The South African government

The South African government has gazetted new cost containing measures for municipalities, which will curb what officials can blow taxpayer’s money on.

The new rules fall under the Municipal Cost Containment Regulations for 2019, which was gazetted in terms of the Municipal Finance Management Act.

National Treasury said that the objective of the new rules is to ensure that resources given to municipalities are used effectively, efficiently and economically by containing spending.

The rules apply to all municipal officials and political office bearers and entities in South Africa.

According to National Treasury, failure to abide by the rules – ie an officer incurs expenditure that is counter to the rules set out by the department – will result in the official being held liable for financial misconduct or a financial offence.

This could result in officials being reported to the police on fraud charges.

Municipalities wil
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The South African government has spent a fortune trying to redistribute the country’s land wealth from the white minority to the black majority.

It has bought thousands of hectares of white owned farm land and either given it or sold it on to poor blacks.

The country’s minister of land reform admitted that many of the new black farmers have simply resold the land back to the original owners.

The minister said black farmers have resold nearly 30 per cent of the white farmland bought for them by the government.

He said: ‘The government bought land and handed it over to aspirant farmers who then sold it again, in many instances back to the original owner.’

Land economists say that the redistribution policy is highly inefficient as the white-owned land is often bought at above its market value by the government.

After the land has been given, or sold at a discount, to the new black owner, he is able to simply then able t
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