The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have launched a scathing attack on the on the draft Budgetary Review and Recommendation Reports (BRRRs) concerning the Department of Defence, Department of Military Veterans, and Armscor, calling them “sanitized and manipulated” documents that obscure the true extent of the South African National Defence Force’s (SANDF’s) collapse.
The EFF’s written response – presented to the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans (PCDMV) on 23 October 2024 by Carl Niehaus, EFF permanent representative on the PCDMV – warns that adopting the reports in their current form would “constitute a grave misrepresentation to Parliament.”
Stating, “this is a sanitised, and manipulated version, and as such it reflects the overall intention of this Report, namely to subvert the oversight work of the Portfolio Committee, and to mislead the National Assembly about the truly disastrous state that the SANDF in its totality is in.”
A dysfunctional SANDF
At the core of Niehaus’s criticism of the BRRRs is that the reports fail to adequately reflect and address the true state of the SANDF. Niehaus contends that the SANDF is failing to meet its constitutional mandate to “defend and protect the Republic, its territorial integrity, and its people…”
He goes on to state that budget cuts as well as oversight and governance failures have left the SANDF unable to perform its critical functions, something that Niehaus argues is not adequately reflected in the BRRRs for 2023/24.
Niehaus pointed to the Navy and Air Force’s inability to meet their operational hours targets due a combination of a general lack of resources and several procurement delays as well as a miss-appropriation of the resources currently at the SANDF’s disposal.
Armscor’s role in the SANDF’s dysfunction
Niehaus was particularly critical of the state-owned arms procurement agency Armscor’s seeming inability to adequately support the SANDF’s operational demands. Armscor has been confronted by several ongoing challenges in providing key services and capabilities to the SANDF, with poor management of facilities and delays in equipment acquisition undermining the SANDF’s ability to fulfil its duties.
Niehaus emphasized that Armscor’s failures to address the Navy and Air Force’s maintenance backlogs have left most of the naval and air fleets non-operational, undermining national security.
Stating “during oversight visits by the Portfolio Committee of Defence and Military Veterans many complaints from all four components of the SANDF were encountered by the Portfolio Committee. This included especially complaints by the SA Navy about the Armscor Dockyard that is for all purposes dysfunctional.”
Referring to the Dockyard, Niehaus said “it is evidently a crime scene, and it has directly resulted in the almost total inability of the SA Navy to have its fleet of vessels functional. A full Directorate of Priority Crime investigation is required. The EFF calls for such.”
The SA Air Force has complained that Armscor fails to empower it to have the required skills and equipment to get its mostly grounded fleet operational again. “The fact that the Oryx and Rooivalk helicopter fleet is mostly dysfunctional and grounded is a very serious problem, that can be directly laid at the door of Armscor due to constant delays and excuses to get the new contracts in place.”
Niehaus highlighted concerns related to repeated delays in delivering key defence projects such as the A-Darter missile programme as well as Project Hoefyster which is aimed at replacing the SANDF’s ageing fleet of Ratel infantry fighting vehicles (IFV), questioning whether Armscor can fulfil its commitments given “the consistent failure of Armscor to make good on undertakings, and to deliver on time.”
“We expressed our outrage with the fact the SANDF paid in advance more than R7 billion Rand to Denel, with Armscor being the facilitating agency, and yet five years later not a single armoured vehicle as envisaged by Project Hoefyster has been produced.”
Niehaus further slammed Armscor’s exploitation of intellectual property, saying there are not adequate measures in place to protect SANDF IP. “We remain concerned that private companies have benefitted from SANDF IP, without financial compensation, and even more disconcerting that this situation undermines our own national safety.”
Oversight failures and financial mismanagement
Niehaus was also particularly critical of the PCDMV for failing to hold the Department of Defence and its entities, including Armscor, accountable for their failings. Niehaus described the draft reports as “not a true reflection” of committee activities and accused the chairperson of allowing critical questions to go unanswered.
Moreover, Niehaus admonished the language used in the reports’ recommendations contending that the language used failed to accurately reflected the sentiments of the members the PCDMV.
Relatedly, Niehaus expressed serious concerns related to the manner in which the PCDMV is run by the Chairperson, Molefi David “Dakota” Legoete, and how this undermines the Committee’s ability to exercise effective oversight.
“Where very important, serious questions and concerns, that are raised by members of the Portfolio Committee, and specifically the EFF Permanent Representative of the Portfolio Committee are not followed up, and answers are not provided. More often than not the Representatives of the DOD who appear in front of the Portfolio Committee are not required, or insisted on, by the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee to answer these critical questions and issues that are raised. We now see the disastrous consequences of this cavalier way of doing things, in this pathetic and totally unacceptable Report,” Niehaus contended.
A warning to Parliament
Niehaus repeatedly warned the Portfolio Committee that should the BRRR on the Department of Defence for 2023/24 be adopted in current form there would likely be serious consequences as the Committee would be neglecting its mandate.
“If the Portfolio Committee adopts this DRAFT Report in its current form, it will fail in its mandate. It will be guilty of TOTAL MISREPRESENTATION to the National Assembly, and thus misleading that august house,” Niehaus contended, adding that “misleading the National Assembly is a very serious and punishable offence.”
Niehaus’s rebuke of the draft BRRR highlights the broader challenges facing South Africa’s defence sector. Successive budget reductions, coupled with systemic governance issues coupled with little effective oversight, have left the SANDF struggling to maintain operational readiness.
