By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Minister of Defence and Military Veterans Thandi Modise says the ministry’s policy does not allow them to provide legal aid to former minister of Defence and National Assembly Speaker, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula.
Modise was speaking during a media briefing on Sunday.
The request came as the former speaker faces 12 counts of corruption and one of money laundering after she allegedly solicited bribes from a defence contractor during her time at the helm of the Defence Department.
Mapisa-Nqakula is out of R50 000 bail with conditions.
The ministry revealed that the request came through the Office of the Head of Legal Services at the South African National Defence Force (SANDF). It was Major General Eric Mnisi who actioned such support prior to seeking counsel from the minister or the accounting officer, Secretary for Defence, Dr Thobekile Gamede, it said.
“As to the matter of the former minister of defence’s application for legal assistance, the matter has received attention from ourselves,” said Modise.
“We then looked at the provisions in the law whether we can accede or not to such a request and we found that in terms of section 6.2 of the state legal representative policy that we cannot help the former minister and therefore, we will not be doing so.”
Mapisa-Nqakula maintained her innocence, as she’s done since the 19 March ID raid at her Johannesburg home.
When President Cyril Ramaphosa promoted Mapisa-Nqakula to National Assembly Speaker in his August 2021 reshuffle, he would have been aware of the defence ministry corruption saga — it emerged in 2019 — and her questionable conduct in office when he fined her three months’ salary for giving ANC members a lift to Harare in an air force plane some 10 months earlier.
Reflecting on the performance of the department, Modise said although “not perfect”, the department had made some achievements locally and internationally.
“We have done a number of good things, we’re not perfect. I think we’ve done well, exceedingly well in gender representation. I think we have done very well in when you look at what we have done on the international space, “she said.
“We have undertaken a number of missions – some reluctantly, some a must. Some of them have been such that we have had a national defence force that has had an all-round experience.”
We’re in the DRC, we’re still in Mozambique, we’ve been in CAR, and Burundi. We have started off with a very quick one in Lesotho , we have also undertaken a number of disaster missions. Mozambique again comes up and Zimbabwe. So, we, on the international side, I think we have done well.”
However, the deployment of the SANDF in the DRC has not been without criticism from experts and political parties, who have called for the force’s withdrawal from the area.
Two soldiers have lost their lives in the region, while three more sustained severe injuries after a mortar bomb landed inside one of the South African Contingent’s military bases.