AUDITOR-GENERAL Terence Nombembe has sugar-coated irregular and fruitless expenditure incurred by the Department of Science and Technology.

Nombembe failed to report to Parliament financial and tender irregularities that resulted in fruitless expenditure totalling R1.3-million.

In addition to deliberately omitting the negative findings against the department, Nombembe went on to state that the department had complied with the laws of the land.

For the period ending March 31 2011 the A-G submitted to Parliament an audit report that stated that there were no findings concerning material non-compliance with laws and regulations applicable to the department.

But a confidential "management report" prepared by his office for the department, which has been leaked to Sowetan, states that the department incurred irregular expenditure of about R1.3-million.

The report states that the expenditure was incurred due to:

- Contravention of practice note 8 of 2007-08 regarding supply chain management. This contravention led to the irregular expenditure of an annual R641147,68 in the procurement of services.

The management report recommended that the contract be cancelled. The department, according to the management report, conceded to and agreed to fix the problem. The management report indicated that the breach would be reported.

Nombembe has since neglected to do so.

- Contravention of the Public Service Act regarding secondment of employees from Square Kilometre Array Office to the department. An irregular expenditure of R725000 was incurred as a result of this bungling.

- Failure to recover R110133 relating to accelerated leadership programme which was attended by two managers who breached contracts by not completing the study programme. The employees were funded to the tune of R55066,66 each. They are not obliged to repay the money as they had not signed an undertaking.

The management report says the amount was spent in vain.

The department conceded and undertook to fix the problem. The management report stated that these should be disclosed in the department's financial statements.

Nombembe's spokeswoman Jeanny Morulane declined to comment on allegations that Nombembe could have been subjected to external pressures in order to give the department a clean bill of health.

"The statutory mandate of the auditor-general is not to comment on draft or final management reports/letters as these are meant for internal use," Morulane said.

"The reports are a form of communication between the A-G and those it audits (the auditees) during our audit processes."

Themba Godi, chairperson of the parliament's standing committee on public accounts, said he was was shocked by the claims.

"The A-G has so far created a reputation of high professionalism and if these allegations are true, Nombembe should be able to explain what went wrong."

The department's spokesman Tommy Makhode had not responded to enquiries yesterday by the time of going to press.

In terms of the Constitution, Nombembe is obliged to report accurately on the financial standing of all departments.

The burning questions

SOWETAN posed the following questions to Terence Nombembe, to which his office declined to respond.

- Why did he not report information about the breaches that occurred in the Department of Science and Technology to Parliament?

- Who was responsible for this audit?

- Is there any political pressure to deliver clean audits regardless of the true nature of the financial status of government departments?

- Don't these omissions of material facts constitute a violation of auditing rules and standards?

- Don't you think these omissions constitute a breach of duty in that the auditor-general deliberately misled Parliament and, by extension, the government and the people of South Africa, and

- Don't you think these omissions constitute a violation of the Constitution?

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