Suspense around the findings of a report into the service conditions for South African troops is set to continue.
Minister for defence and military veterans Lindiwe Sisulu announced on Thursday that it is being referred to Parliament’s joint standing committee on defence, rather than the portfolio committee on defence and military veterans.
The joint standing committee on defence, unlike the portfolio committee, meets behind closed doors and has been known to rarely meet in the course of parliamentary work.
The contents of the report have been at the heart of public battles between the minister and the portfolio committee, who had wanted to see the report during the course of legislating the Defence Amendment Bill, which was submitted to President Jacob Zuma to be signed into law.
Opposition MPs have openly criticised the minister’s past refusal to share the findings of the report with Parliament, arguing that it undermined Parliament’s oversight role of the executive.
The DA’s David Maynier went so far as to accuse Sisulu of “fibbing” to parliament, and was kicked out of the National Assembly for his criticism of her conduct.
Cabinet before Parliament
The minister, however, has maintained that the report, done under the auspices of an interim national defence force service commission, had to be seen by cabinet before it could go to Parliament.
Last week, the ANC axed chairperson of the portfolio committee Nyami Booi, citing the spats between the committee and the minister as one of the reasons for his removal.
Sisulu denied, however, that the report would be kept secret saying that there was no reason why the joint standing committee could not share the report in an open hearing.
“I promised this would be done,” she said, when asked whether the report will be made public. “I will be interacting with the committee and I will urge them to make it public.”
She said that the report had been referred to the joint standing committee as it was tasked with overseeing matters relating to the operations and moral of the defence force.
However, during its reshuffle of Parliament, the ANC also axed the joint standing committee chairperson Hlengiwe Mgabadeli.
Thandi Modise, deputy secretary of the ANC, said at the time that the ANC was unhappy with the way the committee had functioned under her, particularly its silence on crucial issues such as the moral and functioning of the defence force.
Sisulu said she was unable to release the report publicly until the report had been through the office of the Speaker of Parliament, for referral to committee. Instead, she read from an executive summary highlighting some of the issues raised by the interim commission.
They included the concerns around the process of integration and transformation of the defence force and recommended that authorities deal with the rearrangement of the “organisational structure, culture and ranking system of the defence force
A further recommendation was that defence spending be ramped up to 2% of GDP after significant reduction in recent years.
Another concern, said Sisulu, was the low morale within the armed forces, which has allowed the outflow of critical expertise.
Soldiers’ poor living conditions were a further concern, as was the dysfunctional relationship between the military command and the defence secretariat, according to Sisulu.
Prior to Thursday’s announcement, however, two interim reports from the commission were sent to the minister.
The first detailed the conditions of service men and women, while the second made recommendations towards the creation of a permanent national defence force commission and highlighted areas in need of further investigation to address the needs of troops.
The second report, which the Mail and Guardian has seen, stated that morale of the troops was low as a result of poor living conditions, poor infrastructure and poor pay. Unless it was improved, it could threaten state security.