KZN Public Works slashes wasteful expenditure to zero, invests R20m to go paperless

The Kwa Zulu-Natal Department of Public Works and Infrastructure (DPWI) has pulled off a dramatic financial turnaround, cutting its historically bloated unauthorised, fruitless and wasteful expenditure to zero for the 2025/6 financial year. The second-smallest provincial department by budget allocation is leveraging its savings to bankroll a R20 million digital overhaul aimed at eradicating paper-based bureaucracy, stamping out tender corruption and multiplying productivity in the next three years. The department, which buckled under hundreds of millions of rand in rampant overspending, has tightly shut the fiscal taps. “Previously this department had R731m in unauthorised expenditure (mostly on goods and services). We’ve cut that to almost zero,” KZN Public Works and Infrastructure MEC Martin Meyer said on Monday. “We are the only department that has almost zero in unauthorised expenditure and we’ve done that for two years. We’ve done that by using technology efficiently. We don’t overspend on our budgets anymore. We have become a much more efficient department when it comes to the management of our finances,” he said. Meyer was speaking during a media briefing at the KZN DPWI Technology & Innovation Summit, which drew about 400 delegates, including chief financial officers and other senior officials from government departments and the private sector. He announced at the summit that the department is partnering with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research to launch a real-time infrastructure dashboard to manage projects. The tool allowed executives to monitor construction project statuses continuously, pinpoint bottlenecks early and base management decisions on live evidence rather than outdated reports. KZN Public Works and Infrastructure MEC Martin Meyer addresses delegates at the KZN Department of Public Works and Infrastructure Summit in Durban. Source: DPWI R20m paperless drive Meyer said the department had allocat