We must have a full-scale parliamentary inquiry into the CAR situation

Note to editors: The following speech was delivered in the National Assembly today by the DA's Shadow Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, David Maynier MP, in response to the statement by the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, on the situation in the Central African Republic.

One month ago, soldiers from 5 Special Forces Regiment were caught in an ambush outside Bangui in the Central African Republic (CAR). 

So began the "Battle of Bangui", which cost the lives of thirteen soldiers, all of whom served in the elite 1 Parachute Battalion. 

These soldiers fought well when the fighting began, killing an estimated 800 rebels, according to the terrible logic of battle, which is: kill or be killed. 

We extend our condolences to the families of the soldiers who lost their lives. 

But, we must now ask the hard questions about why 13 of our soldiers died in a country so strategically insignificant that not one of our 126 ambassadors, and not one of our 39 defence attaches, was even located in the CAR.

We began asking hard questions and calling for special hearings about this deployment weeks before the "authorization letter" from the president was tabled in Parliament.  We were told that the deployment was in fulfillment of an international obligation. 

However, the Memorandum of Understanding, which the Exchange of Diplomatic Notes, signed on 31 December 2012, purported to be extending, had already lapsed on 11 February 2007, ten months previously. 

The Exchange of Diplomatic Notes, surprisingly, contained no Replying Diplomatic Note from the CAR, as required for bi-lateral international agreements.

This raises very serious questions about whether the bilateral agreement, in terms of which the SANDF were deployed to the CAR, was even valid.

We were not told the whole truth about the reasons for the deployment of the SANDF to the CAR. 

First, we were told that the reason for deployment was to assist with capacity building, as well as with disarmament, demobilization and re-integration. 

But, the forces which were deployed, including 5 Special Forces Regiment and 1 Parachute Battalion, were elite combat units, and hardly suited to this task. 

Then, we were told the soldiers were not trainers: they were, in fact, deployed as a "protection force", to provide protection to the 26 trainers already in the CAR. 

But, the 26 trainers did not seem to want protecting: they reportedly elected to remain in their offices in Bangui, and were eventually protected by French armed forces, stationed at Bangui International Airport. 

The real question, however, is not why the SANDF were deployed in the CAR, but why the SANDF were not withdrawn from the CAR. 

The Minister, herself, stated in an interview on 25 February 2013 that, "If anything, in fact, we should be thinking of reducing the numbers once there is stability".

The answer to the question, as the Minister has told us, was that Margaret Vogt, head of the UN in the CAR, requested the SANDF to remain in the CAR to - and here it comes - create a "firewall" to protect Bangui.

The SANDF, it appears, were also deployed, or ended up, in the CAR trying to prevent the Seleka rebels from entering Bangui and seizing power in the CAR.

This, seems to be confirmed, rather obliquely, in the Exchange of Diplomatic Notes, signed on 31 December 2012, in which South Africa clearly undertook to reinforce its forces to, among other things, assist with "saving lives in Bangui".

This is what Parliament and the public was not told about the SANDF deployment to the CAR.

The deployment, no matter how you look at it, was a monumental defence diplomacy failure.

• Francois Bozize, the former president of the CAR, who we supported, fled the country;
• Michel Djotodia, the Seleka rebel leader, who we opposed, has assumed power in the CAR;
• the CAR's defence force, who we trained, "turned" and may have been responsible for luring our soldiers into the first ambush which triggered the firefight; and
• military equipment, including weapons, ammunition and vehicles, which we were supposed to be protecting, had to be abandoned in the CAR.

In the end, South Africa was out-smarted, out-manoeuvred and out-gunned in the CAR.

This is why we need a full-scale parliamentary inquiry to investigate the deployment.

We need to know how it is that President Francois Bozize, who was a dubious character and an unlikely convert to "Ubuntu", the mainstay of our foreign policy, became our most important "client" in the region. 

We need to know how it is that International Relations and Cooperation Minister, who increasingly seems to have been relegated to playing the role of social secretary for the local diplomatic corps, was isolated from decision-making on the CAR.

We need to know the real reason the SANDF was deployed in the CAR. 

But, above all, we need to know how it was that we were drawn into a battle we could not supply, without the right equipment, despite desperate requests for: armoured personnel carriers; light aircraft; transport helicopters; and attack helicopters.

The fact is that our soldiers were left dangling, with both hands tied behind their backs, in a deadly firefight, which eventually lead to the loss of 13 of our soldiers in the CAR.

In the end, Parliament is responsible for oversight of the deployment of the SANDF.

We were told the SANDF was being deployed to assist with training in the CAR.  

We were not told that the SANDF was being deployed to provide protection in the CAR.  

And, we were definitely were not told that the SANDF was being deployed to prevent the Seleka rebels from entering Bangui and seizing power in the CAR.

This is incontrovertible evidence that President Jacob Zuma did not fully inform Parliament about the deployment of the SANDF in the CAR.

If there is a full-scale parliamentary inquiry - and we have access to all relevant documents including the Presidential Minute, Employment Papers and Force Directives - the full horror of what happened in the CAR will be exposed here in Parliament.

Issued by the DA, April 23 2013

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