PwC auditor admits firm should have reported irregularities at SAA
An auditor from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has admitted before the Zondo commission that an “omission” was made by the auditing firm in not flagging irregularities at South Africa Airways (SAA) as stipulated in regulations governing procurement in state-owned enterprises (SOE).
Pule Mothibe, an auditor at PwC, took the stand at the inquiry on Thursday.
PwC was joint partners with Nkonki Incorporated in auditing the financial books of SAA. The companies were appointed firstly to audit the SOE for the 2011/2012 financial year, but the contact was irregularly extended for five years ending in 2016.
Evidence leader advocate Kate Hofmeyr questioned Mothibe on why PwC had not reported irregularities that were required to be reported under the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA). Mothibe said the firm had worked with all the documentation it had and when irregularities were found, they were reported.
“That work was performed on procurement and where we found deviations we reported these to management and the board’s audit committee.
"For the samples that we had selected, we followed them through and we reported them to management, but there were instances where we could not be provided with the files and we would have not been able to complete the necessary steps,” Mothibe said.
When he was pressed further on whether PwC had an obligation to report PFMA violations, Mothibe admitted so but declined to describe this as a dereliction of duty.
"I would not go as far as saying it is a dereliction of duty. It was an omission,” Mothibe said.
Mothibe was also probed on a contract that was awarded and then reversed by SAA’s board. The domestic catering contract was awarded to an outside catering company for R85 million.
The board later decided to reverse the awarding of this contract and award it to an SAA catering subsidiary. This was beside the fact that the SAA CFO had flagged the decision as a protentional risk for the airline, leaving it vulnerable to a lawsuit.
When PwC audited the airline, it did not note the risk and flag the concerns. Mothibe said, in hindsight, the risk was supposed to be flagged.
The inquiry resumes hearing Mothibe’s evidence on Friday.
Political Bureau
Thu, 16 Jul 2020 15:32:00 GMTZintle Mahlati
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