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In recent years, most South African (SA) municipalities still need to produce clean audits. In 2018 and 2019, most municipalities in SA needed better-quality financial statements and performance reports. Misrepresentation of financial statements in audit reports is linked to inadequate governance, misappropriation of public funds and poor public service delivery. It is upon this background that this study aimed to: (i) assess perceptions of municipality middle management employees on factors affecting auditing, (ii) evaluate the differences in perceptions among municipality middle management employees on factors affecting auditing, (iii) measure the effect of factors affecting auditing on overall clean audit and (iv) establish the effect of clean audit on service delivery at two municipalities in Mpumalanga province. Using a structured questionnaire, a quantitative descriptive approach methodology was employed to collect data from a minimum sample of 294 employees in the middle management category working within the accounting and finance department at two municipalities in Mpumalanga province, SA. SPSS v28 was used to conduct descriptive and multivariate analyses, including mean, analysis of variance (ANOVA), correlation, and regression analysis. Results indicated that employees from the clean audit municipality had positive perceptions of factors affecting clean audit, while employees from the municipality with an unclean audit had negative perceptions. It was also concluded that factors affecting auditing had a statistically significant positive effect on clean audits. The findings in this study led to significant implications for theory and practice.

Purpose
This paper aims to examine how health consciousness, perceived nutrition of cereals, hedonic eating values and utilitarian eating values would influence consumers' attitudes towards cereal consumption, willingness to pay for cereals, actual consumption of cereal products, cereal product consumption satisfaction and continuance of cereal consumption.


Design/methodology/approach
The research embraced a quantitative approach. The examination was completed in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa (SA). A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 380 Generation Z consumers of cereal products. Structural equation modelling analysis was used using the smart partial least squares software to test the hypothesized model.


Findings
The results uncovered that the study variables were significantly associated, and surprisingly, the relationship between hedonic eating values and attitudes towards cereal consumption was found to be insignificant. It was also found that attitudes toward cereal consumption positively and significantly mediated the relationship between health consciousness and willingness to pay for cereals, perceived cereal nutrition and willingness to pay for cereals, hedonic eating values and willingness to pay for cereals and utilitarian eating values and willingness to pay for cereals.


Originality/value
This research adds new, fresh knowledge to the established body of knowledge on cereal consumption behaviour. This area has had little research attention in developing African countries like SA.