It is paradoxical that the present South African authorities in this case Denel and its defenders in the Government of National Unity find themselves on the back foot on this issue (Denel, arms and the law, July 25 to 31).
Quite rightly, the media has, by and large, taken issue with the authorities on their coyness in allowing free and open publication of the governments intentions to peddle arms around the world.
Two issues need to be raised.
Why, in the first place, must arms be sold? Of course I understand that we have a buoyant arms industry, a healthy product of a policy that kept millions of Africans oppressed by Pretoria in the days of apartheid, and that jobs have to be protected and so on. Surely we have sufficient creative brains in that industry to ensure it is used only to service our own countrys interest, without arming other nations to the teeth? Spare capacity in production should be put to use in the manufacture of other products that do not have the same destructive power as munitions.
Secondly, why does our government insist on hawking arms to countries that require an improvement in their quality of life, not the destruction of it? Our country has far healthier commodities with which to trade and which would lead directly to an improvement in the quality of life of the people of this great continent.
Apart from tangible products, we also have intangibles, like our ability, expertise and experience in resolving conflict through negotiation, and in introducing programmes in capacity building.
We seem determined to replace the weapons previously supplied by the American and Eastern Bloc imperialists with those from Southern Africa. That is unacceptable. It is even more unpalatable if we are going to be censored in the information that the government supplies us regarding its trade in arms. It should desist forthwith. The Most Reverend Njongonkulu Winston Hugh Ndungane, Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town
* Congratulations on your stance on the Denal arms deal. A free and vibrant press is essential if our much-vaunted Constitution is to be worth anything more than the paper it is written on.
Could you please direct me to the British newspaper or any other newspaper reporting the R7-billion arms deal , so that I can find out which Middle Eastern country is the arms recipient? Keep on writing the truth, no matter what. Ben Friedman, Johannesburg
l Unfortunately, the M&G has been temporarily interdicted from revealing the name of the Middle Eastern country. However, our sister publication in the United Kingdom, The Guardian, did so last weekend. The editor
n THANK you for the brilliant leader on press freedom (When watchdogs were silent, July 18 to 24).
I hope the courts not only support your contentions but strengthen them. The M&G has broken more news than any other newspaper since the introduction of a new Constitution.
I also hope you will be able to continue to infuriate and expose the pompous and the corrupt. A weekend without the M&G would be the start of the Grey Ages here. Jane Raphaely, Cape Town