South Africa: Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) Committee Questions Whether Performance Targets Reflect Municipal Realities

The Portfolio Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) on Friday cautioned against interpreting performance-target achievements as proof that departmental support to struggling municipalities is working. The committee received a briefing from the Office of the Auditor-General of South Africa (AGSA) on the Department of Cooperative Governance (DCoG), the Department of Traditional Affairs and their entities’ audit outcomes for the 2025/26 financial year. The committee, which has been conducting joint parliamentary oversight engagements across provinces with municipalities that recorded poor audit outcomes in the 2024/2025 municipal financial year, stressed that it would test the reported performance results against persistent dysfunction and service delivery challenges in municipalities. The AGSA reported that the portfolio achieved 89% of its planned targets. The Chairperson of the committee, Dr Zweli Mkhize, however, said a high achievement rate could also mean targets are set too low and are not demanding enough to meaningfully address the scale of the problem. The Chairperson stressed that the committee would examine both how demanding targets were and