UNLAWFUL USE OF SOLDIERS AS GATE GUARDS BY THE DEPUTY MINISTER OF DEFENCE
SANDU HQ, Pretoria, Friday, 24 April 2015
SANDU condemns the unlawful and illegal employment and deployment of 12 soldiers from 4 SA Infantry Battalion, who have been used since February 2015 as gate guards at the private residence of the Deputy Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, Kebby Maphatsoe (see EWN report).
This constitutes a flagrant violation of the Defence Act and the SA Constitution’s prescriptions and requirements relating to the utilisation of the SANDF for civilian duties. The protection of Cabinet members and their deputies remains an SAPS function, carried out by the SAPS VIP Protection Unit.
The utilization of the soldiers in the aforementioned role is even more objectionable, given the fact that VIP police protectors already guard the Deputy Minister, a fact that his office now falsely seeks to deny. Furthermore, Matphatsoe’s spokesman’s explanation that he lives in a cluster home is also a blatant lie as he lives in a security complex which has its own security guards.
Kebby Maphatsoe seems to think that his status and appointment entitles him to act above the law and affords him special privileges. Maphatsoe will do well to remember that the SANDF is not his fiefdom and that soldiers are not guerrilla bush fighters to be utilised at his leisure.
The fact that the SANDF refuses to authorise the payment of allowances to the 12 affected soldiers provides proof that the deployment is unlawful and irregular. The soldiers are rightly aggrieved and, under the circumctances, demand to be sent back to their base. They are being grossly misused as private gate swingers when this country has spent thousands of tax Rands to train them as combat Infantry soldiers.
SANDU demands that the Department of Defence immediately address this irregularity and take decisive action against Maphatsoe who is an embarrassment to the Department and South Africa.
The Deputy Minister must be fired.
If this issue is not addressed immediately, SANDU will take legal action and obtain a court order to remedy the situation.
Statement issued by Adv JG (Pikkie) Greeff, SANDU national secretary, April 24 2015
