Public Works Portfolio Audit Outcomes; Committee Reports on 2026 ERWIC Awards and Sustainable Infrastructure Development Symposium (with the Ministry)

Video In a virtual meeting, Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) reported on the 2025/26 audit outcomes of the Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI), Property Management Trading Entity (PMTE), the Independent Development Trust (IDT), the Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB), Agrément South Africa (ASA) and the Council for the Built Environment (CBE). CIDB and ASA received clean audits. DPWI's outcome was unchanged, and PMTE's qualification areas rose from six to nine. PMTE carried a R4.1 billion overdraft and R3.44 billion in irregular expenditure, and both PMTE and IDT showed going-concern uncertainties. DPWI achieved only 25% of its targets, and delayed hospital refurbishments by IDT were flagged as undermining NHI readiness. During the Q&A session, Members asked why the same findings had recurred year after year and what the Auditor-General's analysis was of the lack of improvement. At what point did repeated non-compliance become a serious accountability failure rather than a set of isolated audit findings, and if the Auditor-General had reached that conclusion about the Department, PMTE or IDT. They asked why the public should trust that lease control failures, which had persisted for five years, would now be resolved. Other members asked what interventions the Committee itself should consider and what escalation mechanisms existed when the Department failed to act on serious irregularities. Members asked if AGSA followed the material irregularity through to recovery of funds, disciplinary action or criminal referral. Members noted investigations into irregular expenditure were taking an average of ten years at PMTE, and queried why successive Ministers had not shortened the process. Disciplinary processes and consequence management took years where losses were not recovered and officials not held accountable. Members asked the Auditor-General for an overview of the major recurring findings in the 88% of audited projects with findings. They noted procurement irregularities, poor project management and bed shortages at OR Tambo Memorial and Harry Gwala hospitals, and called for an intervention. Members noted performance information on the EPWP, leases, accommodation and revenue generation was materially misstated, and asked AGSA what assurance it could give on the corrected information. They asked what the audit revealed about the relationship between expenditure and performance, given that the Department achieved 61% of its targets and IDT 53%, and if there were value-for-money concerns. Questions were asked about weaknesses in ICT governance and cybersecurity. Members argued that PMTE's business model needed to change if audit outcomes were to improve. They asked for clarity on the shift towards public-private partnerships and the timeframes this implied for infrastructure projects. They asked how the devolution of accommodation charges, unresolved for 20 years, would be addressed. They proposed a meeting between the Department, PMTE, National Treasury and the DPSA to assess if the public works sector was properly configured and adequately staffed. They noted pressure from client departments to hand over this function to themselves and asked asked about the unclear implications of the 2019 transfer of the infrastructure function to Public Works. The Committee proposed earlier and more regular engagements with AGSA, noting that these would create opportunities to work collaboratively, identify potential obstacles earlier and address issues before they became more significant.