20 May 2013

Lobatse Town Council (LTC) failed to produce the June 2012 abstract of accounts report due to technical problems with the inventory module, says the chairperson of the finance and works committee, councillor Zubeida Raphael.

Addressing LTC special meeting on abstract accounts for the year ending March 2012, Cllr Raphael said the problem arose at the time of capturing physical stock during the inventory year end when the officers mistakenly captured the data on the column for variances.

 “This led to overstatement of the inventory and subsequently an understatement of expenditure in some votes,” she said, adding that this resulted in the missing of historical data.

Cllr Raphael noted that what remained were only the balances of stock as at 30 March 2012 and other transactions after that date. 

Responding to the chairperson’s remarks, the Mayor of Lobatse, Cllr Caroline Lesang asked the committee if the technical staff is incompetent, as they failed to address the issue to the extent that consultants were sourced to address the issue.

Ms Lesang also wanted to know if the software for module rates is compatible.

She also inquired about the backup, adding that if historical data was lost, figures that are reflected on the report do not give a true reflection. On other issues, the mayor complained that surplus funds that were reflected on the report could have been used for Ipelegeng projects. ENDS