end accounts
Andy Duffy
THE Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) has been ordered to rework its year-end accounts after the auditor general uncovered glaring errors in its figures.
The auditor general’s office, which is also investigating allegations of financial mismanagement at the organisation, told the IBA it would be futile to present its March 1996 figures to Parliament as they were so inaccurate.
An internal investigation quietly ordered by IBA councillors to pre-empt the official probe has also uncovered serious failures in financial and management controls.
The IBA was given until last weekend to rework the year-end figures -compiled by its finance department and consultants Dlamini & Ngidi – and was due to present them this week.
Deputy auditor general Bertie Loots said his auditors had not found any “skulduggery” in the IBA’s finances. But the errors were rudimentary, and the reporting performance was well below that expected from an organisation commanding so much public money. The IBA’s annual budget is R37- million.
Loots said his officials also found the IBA had weak expenditure and credit controls, and it had failed to balance various accounts. The auditor general’s office made similar complaints when it signed off the IBA’s accounts for the year to March 1995.
The reworked figures will be included in the investigation into the mismanagement allegations, where the auditor general is liaising with the public protector. A full report is expected late next month, Loots said.
The findings raise fresh concerns about the IBA’s finance controls – an issue at the root of staff allegations against senior IBA officials.
The council’s own internal inquiry has found the IBA has no clear policy on its councillors’ credit cards – central to the public protector’s probe – and incomplete records for its travel account. The IBA cannot trace flights and other travel which have cost it R250 000, organised by former travel agent Leading Tours.
The inquiry, started 10 days ago, is being undertaken by public relations consultant Patrick Weech. His findings will also be presented to the auditor general and to the public protector.
IBA representative Amos Vilakazi blames the finance department’s performance on its high staff turnover. It has lost three heads in the past 11 months, and current head of department Thandi Sodaba leaves at the end of this month after a three-month stint.
Vilakazi said the IBA was also not happy with Dlamini & Ngidi, who were paid R33 000 a month for six months’ work, according to documents with the public protector.
IBA co-chair Peter de Klerk, who is among those singled out by staff, said councillors had raised the department’s performance with chief executive Harris Gxaweni, which led to the departures of Sodaba’s predecessors. “Gxaweni is accountable for whom he appoints,” De Klerk said. “Of course we came down on him.”
Vilakazi said Gxaweni appointed Sodaba on a three-month contract to avoid the lengthy process of finding a new finance head. Sodaba can apply for the position permanently, but has not.
Sodaba has experience in the Eastern Cape public sector, but is not a qualified accountant. He has known Gxaweni for seven years and lives with him in Johannesburg.
De Klerk did not know Sodaba was leaving. He said he thought the three months was merely a standard probationary period.
Weech refused to comment this week, but sources say he has been asked to go through each of the allegations, in many cases ascertaining whether the IBA has a relevant policy.
Weech has found the IBA has no policy, for example, on whether it should pay its senior officials’ cellphone accounts. It paid R2 840,71 for Gxa-weni’s cellphone bill in September; many of the calls were to the Transkei, his home.
Questions have also been raised about expenses from a 1994 trip to Japan, attended by co-chairs Sebiletso Mokone-Matabane and De Klerk, and councillors John Matisonn and Lyndall Shope-Mafole.
The inquiry is checking whether the councillors, who received advance expenses for the trip, used the IBA’s Diner’s Club credit card on top of claiming daily per diem allowances. So far, only one of the four, believed to be Matisonn, has provided full documentation for the claims.
Documents show Shope-Mafole approved the cheque for the R8 790 claimed by Mokone- Matabane for the trip. Gxaweni approved the R16 758,21 claimed by Shope-Mafole.
The organisation’s staff have been ordered to co-operate fully with Weech, and provide any documentation he requests.
Matisonn refused to comment, but other sources said it would not be surprising to see him leave the IBA before the end of his remaining 16 months with the organisation.