MUNICIPALITIES failed to spend almost R1billion of the money given to them last year for water, sanitation, roads, streetlights, parks and other basic services.

Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs director-general Elroy Africa told a press briefing in his office yesterday that about 24 municipalities had failed to spend R920million in municipal infrastructure grant (MIG) funds in the past financial year.

The municipal financial year ended on June 30 this year.

The MIG funds are only for providing basic services, not for paying municipal salaries.

He said though big multi-year projects often meant that the money would only be spent over a few years, the amount underspent last year "should have been much less".

Some municipalities that failed to provide services for residents had even "redirected MIG funds", Africa said.

Others were just putting the money into the general municipal account and using it for day-to-day expenses.

"Some of these municipalities came to us directly to say the money was put into the general account and getting spent on operating expenditure," he said.

He said the department would go out of its way to ensure that the municipalities spent their money, because it did not want to punish communities by taking the money away.

But it would also swoop on municipalities to check that they were not frittering the money away.

"We are in the process of appointing an independent auditing firm and one of its briefs is to do spot checks across the country on these MIG projects," Africa said.

One of the major culprits is the OR Tambo district municipality in the Eastern Cape, which didn't spend R52million set aside specifically for water and sanitation.

This municipality, which covers Port St Johns, Bizana, Mthatha and other rural areas, admits on its own website that 88percent of its 1,7million residents live below the poverty line.

No doubt R52million worth of water projects would have helped its residents to improve their lives.

"This is one of the districts where the problem of under-expenditure has been with us for some time," Africa said.

Free State, Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo have spent between 86percent and 98percent of their MIG.

But Gauteng, Mpumalanga and North West spent less than 79percent and the Northern Cape spent the least - using only 72 percent of the money given it to provide services for citizens.

Africa said municipalities mainly underspent because of poor planning and a lack of technical skills.

He said even some of the smaller municipalities in a major province like Gauteng were affected by alack of skilled staff to oversee the projects.