The Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans (PCDMV) maintains South Africa’s security and stability faces “a significant threat” if underfunding of the SA National Defence Force (SANDF) continues.
This conclusion comes from a statement following a National Treasury (NT) briefing this week (Wednesday, 9 October).
The statement, on one hand, calls for “a strong defence force” as being “critical” to a safe environment fostering investor confidence which, in turn, will see economic growth.
On the other hand, the statement, issued in the name of PCDMV chair Dakota Legoete, has it the SANDF must use the funds it is given responsibly. This is seemingly not always the case, evidenced by increased irregular expenditure totalling R3.4 billion in the Department of Defence (DoD).
The NT presentation had it there are concerns about financial strain resulting from prolonged and open-ended peacekeeping missions, particularly in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and increased domestic deployments.
Funding-wise, the NT presentation had it since 2017/18 defence received additional funding to the tune of R13 billion. Defence was also accommodated in the adjustments budget and the normal medium term expenditure framework (MTEF) “processes”. A further NT allocation is R4 billion over the next three years for border security focussing on “border safeguarding technology as force multipliers”.
By contrast Angie Motshekga’s other ministerial responsibility – military veterans – and the responsible department does not have “budget related challenges”.
Instead “crippling inefficiencies and underspending” hamstring it to the extent it is rated one of the highest underspending government departments at R260 million. NT has it a factor contributing to the underspend is late promulgation of military veterans’ pension benefit regulations, warning it is worsening and “could affect future budget allocations”.
The PCDMV intends to meet Parliament’s Standing Committee on Appropriations (SCA) “to look at the DoD can be assisted with funding constraints”.
