The South African military veterans database currently has over 87 000 names on it from 10 organisations representing national defence and former liberation forces with an admission by the Department of Military Veterans (DMV) that database applications “change daily” as members come forward.
A list of organisations was supplied to National Assembly (NA) Member of Parliament (MP) Chris Hattingh as part of response to a Parliamentary question asked of Defence and Military Veterans Minister Angie Motshekga early in March. Hattingh, the senior Democratic Alliance (DA) spokesman on defence and military veterans supported by Maliyakhe Shelembe and Nicholas Gotsell sought ministerial input on the status of the long-awaited and still incomplete old soldiers’ database.
The 10 organisations, in no particular order, with number of veterans for each is MK (uMkhonto we Sizwe) with 14 293; APLA (Azanian Peoples’ Liberation Army) with 5 612; SADF (SA Defence Force) with 45 839; SANDF (SA National Defence Force) with 14 927; TDF (Transkei Defence Force) with 2 100; VDF (Venda Defence Force) with 457; BDF (Bophuthatswana Defence Force) with 1 952; CDF (Ciskei Defence Force) with 1 001; UDF (United Democratic Front) with 340 and AZANLA (Azanian National Liberation Army) with 608. The total is 87 129, as per the Ministerial reply.
Explaining the number changes, the response reads “the number of statutory forces database applications changes daily as application are submitted via walk-in at DMV headquarters, provincial offices, emails, etc. therefore we cannot provide the exact outstanding number as the DMV is experiencing a huge influx of applications”.
A February 2024 presentation to the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans (PCDMV) has it 2 452 NSF (non-statutory force) military veteran applications are still to be verified in the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, Northern Cape and Western Cape provinces.
The backlog, Hattingh was informed, is being addressed by the DMV where acting Director-General Nontobeko Mafu is the senior civil servant. “The clearance of the backlog, coupled with regular communication to applicants for submission of outstanding supporting documents within the fixed application process time in line with an updated standard operating procedure (SOP) will help improve the length of the entire processing period” the applicable portion of the Motshekga response reads.
Handling this “huge influx” brought response from the DMV. It used the official DMV website to make public a new email address for veterans to use when applying for registration. The new address is [email protected].
The DMV is supposed to notify applicants of the outcome of their application for a benefit within 30 working days from the date of their application. “Though the DMV would like to have a shorter process to register military veterans on the DMV database and process their applications for benefits, it is not always achieved depending on the completeness of require documents. The length of the process depends on how soon the required documents are submitted,” Mothsekga’s response said.
She added that having a Force Number does not entitle anyone to benefits. “For an applicant to be considered for a benefit such an applicant must apply and qualify in terms of the Military Veterans Benefits Regulations (2014).”
