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Military Veterans Bill tramples upon reconciliation

Dave Steward, Politicsweb
21 June 2011

MILITARY VETERANS AND THE NEED FOR RECONCILIATION

The 1993 interim Constitution which opened the way to our first universal elections on 27 April 1994 requires that South Africa's "legacy of hatred, fear, guilt and revenge" should henceforth be addressed "on the basis that there is a need for understanding but not for vengeance, a need for reparation but not for retaliation, a need for ubuntu but not for victimisation."

Unfortunately, the spirit of ubuntu is decreasingly evident in the manner in which we deal with the past. The latest assault on national reconciliation has come with last minute revisions to the Military Veterans Bill which is currently before Parliament. The original text of the bill correctly defined veterans as any South African citizens who were involved on all sides of South Africa's ‘Liberation War' from 1960 to 1994; who served in the Union Defence Force before 1961; and who had served in the new South African National Defence Force after 1994.

Then, suddenly at the end of May, the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans decided to excise from the definition of military veterans all those who had served as national servicemen in the SADF and who had served in the old Union Defence Force. As a result, some 600 000 former servicemen who fought in the border wars, World War II and the Korean War would no longer be eligible for veteran benefits. According to the Deputy Minister of Defence conscripts performed a national service and were "not disadvantaged by serving the Defence Force". Responsibility for conscripts finding themselves in destitute circumstances could accordingly "not be blamed on the State".

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