Latest news with #CarlNiehaus
IOL News
3 days ago
- Politics
- IOL News
The silence of the NCACC: A call for accountability in South Africa's arms trade
As the investigative spotlight shines on RDM, the deafening silence from NCACC for nearly two months now only amplifies the urgency of the situation. Image: Supplied It has now been nearly two months since the National Conventional Arms Control Committee (NCACC) held its quarterly briefing on April 4, a meeting that failed to provide real answers but made one thing painfully clear: the cracks in South Africa's arms oversight regime are widening. Multiple Members of Parliament expressed sharp criticism that day, urging the NCACC to take more responsibility for South African weapons potentially finding their way into global conflict zones. Among them was MP Carl Niehaus, who didn't just speak; he acted. He submitted a formal written request demanding clarity on how locally produced munitions are being exported to countries at war, particularly Israel and Ukraine. Since then, no formal response has been received from the NCACC. The Committee has neither acknowledged the inquiry nor provided any clarification regarding the allegations. The concerns raised by Niehaus came in the wake of serious investigative reporting. In early 2024 and into 2025, platforms like Investigate Europe and Open Secrets published detailed exposés on Rheinmetall Denel Munition (RDM), a South African-German joint venture operating shell factories whose exports appear to bypass scrutiny and accountability routinely. The stories link RDM to weapons shipments ending up in Ukraine, Israel, and, previously, Yemen. It's a stark reality that South Africa's own legislation, which prohibits arms exports to countries in active conflict, is being blatantly disregarded. This silence not only underscores a deeper institutional issue but also highlights the alarming lack of accountability in the arms trade. Without clear penalties or deadlines, the NCACC's response to parliamentary inquiries becomes optional, and crucial issues like Niehaus's risk being swept under the rug without any consequences. At a time when the world is scrutinising the arms trade more than ever, South Africa's unregulated export of artillery shells to conflict zones sends a deeply troubling message. As a country that claims to champion peace and neutrality, this undermines South Africa's credibility on the global stage and places it in a morally ambiguous, if not outright condemnable, position. Even more disturbing is the complete lack of response from RDM itself. The company has made no effort to address the accusations or even issue a public statement clarifying its compliance with the NCACC's export regulations. This is not a minor oversight. When your company is being named in connection with possible arms exports to war zones, the absolute minimum response should be transparency. Instead, RDM has chosen the same path as the NCACC complete silence. It's worth asking why. The refusal to engage only deepens suspicions. If there is nothing to hide, then why not speak up? If the company is indeed acting within the legal framework, a brief statement would be enough to at least reassure some of the public and parliamentarians who are now rightfully concerned. If the NCACC cannot respond to a parliamentary inquiry promptly, especially under such circumstances, then what exactly is it doing? Who is it protecting? The public? Or the arms industry? Parliament deserves an answer. * Bayethe Msimang is an independent writer and analyst. ** The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of IOL or Independent Media.
IOL News
18-05-2025
- Politics
- IOL News
Saving the SANDF from collapse requires bold, decisive action
A South African National Defence Force base in Merebank has now become a shelter for homeless individuals from nearby Lamontville. Image: Doctor Ngcobo/Independent Media By Carl Niehaus On Thursday, May 15, 2025, I delivered a speech in the National Assembly (NA) during a debate on the Midterm Strategic Defence Review of the Joint Standing Committee on Defence, originally tabled on March 23, 2023. Representing the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), I addressed the dire crisis facing the South African National Defence Force (SANDF). The SANDF is collapsing, threatening our sovereignty and safety. However, it is not enough to merely criticize and lament its state of decay. We must offer decisive, constructive proposals to turn it around and save it. That is precisely what I did in my speech, and I present its content here as an opinion piece to share these urgent EFF proposals with the broader South African public. The Strategic Review lays bare a SANDF crippled by corruption, maladministration, and a shocking lack of strategic vision. The two-year delay by Parliament in addressing this crisis reflects a shameful failure to prioritize defence. The review, grounded in the 1996 White Paper and the 1998 and 2015 Defence Reviews, shows progress in African representation—rising from 38% in 1994 to 76% today—but this achievement is undermined by systemic rot. A staggering 69% of the defence budget is consumed by salaries, far exceeding the 40% target, leaving equipment maintenance and acquisition starved. The Department of Defence's unfunded organogram is a mockery of accountability, betraying our troops. