Presidency fails to meet lifestyle audits deadline yet again

18 March 2021

The Deputy Minister in the Presidency, Thembi Siweya, confirmed in today’s oral questions session that the Ramaphosa administration will fail to meet the extended deadline to finalise lifestyle audits for Cabinet.

The President announced the introduction of lifestyle audits for the Executive as far back as 2018, so it is fair to expect that work on them began 3 years ago. At the time, the President was upbeat that these would herald a new era of transparency, accountability and good governance by the executive.

In the last governance oral questions session in 2020, the late Minister Jackson Mthembu committed the Ramaphosa administration to finalise the introduction of lifestyle audits by the end of March 2021, after failing to meet its initial deadline October 2018.

In contrast, it took approximately 9 months for Premier Alan Winde to deliver on his electoral commitment to introduce lifestyle audits for the DA-led Western Cape Cabinet.

It is completely unacceptable that once again when the deadline for the implementation of the lifestyle audits looms, the Ramaphosa administration finds yet another excuse for the delay.

The latest justification for the Ramaphosa administration’s failure to meet one of its core promises, is conveniently Covid-19.

It is becoming increasingly clear that the consistent determination to push back the deadline is an indication of the political resistance to the introduction of the lifestyle audits by some elements in Cabinet and a faction in Luthuli House.

The DA will continue to use all the parliamentary channels to apply inescapable pressure on the government to deliver these.

Issued bySolly Malatsi,DA Shadow Minister for the Presidency, 18 March 2021