Dakota Legoete, Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans, has faced further backlash for suggesting the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) be used to fight crime.
Briefing the media earlier this month, Legoete noted that 29 000 South African lives are lost annually due to violent crime and this constitutes a de facto war, comparing it to combat losses in Ukraine and the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.
Legoete called for a national proclamation declaring crime as a war against humanity, enabling a coordinated operation involving SANDF, South African Police Service (SAPS), Border Management Authority (BMA), Home Affairs, and the South African Revenue Service (SARS). He emphasised the need for legal authorisation through the judiciary to permit search and seizure operations targeting illegal firearms, drugs, and illicit goods.
Failing to act, he warned, could result in the state being held legally accountable for gross negligence. “In a constitutional democracy, failure to act on this scale is tantamount to state collapse.”
However, experts have pointed out that it is not the duty of the defence force to enforce the law, and fight crime, but the mandate of the police to do so.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) added its voice to those rejecting what it says is a “populist and reckless call” by Legoete for the domestic deployment of the SANDF to fight crime.
In a statement issued on Tuesday 15 April, the EFF said Legoete’s call “represents a gross overreach of his authority, and a dangerous misinterpretation of the SANDF’s constitutional mandate.”
“While an effective and resolute approach to fight the scourge of rampant crime is certainly critical, the answer is not a misinterpretation of the concept of national sovereignty, nor the abuse of the SANDF, which will undermine and weaken both the SANDF and the South African Police Service (SAPS), producing the exact opposite of effective crime-fighting,” the party said.
The EFF made it clear that Legoete as a Chairperson cannot speak for Committee members, and that the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans has never deliberated, or endorsed, deploying the SANDF to fight crime.
“Legoete’s call relies on a misreading of the SANDF’s role under Section 200, Subsections 2 and 3 of the Constitution. These provisions state that the SANDF’s primary object is to defend the Republic, its territorial integrity, and its people in accordance with the Constitution and international law,” the EFF noted.
Domestic deployment is permitted only in exceptional circumstances, such as in cooperation with the SAPS, and requires Parliament’s approval and the President’s notification. “To interpret these clauses as justifying routine crime-fighting deployment is a distortion of the Constitution’s intent. The SANDF’s domestic use is a tightly regulated last resort for national emergencies, like the COVID-19 crisis, not a quick-fix for rampant crime. The Constitution deliberately separates the SANDF from policing to prevent militarisation and protect democratic freedoms,” the EFF said.
An effective and resolute fight against crime is undeniably urgent, but Legoete’s proposal is a terrible idea, the party said. “The SAPS, plagued by corruption, underfunding, and mismanagement, needs urgent reform—not a lazy bypass that further weakens its role. Deploying the SANDF would produce the opposite of effective crime-fighting by creating confusion, overlapping mandates, and institutional resentment. South Africa’s apartheid history painfully illustrates the dangers of domestic military deployment, when the defence force suppressed dissent and eroded freedoms.”
The EFF added that the post-1994 order was crafted to confine the SANDF to external defence and extraordinary crises.
defence expert Dean Wingrin said deploying soldiers for policing is “a terrible idea” as the already stretched and under-resourced SANDF “is not there to prop up a failing State department (SAPS), soldiers are not trained for internal policing, and the Constitution has clearly defined boundaries between the Defence Force and policing.”
African Defence Review Director Darren Olivier agreed that it is “a terrible idea that will not reduce crime over the long run but will further diminish and harm both the SANDF and SAPS.”
He stated that the military is neither a crime-fighting organisation nor a backstop to the failures of other departments, and the government should stop trying to use it like one.
“Study after study shows that using the military in a policing role causes more harm. It typically makes them more corrupt, less disciplined, less combat-ready, and more likely to engage in human rights abuses. Some even find it makes crime worse,” according to Olivier.
