‘HEATED DEBATE OVER CITY COUNCIL FINANCIALS’

Sir,

This letter is in response to an article titled ‘Heated debate over city council financials’, which was published in the Times of Eswatini on Friday September 9, 2022. Thanks are in order for the content of the article, but as a contributor to the discussion, I believe a response to the CEO of the Mbabane Town Council would be in order. In essence, the point I was making in the meeting was that it was called an annual general meeting but it should be recognised that in a company annual general meeting, the annual financial statements are formally approved and resolutions passed.

Resolutions

This is not the case for the Mbabane Town Council as its annual financial statements are approved by management and the councillors and resolutions are not tabled for approval. We must then ask the question as to the purpose of the meeting which was given and I quote; “This will be an opportunity for key stakeholders to receive a report on the performance of the municipality.” In the meeting I questioned the fact that some expense categories had increased between 2021 and 2022 by anywhere between 13 per cent and 113 per cent with ‘Other Operating Expenses’ having increased in total by E9 million or some 13 per cent.

This should be considered disturbing when revenues from rates were flat between 2021 and 2022. The disturbing increase in expenses, which were not adequately explained, resulted in me raising the question of the budget for the 2022 financial year, to which the CEO responded that this was handled by councillors and was done at a different time.

Information

Yes this is fully understood, but if the forum is being transparent and sharing information and reviewing performance, surely the budget could be added as a column to figures presented in the meeting. Clearly the budget does not appear in the annual financial statements but could be presented by the CFO in his presentation. Justification for such large increases in certain expense categories should be forthcoming in the interests of transparency. Thank you for sharing this response which I believe is required in order to clarify the reason for raising the question in the first place.

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