SA defence sector disintegrating

South Africa’s once proud, innovative and highly efficient defence sector  seems to be in a state disintegration under the assault of controversy after controversy, with the present minister of defence often in the middle of some of these controversies.

Over recent times, the sector has  chalked up the following scoreboard:

• The arms-deal corruption scandal that is now being swept under the carpet;
• A soldiers’ strike and violent confrontation with police last year;
• Various breakdowns of discipline leading to scandals and crime both at home and elsewhere on peacekeeping missions;
• The grounding of expensive aircraft due to budgetary and pilot constraints;
• The failure to maintain expensive new frigates and submarines;
• Frequent clashes between the minister and Parliament;
• The demise of South Africa’s defence industry coupled with management squabbles at Armscor; and
• Defence policy seemingly having gone awry.

Now, on top of all of this, the Auditor-General's office last week named and shamed government departments guilty of irregular expenditure in the last financial year. The Department of Defence was top of the league as the worst offender of all.

Perhaps as a somewhat belated remedial effort the chairpersons of parliamentary committees dealing with defence have been fired by the African National Congress. But the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, Lindiwe Sisulu, remains firmly in place.

In a briefing to members of Parliament last week Lashman Kevish, of the AG's office, said that the Department of Defence had racked up more than R1-billion in irregular expenditure, accounting for 43% of the government's total bill of irregular expenditure of just under R3.9-billion in 2009/10.

Almost 50% of all irregular spending was traced to supply-chain management irregularities – procurement fraud and corruption - Kevish told the portfolio committee on public service and administration.

This comes at a time when the police special investigative unit the Hawks announced an end to all investigations into arms-deal corruption, meaning several cases surrounding the arms deal would shelved unresolved. The National Prosecuting Authority under controversial NPA boss Mendi Simelane had earlier this year washed its hands of the arms deal corruption by handing over all arms-deal cases to the Hawks.

The investigations that will now be permanently shelved include

• A R21-million bribe allegedly paid by a company in the German Frigate Consortium to Chippy Shaik, who headed the arms procurement process in the Defence Department and is the brother of convicted corruption criminal Shabir Shaik;
• More than R200-million allegedly paid by British BAE Systems to businessman Fana Hlongwane; and
• More than R154-million in payments linked to former President Thabo Mbeki and members of his cabinet, allegedly made by a German consortium.

However, Britain’s auditing watchdog, the Accountancy and Actuarial Discipline Board (AADB) announced it will investigate KPMG, which advised BAE Systems regarding the payment of "commissions" to influence the awarding of lucrative contracts in South Africa's R47.4-billion arms procurement programme. The body said it will name politicians and businessmen who pocketed more than R1-billion.

Meanwhile the international cooperation, trade and security cluster of ministers, headed by Defence Minister Sisulu, signed a service delivery agreement earlier this month with President Jacob Zuma in which they committed themselves to the achievement of set objectives.

However, shortly afterwards Sisulu and her deputy in this cluster, International Relations and Cooperation Minister Maite Nkoane-Mashabane, backtracked somewhat saying they had no control over time-scales but that their outputs would be measurable.

Sisulu said the objectives are the implementation of the enhanced African agenda and promoting sustainable development, achieving greater regional integration, reforming global governance and increasing trade and investment. To this end, she said, South Africa will participate in international conferences, summit meetings, meetings of international organisations such as the United Nations and African Union and more. These objectives included freedom from want and poverty, and a reduction in absolute poverty for South Africa and Africa.

According to minister Sisulu the future of South Africa “is inextricably linked to Africa and the developing world”. Yet such concerns did not seem to feature when Sisulu signed a defence agreement with Argentina over the weekend (see analysis below).

Parliamentary committee chairs

Meanwhile, in a move that informed sources believe is linked to the many embarrassing problems in the defence sector, the ANC has replaced the chairs of parliamentary committees dealing with defence issues. This followed on the recent cabinet reshuffle by President Zuma which left various parliamentary committees without chairpersons. However, none of the defence committees were affected by Zuma’s reshuffle, so the replacement of these chairpersons means they were effectively fired.

The chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans, Nyamizeli Booi, was removed because the ANC was not happy with the way it functioned and its tense relationship with minister Sisulu. Also replaced was the Joint Standing Committee on Defence chairman Hlengiwe Mgabadeli, whose committee has met only once when she was elected chairperson.

While the ANC said it could not tolerate the kind of tense stand-offs that occurred between Booi and Sisulu, the minister has emerged unscathed. As Booi tried to hold Sisulu accountable to Parliament, it seems this is another case of the messenger rather than the culprit being shot. It is highly doubtful that the changing of the guard at the committees will serve as an effective remedy for the many ailments killing South Africa’s defence sector.