the deficit incurred by the Eastern Cape department alone was R1.7 billion.

The Free State department was in a particularly vulnerable position, having already spent 78% of its 2018-19 operating expenditure budget in 2017-18.

Looking at the data provided by the AG, combined – across all education and health audits – irregular expenditure exceeded R3.8 billion and R5 billion for each department, respectively.

It is also clear that water and sanitation is failing to keep a lid on its rampant spending.

The tables below outline the worst culprits when it comes to unauthorised, irregular and wasteful spending – including which are the worst when taking all three categories combined.

Unauthorised expenditure

This is expenditure that results in overspending of a budget vote or expenditure that is made not in accordance with the purpose of a budget vote. The AG’s data shows that unauthorised spending totalled R2.12 billion across all audits.

The worst 10 culprits – which account for 97% of this total – are listed below.

* Combination of multiple data entries

Irregular expenditure

The AG’s data showed that irregular expenditure totalled R74.4 billion across all audits.

The worst 10 culprits – which account for 66% of this total – are listed below.

* Combination of multiple data entries

Fruitless and Wasteful expenditure

Fruitless and wasteful expenditure is expenditure which was made in vain and would have been avoided had reasonable care been exercised. The AG’s data showed that wasteful spending totalled R2.6 billion across all audits.

The worst 10 culprits – which account for 85% of this total – are listed below.

* Combination of multiple data entries

Biggest wasters

The worst 10 culprits – which account for 71% of this total – are listed below.

* Combination of multiple data entries

Read: Government departments rack up R51 billion in irregular expenditure