LOCAL authorities failed to remit statutory obligations including taxes to the Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) and membership contributions to NAPSA amounting to a combined K1.7 billion over the two financial years of 2018 and 2019, says the Auditor General.
According to the latest Auditor General’s Report on the Audit of Accounts of Local Authorities for the financial years ended December 31, 2018 and 2019, all 60 local authorities countrywide failed to remit statutory obligations, including taxes to the ZRA and membership contributions to NAPSA, amounting to a combined K1.7 billion over the two financial years of 2018 and 2019.
“The Report has revealed failure to remit statutory obligations as the highest irregularity at K1,693,684,384; failure to settle staff obligations at K276,689,804 and failure to collect revenue at K108,885,954. The implication for failure to remit statutory obligations is that this may disadvantage employees of their benefits at the time of leaving service, while the implication for failure to settle staff obligations may result in low staff morale, ultimately affecting service delivery negatively and possible litigation. In the case of failure to collect revenue, this deprives government and respective institutions of the much-needed revenue for provision of social services for improved service delivery and operations,” Ellen Chikale, the AG’s head of public relations, stated in a press release, Wednesday.
She added that the report also exposed unusually high unsupported payments found at over K20.7 million, while missing payment vouchers were at nearly K19.3 million.
“The report also revealed unsupported payments which stood at K20,762,409, whilst missing payment vouchers were at K19,265,971. The implication of the unsupported payments and missing payment vouchers is that, they promote concealment of wrong doing due to lack of audit trail and supporting documents. other findings raised in the report are failure to develop integrated development plans, poor management of solid waste, failure to update valuation rolls, failure to control markets by the councils, weaknesses in procurement and contract management. The audit also revealed weaknesses in the management of Local Government Equalisation and Constituency Development Funds,” stated Chikale.
“The implications of the above findings range from, the country having Unplanned Settlements, Poor Management of Waste to Poor Service Delivery among others. The Auditor General is concerned that Local Authorities that are expected to provide service at local level have continued to exhibit poor governance in the management of public resources.”
The audit scope covered the accounts and records of Local Authorities for the financial years ended December 31, 2018, and 2019 and in some cases, observations that required updating were reported as at October 31, 2020.
Under the Constitution of Zambia (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2016, a local authority is competent to levy, impose, recover and retain local taxes.
A local authority may make bylaws to impose a levy on leviable persons owning or occupying property or premises situated within the area of the local authority, leviable persons carrying on a business, trade or occupation within the area of the local authority or the purchase or sale of a commodity within the area of the local authority.
The Council also receives funding through national support in form of the much-sought-after Local Government Equalisation Fund (LGEF), Constituency Development Fund (CDF) and any other grants as government may issue.
Nothing new and nothing wrong. They’re the law and that is why no action will follow.
The post newspaper was forcefully closed down due to unsubstantiated claims of not paying taxes. Lungu was hell bent on closing it down
What action will lungu take in local authorities my answer NOTHING. This money would have helped towards health sector and other urgent needs. Also to pay off the massive gigantic debt
LOCAL AUTHORITIES have either been cadrerised or incapacitated due to political interference that’s why…
ALL GONE IN CADERS POCKETS. WHY KEEP THAT LAZY DULL MINISTER AT THE MINISTRY?
Government has for 17 years failed to remit NAPSA statutory remittance (2001 t0 2003) for former ex-RAMCOZ employees.
If it were private companies everyone from ZRA to NAPSA would have been there with bailiffs but since its part of local government nobody bothers.
All these local authorities are governed by 2 political divides, the PF and the UPND councilors,mayors and/or council chairpersons. It would be good to make an analysis an analysis of which councils are doing better than the other, or they are all in the same watsapp group
That has been the problem of all councils since multipartism came into being.hence now cadres have also joined in the looting of resources even bleaching their skins due excess money.
This is Zambia under Lazy Lungu…nothing is taken seriously
PF failure is all over Zambia, where can PF ‘sonta’, even the food they eat is either stolen food or donated to Zambians and quickly share among PF cadres. They have even corrupted the church in Zambia a Christian nation.
Maybe running of local authorities should be separated from political structures. A system that allows participation of any qualifying resident in the jurisdiction of the local authority to contest positions in running affairs of the local authority could be put in place answerable to the appropriate ministry. Office tenure could be different from the political one and so would be the budget. Central government can not run local authorities on a uniform platform!