Letuka Chafotsa
The Office of the Auditor General has released a draft audit of the Lesotho Durban Consulate for the financial years 2009/10 to May 2014, which chronicles alleged massive abuse of public funds, and poor management by the Consul General, Lerato Tsosane.
The Auditor General, Lucy Liphafa, has since written to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Relations Principal Secretary, expressing concern at the alleged irregularities, which she fears could have cost the government millions of maloti.
In a letter dated 17 June 2014, Ms Liphafa, summaries the findings of her audit team and implores the relevant authorities to remedy the situation and if possible, recover the misappropriated funds.
“The audit of the Lesotho Durban Consulate for the financial years 2009/10 to May 2014 has been completed, and the Draft Audit Inspection Report accompanying this letter summarises the matters arising from the audit.
“I would like to draw your attention to the following major weaknesses noted during the course of the audit:
Irregular cash withdrawals from the Consulate bank account whereby a total of R500 000 was withdrawn between November and December 2013. This amount appears to have been deposited into the Consul General’s personal account from which some payments were made.
In the 2013/14 financial year, the Consul General claimed out-of-pocket expenses amounting to R70,970.99, while there was a lot of cash withdrawn as explained in the paragraph above.
Unauthorised change of accommodation by the Consul General where the government has incurred expenditure amounting to R300,800.00 for the occupancy of the new house, while the former property broker has claimed R210,068.91 which, if it is not paid, legal action will be instituted against the government.
There were purchases of furniture and other items made for the Consul General amounting to R216,388.86, which the auditors were not able to verify their physical existence as the Consul General was never available throughout the time of the audit. Of this amount, R87,056.00 was for items which had been purchased in Lesotho, of which the auditors noted that the concept value for money was not observed as the said items could have been purchased in Durban.”
The draft audit further gives a grim picture of accounting procedures at the Consulate, while the Auditor General continually questions payments to the Consular General, which include per-diems during unauthorised travels outside South Africa, refunds for goods purchased for the office, and out of pocket allowances.
“Most payments of the Consulate Office were effected on the basis of quotations and invoices which were not signed by the supplier as proof of ownership of responsibility.
“Therefore, the authenticity of such payments by the Consul General was doubtful as to whether they were genuine payments for which goods or services were beneficial to the office. For instance, there is an un-initialled paid invoice amounting to R186,059.25.”
Due to the magnitude of the alleged rot, the Auditor General has recommended a thorough forensic audit to determine the extent to which funds could have been abused at the Consulate.
“As indicated that public funds of the Durban Consul are subjected to fraud, management is advised to make further investigations (forensic audit) as the Office of the Auditor General is not mandated to make further verifications with third parties to confirm the occurrence of the transactions and reliability and existence of suppliers whose invoices and quotations were not signed and find out whether they are authorised suppliers.”
The Auditor General has also recommended that the Consul General’s personal bank accounts be scrutinised, to determine the source of her funds.
“Management should make a follow-up and forensic investigations on the sources of income and inflow of deposits in the Consul General’s account, to find out whether she was actually in possession of such huge amounts she says she sometimes spent on government business.
“For instance, there were instances where disbursements amounting to R75,555.67 for goods and services in respect of the Consulate were paid from the Consul General’s personal account, instead of the authorised government account.”
The Auditor General has also questioned the payment of R235 000 to a vacant flat by the Consular General.
“The audit revealed that Flat 23, Umhlanga Ridge, was vacant from March 2013 to February 2014, yet monthly rentals totalling R235 000 were paid during the period in question. This implied that public funds have been wasted on what the government of Lesotho did not benefit and there was no explanation given.”
The Consulate staff have also been accused, in the audit, of making unauthorised trips, amounting to R84 000.
The Consulate was also noted in the audit as having purchased alcoholic amounting to R9200.00 using public funds, without proving there was any need to have any function that warranted the expenditure.
Concludes the audit: “There is a very serious laxity in management of public funds at the Durban Consulate, resulting in non-compliance with the laws and regulations and other government accounting procedures. “
Contacted yesterday to comment on the report, the Auditor General’s Office Chief Information Officer, ‘Matšepo Mohau said: “We are shocked that you have that draft report. However, we do not own any report of the services we would have offered, so that document now belongs to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Relations.
“What we know is we have communicated with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding that audit and we cannot talk about a document that does not belong to us anymore. Maybe the owner of the report is in a better position to explain.”
According to Ms Mohau, the only report that the Auditor General’s Office is responsible for is that which is presented to parliament, which stipulates the fiscal-year performance of public funds. Repeated attempts to seek Ms Tsosane’s side of the story proved fruitless yesterday, while there was also no immediate comment from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Relations Principal Secretary, Tebello Metsing who is said to be out of the country.
