LOCAL GOVERNMENT
Broke councils use infrastructure grant funds to meet salary bill
Why the misuse of infrastructure grants is expected to get worse
Broke municipalities are dipping into their infrastructure grant funds to pay salaries, a concern for the South African Local Government Association (Salga) and the Department of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs. The misuse of infrastructure grants is expected to get worse as the Department of Water and Sanitation is increasingly passing on the refurbishment and maintenance of water infrastructure to councils. Salga has introduced a "differentiated approach" to review municipalities on a case-by-case basis to assess the extent to which they are financially distressed and how the organisation can help them get their books in order as well as balance their obligations to spend their infrastructure grants in appropriate ways. MPs on the standing committee on appropriations and the select committee on appropriations recently got an alarming insight into the competing priorities for funding at provincial and local government level.
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