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ The absence of strategy is a travesty. The SANDF's 'Road to Greatness' document, intended for President Ramaphosa in October 2024, remains secret, withheld from Parliament in a blatant assault on oversight. Our soldiers' disastrous deployment in the SADC Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)—ill-equipped and unsupported — proves the SANDF is incapable of executing foreign missions or ensuring troop safety in its current state. Overextension is killing the force. Beyond defending our borders, the SANDF is burdened with untrained roles like fighting crime, tackling illegal mining, and disaster response, draining resources and eroding readiness. SANDF soldiers deployed under "Operation Corona" at the Free State borderline, Maseru entry port into Lesotho, take the media on a border patrol operation and other engagements onsite. Image: Kamogelo Moichela / IOL The equipment crisis is a national disgrace. Gripen fighters have been unserviceable since 2022; naval frigates and submarines rot without upgrades. The Armscor Dockyard is in shambles, and Project Hoefyster for infantry vehicles is stalled, risking billions in wasteful expenditure. Training has collapsed — Air Force flying hours have plummeted with barely any operational planes. The state of 1 Military Hospital, a dysfunctional construction site for over 15 years, mired in legal disputes over corrupt tenders, is a deadly failure. On April 14, 2025, Warrant Officer M. P. Mncube was denied admission to 1 Military Hospital and tragically passed away. His death, and the loss of heroic soldiers in the DRC, underscores the human cost of this crisis. The EFF dedicates this call to action to their memory. The defence budget, a mere 0.76% of GDP, is an insult compared to the global 2% norm. The Military Skills Development System is skewed, risking future imbalances, and force rejuvenation is stalled, with the average soldier's age now over 40. Without bold intervention, the SANDF will collapse, leaving South Africa defenceless. The EFF's proposals offer the only path to salvation. We demand, as a bare minimum: • The removal of the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, her two ineffective, bungling, deputies, the Chief of the SANDF, and senior command—replaced by capable, accountable leaders. • An independent anti-corruption unit within the Department of Defence, reporting to Parliament, to ensure transparent procurement. • An increase in defence spending to 1.5% of GDP within five years, restoring the 40:30:30 budget ratio for salaries, operations, and capital investment. • A national defence summit to revise the 2015 Defence Review and develop a 10-year modernisation plan. • Improved soldier welfare—better salaries, housing, and healthcare—and a Military Skills Development System aligned with equity targets. • Increased training funds, multinational exercises with BRICS partners, and support for Denel to ensure self-reliance in defence manufacturing. The SANDF's collapse is a crisis we can still avert. These EFF proposals are not mere rhetoric but a roadmap to a disciplined, equipped, and capable defence force. We must act now to honour our soldiers and secure our future, or face consequences far worse than the disastrous DRC deployment. The hour is upon us—South Africa must rise with courage and do what is right. EThis piece is based on the speech I delivered on behalf of the EFF in the National Assembly on May 15, 2025, during the debate on the Midterm Strategic Defence Review of the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. * Carl Niehaus is an EFF MP,. He represents the EFF on the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. ** The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of Independent Media or IOL.
IOL News
18-05-2025
- Politics
- IOL News
Saving the SANDF from collapse requires bold, decisive action
A South African National Defence Force base in Merebank has now become a shelter for homeless individuals from nearby Lamontville. Image: Doctor Ngcobo/Independent Media By Carl Niehaus On Thursday, May 15, 2025, I delivered a speech in the National Assembly (NA) during a debate on the Midterm Strategic Defence Review of the Joint Standing Committee on Defence, originally tabled on March 23, 2023. Representing the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), I addressed the dire crisis facing the South African National Defence Force (SANDF). The SANDF is collapsing, threatening our sovereignty and safety. However, it is not enough to merely criticize and lament its state of decay. We must offer decisive, constructive proposals to turn it around and save it. That is precisely what I did in my speech, and I present its content here as an opinion piece to share these urgent EFF proposals with the broader South African public. The Strategic Review lays bare a SANDF crippled by corruption, maladministration, and a shocking lack of strategic vision. The two-year delay by Parliament in addressing this crisis reflects a shameful failure to prioritize defence. The review, grounded in the 1996 White Paper and the 1998 and 2015 Defence Reviews, shows progress in African representation—rising from 38% in 1994 to 76% today—but this achievement is undermined by systemic rot. A staggering 69% of the defence budget is consumed by salaries, far exceeding the 40% target, leaving equipment maintenance and acquisition starved. The Department of Defence's unfunded organogram is a mockery of accountability, betraying our troops. The absence of strategy is a travesty. The SANDF's 'Road to Greatness' document, intended for President Ramaphosa in October 2024, remains secret, withheld from Parliament in a blatant assault on oversight. Our soldiers' disastrous deployment in the SADC Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)—ill-equipped and unsupported — proves the SANDF is incapable of executing foreign missions or ensuring troop safety