While the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa’s (Icasa’s) annual report to Parliament painted a “bleak” picture of the telecommunications regulator’s performance, much work had been done in the 2014/15 financial year, COO Willington Ngwepe said on Wednesday.

During the year under review, the authority achieved only 29% of its targets amid deficient internal controls, inadequate and unreliable information performance, underspending of conditional grants and the ineffective management of the National Revenue Fund receivables, besides others.

“No person within Icasa is in denial about the problems – both internal and external – that the organisation faces and the reasons why the organisation has performed so poorly,” he explained.

However, as the authority worked to arrest and reverse the decline, committing to a “far better” performance for the current 2015/16 financial year, Ngwepe pointed out that Icasa had achieved an unqualified audit for a third consecutive year.

“Obviously, the ultimate aspiration is a clean audit. However, the fact that the organisation’s finances have been unqualified three years in succession means that the organisation is on the right track. This means we have the capacity to improve on our controls, as well as our performance,” he pointed out.

Meanwhile, strategic achievements were highlighted in the facilitation of free and fair national elections during the year under review through the equitable treatment of political parties by broadcasters; the changed behaviour pricing in the telecommunications market owing to Icasa’s wholesale call termination regulations; and promulgation of the International Mobile Telecommunications Roadmap and the Radio Frequency Spectrum Assignment Plans.

“We have also positioned the organisation, both structurally and functionally, to perform. The organisational realignment and restructuring is now complete and all divisions are aligned to work collaboratively to deliver on the organisational mandate,” Ngwepe concluded.

For the current financial year, Icasa aimed to achieve at least 65% of its regulatory and business targets.