A new financial management system – on which the municipality has spent about R71-million so far – is in limbo as the company meant to implement it has not been paid by the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality since December.
The metro is also in the process of trying to ascertain if it should continue with the project or cut its losses now.
It emerged this week that staff of Sebata – the contractor implementing the Enterprise Management System (EMS) for the municipality – downed tools on Monday.
At a human resources and corporate services portfolio committee meeting on Thursday, application specialist in the municipality Phumeza Sume said the metro had not paid Sebata since December.
“As of Monday, everybody who has been working on the project has left site but I am in contact with the project manager,” Sume said.
Sume said the project had also been delayed by the municipality’s intention to investigate whether to continue with the project or not.
City manager Johann Mettler confirmed that work on the city’s EMS had indeed been halted.
Mettler said payment to Sebata would be made only when additional work done had been certified.
The municipality has appointed the State Information Technology Agency (Sita) to do the investigation and to certify the work.
But Sume said this too had been delayed.
“We can’t make any decisions until the Sita assessment comes out.”
Sume said Sita was unable to start its investigation as the municipality’s legal department was studying the documents.
“Everything is at a standstill until the contracts are finalised between our legal department and Sita’s legal department. If we continue, it would be irregular,” Sume said.
Committee chair Annette Lovemore said it was important for the investigation to start.
Councillors in the committee said they were skeptical of the project.
DA councillor Kholeka Ngumbela requested that the committee be introduced to the company.
Sebata declined to comment and referred questions to the municipality.