The 2024/2025 financial year audit outcomes of the Eastern Cape provincial government exhibit good progress of the good governance we are continuously putting in place.
All Eastern Cape provincial government departments got unqualified audit opinions, with six departments getting clean audits.
We welcome these results, mindful that we are not yet where we want to be.
When we came into office in 2019, we had a responsibility to continue with the work of leaders who came before us by giving citizens of this province a better life.
Addressing governance, systems, control and accountability problems that beset government is key to this responsibility.
All the premiers before me, and the MECs, led and started initiatives to put in place clean and good governance systems and controls to ensure that public money was spent correctly and always accounted for.
The 2024/2025 financial year audit results show that efforts started by premiers Raymond Mhlaba, Makhenkesi Stofile, Nosimo Balindlela, Mbulelo Sogoni, Noxolo Kiviet, and Phumulo Masualle are yielding commendable results and steady progress.
Through good work done by those administrations, a foundation that anchors the good outcomes we are seeing today was laid.
Under my leadership as premier, we have carried this task, mindful of the history of our past where adverse audit findings and disclaimer audit opinions were the order of the day.
Where it was warranted, we took consequence management measures against officials whose actions led to irregular spending or wasteful, unauthorised, fruitless, and over and under expenditure, to protect the public purse.
While we are not working for clean audits alone, we celebrate these results because they are an important ingredient in building the Eastern Cape we want, a province that gives all her people a better life.
Clean audits are an outcome of stable environments where political leadership leads administrators in implementing the electoral mandate properly.
In this environment, when we say “no” to someone or something, we mean no to things that will negatively affect governance and our people.
Our “yes” then becomes a firm commitment to allowing only right and correct things to be done because they benefit residents.
The stars of these results are the departments of health and education that endured a protracted administrative quagmire.
Their audit outcomes are a clear example of what happens when there is firm and stable leadership in government.
We will firm up our governance so we continue this progress by attending to audit findings.
Clean and good governance that gives us improved audit outcomes proves we are managing these institutions better with competent governance systems, performing our functions better, and are accountable for our work.
To the people of our beautiful Eastern Cape I want to say, the financial statements of Eastern Cape government departments are free of material misstatements.
We are doing this so that your money is managed properly and is used only to deliver goods and services to you, and to build socioeconomic infrastructure that will allow businesses to create jobs.
Obtaining unqualified audit outcomes is not the end of our work. It is a sign that we are finally doing things right in the Eastern Cape.
We still have a lot of work to do to grow the economy so that we can eradicate poverty, end malnutrition, reduce unemployment, eradicate crime, improve delivery of public roads and related infrastructure, and improve management of financial development institutions so they fund more entrepreneurs and businesses.
In the 2018/2019 Public Finance Management Act report, the financial year before we came into office, the Eastern Cape slightly regressed, with an increase in qualified audit opinions from two in the previous financial year to five.
I am happy that we are making this progress. I am mindful of the challenges we still have.
I am motivated by what we have achieved thus far, and I am confident we will overcome the remaining challenges, including ballooning unauthorised expenditure.
We will attend to the essential and fundamental findings highlighted by the auditor-general, and improve monitoring processes to ensure work is delivered on time, to yield expected results in a cost-effective manner.
Lubabalo Oscar Mabuyane is the premier of the Eastern Cape and a member of the Eastern Cape provincial legislature.
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