The South African National Defence Force (SANDF) has hundreds of outstanding corruption and fraud cases among its members, totalling above R1 billion.
This was revealed during a presentation by the SANDF to Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Defence.
The SANDF showed a massive backlog of cases with 407 still either under investigation or in court. In the last quarter only 14 cases were concluded, while a further 33 cases were added.
Most concluded cases were for minor offences like fraudulent authorisation of trips and receipts, and fraudulent sick leave.
The most severe convictions were a fine of R6 000 and suspended six months imprisonment for sick note fraud, and two dismissals related to sick leave fraud.
The most recent cases of suspected fraud and corruption occurred between 2019 and 2020, and include a R400 million contract for Covid-19-related equipment; R239 million for a life capability project; R17.9 million for a server rack; and R11.4 million paid for 658 computers before delivery.
A R120-million deal from the 2017/2018 financial year was for the purchase of 20 000 unspecified software licences of which only 15 000 were delivered.
Many of the cases involved hundreds of thousands or millions of rand paid in salaries for work that was not completed, or for tenders that did not follow the right procurement processes.
The high-profile cases go back over the last two decades.
These cases do not include instances of irregular, fruitless, and wasteful expenditure.
New defence minister Thandi Modise apologised for the presentation’s quality and said that MPs were not briefed properly beforehand on the contents to allow for proper questioning.
DA MP Kobus Marais said the state of the cases was a sign of poor management and discipline up to the highest rank and position.