SA’s flawed security strategy masks deepening state and economic crisis: Katzenellenbogen

Key topics:

• SA’s security plan lacks clarity, listing broad and vague threats

• Economic collapse fuels instability, crime, and national vulnerability

• Poor governance erodes defence capacity and regional influence

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By Jonathan Katzenellenbogen*

Last week President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office released the government’s National Security Strategy, or rather a cut down version of the full document on the subject produced last year.

The idea behind coming up with this redacted public document a year after its release within a small circle in the government is to maintain secrecy. Many parliamentary democracies only release a redacted version, but they use this as a chance to get a clear message across.

They want to tell the world what they consider to be the greatest threats to the state and the nation and how they intend to deal with these. It is a way to tell your enemies to watch out, we have an eye on you, and this is what we might do.

And it is a way of telling a domestic audience, including parliamentarians, that this is where the government should spend its money and why this should be supported. It is also a way for the intelligence agencies and armed forces of a country to say to the world and the taxpayers that they are on top of things.

But not in South Africa. Almost every possible threat to national security from climate change to gender-based violence to disinformation to drug taking by youngsters is mentioned in generic terms in the redacted document. That is because the ANC believes the state should have an all-encompassing role, including that of shaping national identity. Hence the very long list of threats mentioned in the report. There is no convincing ranking of the threats or an indication of their probability.

The extensive breadth of the threats it mentions allows the drafters to say: “we told you so,” even in the case of say a meteorite strike.

Remote threat

That is why the most dramatic but very remote threat of a coup made headlines last week. We should have at least heard in detail what the intelligence agencies clearly regard as at least the top five threats.

We know what the Trump administration regards as its top security threats. Clearly border security and illegal migration head the Trump administration list. Next is bringing back manufacturing to the US and using tariffs as a weapon to achieve this and punish countries the Trump White House does not see as playing by the rules in foreign policy and trade. Third, and related to this, is securing US supply chains in key areas like rare earth minerals.

Then there is the push for the US to remain competitive in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and the life sciences. Its defence and foreign policy posture is aimed at achieving US aims in the Middle East, countering China, and selectively supporting European allies against Russia.

It can be messy in implementation, but the US strategy is a lot more straightforward than South Africa’s long list of threats. According to the National Security Strategy document South Africa’s most immediate threats are: illegal migration, service delivery, corruption, poverty, unemployment and inequality, health epidemics, illicit mining, organised crime and human trafficking, illicit financial flows, substance abuse, gender-based violence, extortion and damage to infrastructure, cybersecurity, mushrooming of charismatic churches that abuse their followers, energy and water security, and violent extremism.

One cannot dispute these as serious threats to our national fabric, but what gives some of these wings is our miserable economic growth rate, high unemployment, and the collapse of the state and municipalities. Collapse itself is the most severe cause of our growing threats and ability to deal with them. And that is the result of the ANC’s own goals.

Illegal migration into South Africa might be in greater numbers if our economy was thriving, but our ability to deal with the problem is eroded by absence of revenue and the poor management of the state.

Refusal

There is a worrying refusal to see that the growing range of threats is in large measure due to our negligible economic growth and the collapse of public enterprises, the spread of corruption, the decline of law and order and advanced urban decay.

Growth at below one percent, when the population growth rate is about 1.3% means we are getting poorer. Youth unemployment at over 50 percent has to pose a very serious threat to our national stability. It might have been very different, but with the collapse of public enterprises and the rise of a bureaucratic state, investors have been chased away and growth is minimal.

The serious threats the report highlights certainly exist. Due to a series of own goals, the threat to national security from domestic disorder, supply interruption to power and water, as well as serious disruptions to imports and exports due to the poor state of Transnet might just happen.

Addressing economic growth and government corruption and incompetence should be the overwhelming priorities of a national security strategy. It is in an environment of low growth and state collapse that public violence and radical populist extremist movements and organised crime can thrive.

With pressures on government services like health care, a large number of foreign migrants can easily become a source of mass protest. Add that to protests against increases in power charges by Eskom and rising prices, in an environment of job lay-offs, threats to national security are almost a given.

Second to boosting economic growth, ensuring proper management and funding of the defence force and police should be the absolute priority.

Negligible growth

Negligible growth, which means low tax revenue, when added to mismanagement means a diminished defence and security posture. The withdrawal of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the face of attacks by Rwanda and M23 insurgent forces has, at least for the time being, ended our larger regional role.

We simply did not have the wherewithal to bring sufficient firepower to bear to defend our forces. Now the US seems to have taken over our role as peacekeeper in the region by brokering a peace deal between Rwanda and the DRC.

As we are no longer a regional military and diplomatic power, it means that we can do a lot less about regional threats. Regional wars are ultimately bound to have an impact on us, whether it is through the spread of weapons and jihadism or an increase in migrants.

Our foreign policy positioning has also not helped. If the ANC were nimble it could come up with an answer to the four US demands to improve relations: denounce kill the Boer chants, effectively deal with farm attacks and murders, not expropriate land without compensation, and not apply empowerment rules to the US.

There is also the risk that the US posture might yet harden. The ANC might then seek to further embrace Russia, China, and Iran, complicating our national security and making our life difficult with the west and the US.

We can but hope that something can save us from a perfect storm.

*Jonathan Katzenellenbogen is a Johannesburg-based freelance journalist.

This article was first published by Daily Friend and is republished with permission.