Johannesburg | Monday
THE SA National Defence Force will transfer about 7 700 ”earmarked” soldiers to the police to help in the fight against crime by mid-year.
”The earmarked soldiers are literate and have no criminal records,” Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota said at the weekend.
He said the transfers would free up resources within the SANDF to deal with other pressing issues.
These would take place within the framework established for restructuring the public service.
Lekota said those affected would be transferred with their pensions and other benefits.
The government has committed itself to transferring redundant staff from one department to another, where possible, before embarking on retrenchments.
The police are recruiting 5 000 new staff this year and will employ 16 000 more in the next few years.
It was not immediately clear if the transfers would be in addition to this number or part of it.
The majority of transfers were likely to come from the army’s ageing infantry.
Foot soldiering is a young man’s job but as a result of the integration process that followed the creation of the SANDF in April 1994 and a lack of finance since to recruit youths into the military, the average age of the infantry has climbed into the low thirties.
Mature men in the age group are, however, well suited to the demands of policing in a democracy.
Lekota further said the SANDF was still determined to recruit about 10 000 young men and woman a year for voluntary military service.
During their year of service they would be taught self-discipline and skills required in the economy.
They would also serve as a pool from which to recruit the next generation of soldiers and commanders, Lekota said.
It was not clear when this programme would start.
At present the bulk of the defence budget, including the R2-billion increase announced by Finance Minister Trevor Manuel last month, is being spent on paying for the military’s multi-billion rand arms acquisition programme.
It was unlikely the programme could start before the personnel transfer.
The minister also said the SANDF would be reducing the number of generals it was mustering.
It currently employed 207 generals and admirals, a number some reports have called among the highest in the world.
The SANDF presently has 77 156 members.
Sweden, by comparison, has 15 generals and admirals for a mobilised force of 270 000. In a recent SANDF internal bulletin, released to ”contextualise” a Jonathan Shapiro (Zapiro) cartoon, SANDF representative Major General Chris Pepani said the number was the result of the integration process.
”Owing to the unique process which integrated seven opposing forces into one organisation, it is not possible, and even unfair, to compare the SANDF as it is today with other military forces in the world, or for that matter, the former SADF,” Pepani said.
”All posts are in the process of being evaluated by an equation process and this will in time lead to a more balanced force structure. This process will also determine the appropriate rank level of the different posts in the structure.”
But African Armed Forces Journal editor Peter McIntosh questioned why after eight years of transformation the process was still incomplete –and why they had appointed so many generals in the first place.
”They’ve painted themselves into a corner,” he said.
”Presently, it is not uncommon for brigadiers general to do a job done by a major in any other army.”
The cost of these officers to the defence budget was enormous and if they were to afford the voluntary service programme they would have to prune the numbers significantly, and soon, he said.
Lekota said he was not in favour of retiring the officers immediately.
He said the country had invested resources in them and should first reap some benefit from their accumulated knowledge.
He believed they could be seconded to the United Nations and its various peacekeeping missions in Africa and beyond or to other armed forces.
”That way they can gain experience and bring it back home while exporting the South African experience.”
One country where this would be especially relevant was Afghanistan, the minister said, pointing out that it was at present embarking on a similar process of establishing a national army out of disparate and sometimes antagonistic forces.
Officers sent abroad could be seconded for between three and five years before returning home, writing their reports and then retiring, Lekota said. – Sapa