The SA National Defence Force (SANDF), with the SA Army in the vanguard, over the weekend buried four soldiers who seemingly succumbed to carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning while on guard duty as part of the SA Police Service (SAPS) led Operation Vala Umgodi to curb illegal mining.
The deaths on 6 July of Lance Corporal LS Mbongwa, privates MS Manganyi, LRT Mpolokeng and MP Nzukela were followed by an inquest performed by a North West provincial district surgeon. Preliminary findings by a SAPS forensic science laboratory (FSL) team from Pretoria had carbon monoxide poisoning as the most probable cause of death. This was ascribed by an SANDF statement attributed to Siphiwe Dlamini, Department of Defence (DoD) Head of Communication (HoC) to “a possible fire made during the cold night inside the container structure” – the soldiers’ bodies were found in a shipping container used as a guard room by their relief on completion of a 24 hour shift at a disused mine in the Orkney area of the North West province.
Apart from making known the dead soldiers’ names and where they were buried, the SANDF in the form of its Acting Director, Directorate Corporate Communication (DCC) Colonel Selinah Rawlins, has not responded to a defenceWeb inquiry. The inquiry was also addressed to SA Army Corporate Communication with – to date – no response. This publication wants to know if a board of inquiry (BOI) will be constituted to investigate the deaths, standard operating procedure (SOP) in the national defence force.
Questions have been raised about the guard detail with one, obviously with knowledge of the South African military, noting radio communication on guard duty is of the “utmost importance”. He has it soldiers standing guard need to report to an ops room hourly. This should be manned by “capable signallers” who again – should – report to the guard commander or officer on duty if no contact is made. Additionally, the officer and NCO on duty are supposed to do rounds regularly to check on guards. In the Orkney incident it appears none of these were done.
