SA MUST NOT SELL THE FAMILY JEWELS
WHAT every country usually guards like the crown jewels is its intellectual property, or IP, especially when it comes to strategic sectors like military or scientific capabilities.
South Africa possesses particularly valuable IP when it comes to weapons technology, as our stateowned arms company Denel has highly advanced strategic capabilities in terms of technology which many other countries would like to get their hands on.
Saudi Arabia is one of a few countries which has made a bid for joint ventures with Denel so it can transfer our technological know-how back home and build up its own domestic defence industries.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman’s vision is for the state-owned Saudi Arabia Military Industries (Sami) to become the
25th largest defence company in the world by 2030. While Sami is only able to domestically produce 5% of its own weapons, it plans to increase that to 50% by 2030.
To accomplish this goal, Sami needs IP in order to manufacture its own armaments.
It is already deeply worrying that a “Made in South Africa” Seeker II drone was shot down in Yemen. Subsequently, remnants of mortar shells produced by the Joint Venture between Germany’s Rheinmetall and Denel were found in Yemen, having caused civilian casualties.
What lies ahead are allegations that South Africa is complicit in the deaths of children and civilians in Yemen as our armaments are being found in debris next to the bodies.
Sami has already made a bid worth $1 billion (R14bn) to partner with Denel, and it wants an answer by the end of this year. Sami is targeting Denel’s 49% stake in the Joint Venture with Rheinmetall as it wants to be part of the development, design and manufacturing of large calibre ammunition, including artillery shells. Sami has also offered to finance research and development in Denel Dynamics in order to develop and produce tactical missiles and precision guided weapons.
To sweeten the offer, Sami would guarantee the purchase of a certain percentage of Denel’s production annually.
The reason this has been a tempting offer is that Denel is in a serious financial crisis, having just declared an operating loss of R1.7bn for 2017/18. It is unable to pay salaries, suppliers, or deliver on R18bn worth of orders. Without significant and urgent investment, Denel may default on its loans and could even end up liquidated. This would be at a cost of 4 000 jobs.
But the cost to our country’s reputation and moral foreign policy of accepting Sami’s bid, given the raging war in Yemen and ongoing human rights violations, would be far higher in the long run.
We are deciding on this bid at a time when most countries which care about human rights, peace and security are either suspending or reviewing their arms sales to Saudi.
The brutal killing of the Saudi Washington Post columnist
Jamal Khashoggi has heightened international outrage at Saudi Arabia’s human rights abuses, and its seems the killing continues.
Whether in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul or in Saudi prisons themselves, human rights violations are continuing unabated.
Our own Act says under these conditions South Africa cannot sell its armaments or military technology as we are “responsible members of the international community”.