Eastern Cape – Provincial Treasury

The province’s recovery and emergence from Section 100 status clearly demonstrated and confirmed the ability of treasury to apply stringent financial controls and restore monetary discipline. The institution of decentralised budgetary control is in keeping with new management philosophies where management must be given the mandate to manage and be held accountable for outcomes. One of the challenges the Treasury faced since 1999 and which it will continue to face, is the transition from the previous “Exchequer Control mentality” to the new decentralised Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) milieu. The Exchequer Control Act, with emphasis on a highly centralised control environment focused on inputs and is juxtaposed to the PFMA, which calls for decentralised control, accountability and outputs or outcomes.