The Auditor Generals’ Report on Municipal Councils for 2014 to 2017 found the Labasa Town Council failed to file its financial statements on time.

The finding was revealed during the submission to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts in Labasa on Friday.

According to the Local Government Act, all municipal councils must submit their reports by May 31st and the audit report revealed that the Labasa Town Council failed to adhere to this.

Labasa and Savusavu Special Administrator Ami Kohli says there were a lot of factors that contributed to this.

“There have been changes in accountants between 2014 and 2015, we had previous issues with finances in 2014, and there have been changes in the software. These are not excuses but these are some of the matters.”

Savusavu Town Council chief executive Seema Shiwani Dutt explained a major contribution behind late submission was the wrong entry of data in the MYOB software system.

“Before I came in, the software was already installed and it took a lot of time for me to correct the data entry in the software. This is the reason it took so much time to present the financial statements for 2015 to 2017.”

Kohli has assured the Committee, the Labasa Town Council will be adhering to the timeline, as stipulated in the Local Government Act.

According to the Auditor General’s Report, the timely preparation of quality draft annual financial statements is a major issue that continues to exist and needs to be addressed by those charged with governance in towns and city councils.

The Auditor-General has recommended that the Ministry of Local Government should enforce the Local Government Act on the councils and any non-compliance should be strictly dealt with and Special Administrators and Chief Executive Officers should take more accountability and ownership to ensure the timeline is met.