War veterans’ reparations open to abuse
IT IS a tragedy what is happening with the country’s disgruntled war veterans if they have a valid point that the government has neglected them when they have fought for the liberation of this country.
But where have these “veterans” been all along? The veterans of the so-called non-statutory forces of the ANC, PAC and other liberation movements were absorbed into the army and other security services of the country, such as the police and intelligence services, way back in the mid-1990s. Some received pensions and their children educational bursaries.
After more than 20 years, where is this group from? Are they perhaps veterans who, indeed, received some compensation and subsequently fallen on hard times? If that is the case, they cannot claim that nothing was ever done for them.
And one of their demands is seriously disturbing: that is, their call that they each be allocated R2 million for their participation in the Struggle.
That is going to open a very serious challenge for the government and the country. For example, there are thousands of people out there who were not formally part of these structures but who opposed and fought apartheid. What about them? What if they also rise up and demand “reparations” from the government?
What are the political parties of these “veterans” saying about this issue? Have they or are they involved in vetting that, indeed, these people calling themselves veterans were in the liberation Struggle?
Of course, that is a difficult and complex issue to determine because of the secrecy of the liberation Struggle for security reasons. But there should be ways of determining their credibility or else we are going to have chancers who are going to take advantage of the situation.