Challenges to human security in the new South Africa

The 1996 South African Constitution clearly defined a progressive concept of national security, stating its aim to ‘reflect the resolve of South Africans, as individuals and as a nation, to live as equals, to live in peace and harmony, to be free from fear and want and to seek a better life.’ The Constitution expressed a vision of a primarily human-centered security, ‘protecting vital freedoms’ and ‘protecting people from critical and pervasive threats and situations’.

In adopting these principles, the State recognised that critical security threats are not merely territorial. Indeed, the Bill of Rights ensures rights to health care, housing and education and requires the state to ‘take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realisation of each of these rights’.

In its 1996 White Paper, the South African Defense Department gave an entirely realistic assessment of the threat climate. It recognised that intrastate, rather than international, conflict was vastly more common on the continent and that no foreseeable conventional military threat existed. Rather, the region faced ‘chronic underdevelopment and the attendant problems of poverty, illiteracy and unemployment, large numbers of refugees and displaced people; an acute debt crisis; widespread disease and environmental degradation; and a proliferation of small arms.’

The overwhelming threat to human security in South Africa is unquestionably HIV/AIDS. In 2001 alone, 3 million South Africans (nearly 7% of the population) died of HIV/AIDS. Crime rates are significant in South Africa and the percentage of small arms and light weapons is very worrying, but no other threat could approach the scale of the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

In 1999 however, the Government decided to spend some R30 billion (around US$4.8 billion, up to R52.7 billion (US$7.7 billion) at time of going to press) on military ships and aircraft. A variety of reasons have been given, including protecting fisheries (submarines) and most important, job creation. The purchase contracts involved a series of barter arrangements, cooperative trade agreements, or ‘offsets,’ which the Government asserted would create 65000 new jobs. It was calculated however, that this meant that each job would cost more than R800000 (over US$122000) which could employ a dozen teachers or nurses.

There was considerable public scrutiny of the arms deal. Numerous parliamentary hearings were held and the public debated the details of the deal, the role of the first world in selling arms to the third world as well as the possible involvement of bribery and other forms of corruption. The South African branch of the international non-governmental organisation the Economists Allied for Arms Reduction (ECAAR-SA) filed a legal suit against the South African government on the grounds that the arms deal was strategically and economically ‘irrational’ and therefore unconstitutional. ECCAR-SA’s case against the government is based on its claim that the constraints imposed on the country’s resources and foreign currency reserves would significantly limit its ability to take the ‘reasonable measures’ to provide its citizens the rights to housing, education and health care required of it by the Bill of Rights: the struggle against apartheid was being betrayed, ECAAR claimed, by a focus on unnecessary military expenditure rather than on social welfare.

On March 4, 2004, the Cape High Court heard the case but dismissed it on jurisdictional grounds, ruling that the suit should have named the Cabinet, rather than the Finance Minister and President, as defendants. ECAAR-SA has filed an appeal, arguing that the suit was filed against those responsible and that the case should be ruled on its merits. ECAAR-SA continues to believe that the Government’s contract with its people is to ensure lasting human security and peace.

Kate Cell

Kate Cell is the Director of the US branch of Economists Allied for Arms Reduction (ECAAR), a UN-accredited NGO which promotes economic analysis and appropriate action on issues relating to peace, security and the world economy.
katecell@ecaar.org
www.ecaar.org

See also

Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, Chapter 2, Section 25 – 27.

Harris, Geoff. The Irrationality of South Africa’s Military Expenditure. Africa Security Review: Volume 11, No. 2, 2002.

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