Government was being overly reliant on consultants and did not always get value for money, according to Auditor-General Shauket Fakie.
In his annual general report, Fakie said that government departments, nationally and provincially, unnecessarily made
extensive use of consultants - and at times paid millions of rands for shoddy work.
When consultants were engaged, it was hoped that there would be a transfer of skills and capacity building in the course of them (consultants) doing their work.
Fakie listed two departments by way of example, but noted that the problem was prevalent across the public service.
He cited an example of Gauteng's department of housing and land affairs which engaged consultants to manage housing delivery projects in four areas since 1997.
This in spite of the fact that the department had project management directorates to manage housing delivery projects.
"According to information received from the department and various tender documents, consultants were appointed as there was a lack of internal capacity, skills and expertise. But the consultants were appointed on four different occasions over a period of three years, at a total cost of R10,9-million, without the necessary skills having been transferred or capacity built," said Fakie.
He also cited the Eastern Cape department of housing, local government and traditional affairs, saying it spent a total of R17,1-million on consultants without its officials gaining in the transfer of skills.
Fakie said a tender to the amount of R2 041-million was awarded to a consortium of consultants and consulting engineers for phase one of the implementation of the management support programme to assist 33 municipalities with various aspects of capacity building, such as human resources and financial management.
A further tender to the amount of R15 056-million was awarded for phase two and three of the programme.
"In terms of the programme the consultants employed would assist municipalities to be able to prepare their own financial statements in future," said Fakie.
He said in some municipalities that his office visited, it was reported that staff of the municipalities were not at all involved in preparing the financial statements.
"Consultants would visit the municipalities, collect the information needed and return with the financial statements. Transfer of the necessary skills in the preparation of financial statements did therefore not take place," he said.
Fakie reported that it was found that alternative ways of addressing needs, such as to train staff and build more capacity, to recruit new employees or to extend working hours and pay overtime, were not always duly considered before projects were allocated to consultants.
Fakie also noted that sound procurement principles, such as comparison of tenders not only on the basis of prices but also on functionality by evaluating competencies of tenderers and their readiness to deliver were not always applied.
"This resulted in (public service) staff having to be withdrawn from their functions to assist the consultants in performing their tasks (at more cost to government)," said Fakie.