Auditor general of South Africa (AGSA) as an oversight body in local government sphere

Abstract

The Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) has a constitutional mandate as the country's Supreme Audit Institution (SAI), and it strengthens democracy by providing monitoring, accountability, and governance in the public sector through auditing, hence increasing public trust. The AGSA, throughout the years, has been auditing municipalities throughout South Africa and giving them audit outcomes with the hope that the financial management and reporting in the local government sphere will improve. Unfortunately, the local government sphere in South Africa has worsened over the years, even though the AGSA has provided them with reports that speculate what is working and what is not working within the sphere, especially regarding the issues of using state funds. This paper examines the root causes of poor audit outcomes and proposes strategies the local government can implement to improve their audit outcomes. This paper will use a qualitative approach to review current literature and MFMA reports from 2014 to 2021 from the AGSA to meet its objectives and answer the research problem. The authors agree that AGSA has done outstanding work as an oversight and accountability enabler in the Local Government sphere and that the recent material irregularity process, which was implemented as an enforcement tool to compel municipal managers to take action, is making progress towards ensuring that AGSA fulfils its constitutional mandate as the Supreme Audit Institution (SAI).