This, as the South African Local Government Association (SALGA), together with the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), hold the 8th annual Local Government Week programme to focus on issues plaguing municipalities and hampering service delivery. 

The programme is aimed at the implementation of interventions needed at municipalities to change their status quo. The programme, to be led by Salga President Thembi Nkadimeng, comes just weeks after the Auditor-General (AG) released a damning report indicating how only 20 municipalities of the country's 257 municipalities have been able to attain a clean audit, while those in the Free State and North West failed to obtain any clean audits.

AG Kimi Makwetu outlined that the majority of municipalities in the country are in a vulnerable financial position needing urgent intervention.

He indicated that 13 of the 20 clean audits were found in the Western Cape, two in Mpumalanga, one in Gauteng, one in Limpopo, one in KwaZulu-Natal, one in the Eastern Cape and another one in the Northern Cape.

Makwetu said there is a deliberate lack of accountability by the political and administrative municipal leadership in the Free State while there is a breakdown of financial systems in the North West.

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