MEDIA RELEASE Municipal Public Accounts Committee have failed the Metro Council and the ratepayers of this city 02 October 2008
Municipal Public Accounts Committee have failed the Metro Council and the ratepayers of this city
The
initial enthusiasm when the MPAC was launched about a year ago has
unfortunately turned into despair, when the Committee had to vote on
the oversight report – whether to accept the oversight report with or
without reservation.
A number of important flaws in the initial setting up of the Committee, which the ACDP pointed out at the time, are: • The
ANC elected to appoint a chairman from their ranks, instead of
appointing an unbiased, objective chairman who can take the officials
to task. Parliament's SCOPA is chaired by an opposition party
member. • The ANC chose to keep their
seat, indicating from the outset that the Committee was going to be
politically driven. • The committee does not have a budget to launch independent investigations.
When
we got to the point to adopt the oversight report in the committee, it
came to a vote – the opposition parties in the Committee believed that
the report had to be accepted with reservation, whereas the ANC felt
that it should be accepted without reservation.
We have failed this Council and we have failed the ratepayers of this city. We are unfortunately wasting our time on MPAC and call for a fundamental review of the structure of the Committee.
The ACDP voted against the recommendations of the report.
For more information contact Richard Dinkelmann ACDP Councillor Tshwane Metro 083 263 2664