"The South Africa/Lesotho border fence has been stolen..."

The South Africa/Lesotho border is wide open, making local residents in the border areas vulnerable to transnational crime - especially stock theft.

We found, during a visit to the South Africa/Lesotho border in the Golden Gate-Clarens-Fouriesburg area, that:-

• the borderline fence does not - for all practical purposes - exist with large parts of the fence and many fence poles having been stolen [see photograph below]
• the SAPS borderline security unit is ineffective because there are too few borderline police - there are approximately 30 police officers to protect 130 kilometres of landward border, that is 1 policeman for every 4.3kms;
• the SAPS Stock Theft Unit is also ineffective - the unit has 3 police officers with 13 vacant posts.

Residents associations are therefore forced to spend hundreds of thousands of rands each year on borderline security, effectively privatizing borderline security on the South Africa/Lesotho border.

The state of borderline security is shocking and is not restricted to the South Africa/Lesotho border. South Africa 's 4862 kilometre landward border is protected by just 684 police officers, which is the equivalent of deploying approximately one police officer every seven kilometres of landward border.

Moreover, in this financial year the SAPS plans to spend more on "VIP Protection Services" (R380 004 000) than on "Borderline Security" (R224 969 000). The fact is that we spend more on bodyguards than we spend on borderline security.

The SANDF must urgently be deployed back to protect the borders of South Africa.

Statement issued by David Maynier MP, Democratic Alliance shadow minister of defence and military veterans, July 20 2009

David Maynier MP (right) Democratic Alliance shadow minister of defence with deputy James Lorimer MP, on the SA Lesotho border.

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