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SA National Defence Force (SANDF) chief General Solly Shoke says it is untrue that the country’s soldiers are hostile towards President Cyril Ramaphosa, and that those who are spreading the false information are doing so “to create mistrust between the military and the executive”.
Shoke told City Press that “untrue” stories told about the SANDF created a toxic environment that dragged South Africa back to the days when “people were labelled as impimpis and killed because of misinformation”.
“We want people to understand that we are a defence force that belongs to South Africans, and we are a defence force that they must have trust and confidence in,” Shoke said.
“As soon as we meddle in politics, it is a recipe for instability,” he said, citing neighbouring Lesotho as an example.
City Press last month reported on a high-level meeting between the military top brass and Ramaphosa on January 31, when he was warned to resolve the standoff over former president Jacob Zuma’s axing because it was likely to cause instability if it dragged on.
Read: How Ramaphosa 'dodged a coup' - security bosses reveal all
According to highly placed sources in the security cluster, the ANC and government, the army’s top brass was wary that Zuma’s popularity among former Umkhonto weSizwe comrades was being exploited to mobilise sympathy among the forces and that military intelligence had picked up on some of the rumblings.
City Press also had it on good authority that the military and Ramaphosa discussed the ANC’s handling of Zuma’s recall, but Shoke insisted that such a discussion “never happened”.
“We will never allow ourselves to meddle in party politics. We are above party politics and we say it all the time in parades, in meetings and during functions,” he said.
Shoke said the defence force consisted of more than seven former fighting forces that used to fight one another in the past – some from the previous apartheid military sector, others from former Bantustans and some liberation army fighters.
“Had we brought the politics into the defence force, we were going to shoot each other,” he said.
The former allegiances no longer mattered because the soldiers were united, he said, adding that there was stability in the defence force because they did not bring politics into the service.
Shoke said the defence force “should be the crown jewel of the nation and something that people
should try to protect at all costs”.
“It is the inheritance of South Africans and it should make South Africans proud and feel safe,” he said.
ARMY PULLING OUT OF NORTH WEST’S HEALTH DEPARTMENT
During a media briefing on Tuesday, Shoke said the SANDF would no longer continue to assist the North West health department with medical services because the situation there was “almost back to normal” after a months-long strike.
“I am proud to say that the mission has been accomplished and we will be pulling out of North West with immediate effect,” he said.
“Whether or not they will continue to sustain what we had done, it is not in our domain. They have their own executive that would determine that.”
However, he said, the services provided to the Ditsobotla Local Municipality for water and sanitation would continue.
He said he expected that the defence force would be paid for the service because it suffered from serious budget constraints and the army needed “every cent”.
ON CRIME
Shoke also said that the defence force’s mandate was to protect the territorial integrity of the country. However, “as part of our activity, we do assist other state departments”.
“We do not deploy ourselves, we are ordered. And when we are ordered to do something, we never refuse,” he said.
Be that as it may, Shoke said, crime – there have been recent calls for the military to become involved in combatting gang violence on the Cape Flats – was not part of the army’s mandate “and we try to avoid getting involved in combating crime as much as possible”.
“When we come in, we skop and donder, and we do not want ourselves to be in a situation were we are seen to be fighting against our own people.”
ON ZIMBABWE
Before the country’s elections earlier this week, Shoke said that it did not make sense that people did not think Zimbabweans were capable of conducting a peaceful election process without war and conflict, and that the SANDF did not expect any violence.
However, by Wednesday, things had changed as Zanu-PF opposition supporters clashed with police and a state of emergency was declared.
