SAMWU Appoints a Forensic Auditor

03 February 2016

The South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU) has appointed a reputable forensic auditor, Earnest and Young to conduct a forensic audit on the union’s finances. The decision to have the forensic audit follows calls by our members and resolutions of the Central Executive Committee (CEC) meetings after allegations of missing millions from the union coffers were made.

The union undertook a fair and transparent bidding process wherein audit firms were invited to submit their bids for the audit. Subsequently three major audit firms were shortlisted leading to the appointment of Earnest and Young as guided by the union’s CEC. Earnest and Young has been appointed to conduct the forensic audit for the past 6 years focusing on the national union and provinces accounts.  

We trust that this process will bring the issue of alleged missing money from the union’s coffers to closure. As a law abiding institution, we will be awaiting anxiously for the report so we together with our members can know if in deed there has been any money that is missing and who is responsible for such.

We are therefore not going to be making any comment on the process until such a time that we have received a full comprehensive audit report from the auditors with their recommendations. Should the report implicate any of the current or previous office bearers or officials at provincial or national level, we will take all necessary steps to recoup our members’ hard earned money.

In addition to this, we will further lay criminal charges with the police against anyone implicated of wrong doing. Just as we are determined to see clean and transparent municipal finances and doing away with corruption, we believe that we should begin by ensuring that our home is clean and corruption free.

Statement issued by Simon Mathe, SAMWU General Secretary, 3 February 2016