The communications regulator Icasa did not spend R333.7-million of its 2025/2026 budget. At the same time, it told parliament that a lack of money is its main problem in buying tools to check on operators.
Icasa used only 0.5% of its capital budget, leaving R130.5-million untouched. Another R203.2-million of its operating budget was also not spent. The regulator ended the year with a surplus of R100.2-million.
The figures come from the Parliamentary Monitoring Group’s record of Icasa’s annual report briefing. Icasa presented the report to the portfolio committee on communications and digital technologies on 9 October, TechCentral reported.
Icasa chairman Mothibi Ramusi told MPs that getting enough funding for the regulatory tools it needs remains the authority’s main challenge.
Ramusi said Icasa’s CEO would hand in a business case by the end of October. Ramusi said it would set out medium and long term priorities. These include ways to deal with network quality before problems arise, instead of only reacting to them.
DA MP Tsholofelo Bodlani said Icasa had admitted its monitoring tools are not good enough. This includes the drive-testing equipment it uses to check whether operators follow the rules. Drive-testing measures coverage and network performance with special equipment along set routes.
Bodlani said the shortfall stops the regulator from holding well-funded operators to account. Bodlani asked when the problem would be fixed.
Icasa would not say where the money to upgrade its systems would come from. Licensing and compliance executive Fikile Hlongwane said talks with national treasury and infrastructure authorities were still going on. Hlongwane said the talks were sensitive and funding sources could not be shared until agreements were final.
Bodlani said keeping this from parliament weakened oversight. Bodlani also asked for a promise that the funding would not harm the regulator’s independence.
Senior finance manager Moroesi Mooketsa said the surplus came mainly from grants set aside for upgrading Icasa’s infrastructure and technology. Of R588.1-million in grants, R102-million was kept for these projects, which run over several years.
Mooketsa said the roll-out was still under way at the end of the financial year. For this reason, Icasa asked national treasury to let it keep the unspent money.
Mooketsa also said Icasa’s finance and supply chain teams did not have enough staff for their workload. Mooketsa said tenders could take up to 120 days and were often delayed because too few companies placed bids. Capital projects worth R36-million and the buying of a new licensing system were under way, according to Mooketsa.
Acting committee chairman Shaik Imraan Subrathie asked the regulator to explain how it could have a R100-million surplus while asking for more state funding.
Icasa’s contingent liabilities more than tripled, from R24.2-million to R82.5-million. Mooketsa said the biggest single item was a R28-million claim from Cell C. Another large part was linked to CCMA disputes over 2023/2024 performance bonuses.
The regulator improved its audit result from qualified to unqualified with findings. It met 40 of its 47 performance targets, and most of the missed targets were in its finance division.
MPs also raised a finding by the auditor-general. The auditor-general could not check Icasa’s reported results on solving radio frequency interference cases because supporting evidence was missing.
Hlongwane said the auditor-general made no changes to Icasa’s reported figures. Hlongwane said Icasa was moving its customer relationship management system from its own servers to the cloud to fix the problem.
Source: this article is based on reporting by TechCentral. Image: TechCentral. Written with the help of AI and published by the Tzaneen Voice Technology desk. See our Editorial Standards.
Werner Jacobs covers technology for Tzaneen Voice. Werner reports on mobile networks, data prices, internet access, smartphones, apps, AI, cybersecurity and South African tech companies. Each story explains what a new product, price change or policy means for ordinary users in South Africa.