Parliament of South Africa

South Africa Defence Minister Lindiwe Sisulu warned yesterday that her country’s involvement in war torn Somalia could leave it prone to terrorist attacks. She told Parliament SA was under increasing pressure from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to send soldiers to reinforce a peacekeeping mission in Somalia.

Ms Sisulu told the defence and military veterans’ portfolio committee it was precisely for this security reason that the question of SA’s involvement could be raised only after the soccer event was over. The European Union has also asked SA to get involved. The Cabinet had to decide soon whether it would send forces to protect sea lanes from pirates, and land forces to bring stability.

Deputy Defence Minister Thabang Makwetla said South African forces were combat ready but the question was whether there were sufficient numbers for another mission, which would be more peace enforcement than peacekeeping. SA already has a battalion in the Democratic Republic of Congo and one in Darfur and has a detachment in the Central African Republic. Furthermore, lives would probably be lost, Mr Makwetla said.

On the other hand, not sending forces to Somalia would undermine SA’s political standing on the continent, to which it had a responsibility, he said. “We need to start discussions on a very urgent basis.” Ms Sisulu insisted that if South African forces went to Somalia, it would be for a limited period and only as part of a broad, shared
African mission.

Kenya, Uganda and Burundi have more than 500,000 [number as received soldiers in that country. Its only Burundi and Uganda that have almost 6,000 soldiers in Somalia under the African Union peacekeeping mission AMISOM.

SADC has sent a task team to the Horn of Africa to investigate how to protect SADC [southern African regional body] waters from pirates who are moving further and further south along the east African coast. Ms Sisulu said SA was ready to deploy forces to Somali waters.

During the committee meeting, Ms Sisulu locked horns with Democratic Alliance defence spokesman David Maynier over the release of two preliminary reports from the interim defense force service commission, which found that service conditions in the defense force were appalling.

The committee has been in a tussle with the minister since November to get access to the reports, arguing that it needed them to deliberate on the Defense Amendment Bill.

The bill proposes the establishment of a permanent defense force service commission.

Source: Business Day website, Johannesburg

News Report By Abdulaziz Billow
Abdulaziz Billow is AfrobeatRadio’s correspondent for East Africa.