in its current state. Overextension is killing the force. Beyond defending our borders, the SANDF is burdened with untrained roles like fighting crime, tackling illegal mining, and disaster response, draining resources and eroding readiness. SANDF soldiers deployed under "Operation Corona" at the Free State borderline, Maseru entry port into Lesotho, take the media on a border patrol operation and other engagements onsite. Image: Kamogelo Moichela / IOL The equipment crisis is a national disgrace. Gripen fighters have been unserviceable since 2022; naval frigates and submarines rot without upgrades. The Armscor Dockyard is in shambles, and Project Hoefyster for infantry vehicles is stalled, risking billions in wasteful expenditure. Training has collapsed — Air Force flying hours have plummeted with barely any operational planes. The state of 1 Military Hospital, a dysfunctional construction site for over 15 years, mired in legal disputes over corrupt tenders, is a deadly failure. On April 14, 2025, Warrant Officer M. P. Mncube was denied admission to 1 Military Hospital and tragically passed away. His death, and the loss of heroic soldiers in the DRC, underscores the human cost of this crisis. The EFF dedicates this call to action to their memory. The defence budget, a mere 0.76% of GDP, is an insult compared to the global 2% norm. The Military Skills Development System is skewed, risking future imbalances, and force rejuvenation is stalled, with the average soldier's age now over 40. Without bold intervention, the SANDF will collapse, leaving South Africa defenceless. The EFF's proposals offer the only path to salvation. We demand, as a bare minimum: • The removal of the Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, her two ineffective, bungling, deputies, the Chief of the SANDF, and senior command—replaced by capable, accountable leaders. • An independent anti-corruption unit within the Department of Defence, reporting to Parliament, to ensure transparent procurement. • An increase in defence spending to 1.5% of GDP within five years, restoring the 40:30:30 budget ratio for salaries, operations, and capital investment. • A national defence summit to revise the 2015 Defence Review and develop a 10-year modernisation plan. • Improved soldier welfare—better salaries, housing, and healthcare—and a Military Skills Development System aligned with equity targets. • Increased training funds, multinational exercises with BRICS partners, and support for Denel to ensure self-reliance in defence manufacturing. The SANDF's collapse is a crisis we can still avert. These EFF proposals are not mere rhetoric but a roadmap to a disciplined, equipped, and capable defence force. We must act now to honour our soldiers and secure our future, or face consequences far worse than the disastrous DRC deployment. The hour is upon us—South Africa must rise with courage and do what is right. EThis piece is based on the speech I delivered on behalf of the EFF in the National Assembly on May 15, 2025, during the debate on the Midterm Strategic Defence Review of the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. * Carl Niehaus is an EFF MP,. He represents the EFF on the Joint Standing Committee on Defence. ** The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of Independent Media or IOL.
IOL News
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- IOL News
The Centenary of Afrikaans as an Official Language: From Beacon to Bludgeon
IOL EFF MP Carl Niehaus slams Afrikaans at 100, calling it a fallen language of exclusion—not celebration—and urges a radical reclaiming of its lost dignity. Image: File By Carl Niehaus This year, South Africa commemorates the centenary of Afrikaans as an official language, a milestone that ought to inspire pride but instead lays bare a troubling reality. What was once a language of profound literary and cultural potential has been vulgarized, stripped of its intellectual and artistic depth, and transformed into something far uglier: a cabal exclusionist sjambok, wielded to beat down, abuse, and insult other cultures. Far from being a beacon of cultural advancement and upliftment, Afrikaans has, in many contemporary contexts, devolved into a crude instrument of white supremacy, separatism, and exclusion—a language of the gutter, its once-vibrant legacy now akin to stinking sewer water seeping down the roads of our shared nation. The Afrikaans of yesteryear bore the hallmarks of greatness. Writers like N.P. van Wyk Louw, D.J. Opperman, Breyten Breytenbach, and André Brink crafted works of staggering depth, their poetry and prose wrestling with the complexities of identity, history, and humanity. Etienne Leroux's Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! stood as a literary monument, dissecting the Afrikaner psyche with wit and existential gravitas. This was a language that could transcend race and culture, its music and literature capable of stirring souls across divides. Afrikaans was once a vehicle for universal truths, a medium through which the human condition could be explored with elegance and empathy. Today, that legacy feels like a distant memory. The cultural output of modern Afrikaans has largely abandoned sophistication for banality, pandering to the most simplistic and base instincts of its audience. Popular music, exemplified by the likes of Kurt Darren's Hop, Hop, Spinnekop—with its repetitive three-word chorus and rudimentary rhyme—lacks the ambition to inspire or endure. Literature and art, too, have lost their intellectual rigor, replaced by creations that prioritize accessibility over depth, amusement over meaning. The Afrikaans cultural scene, once a crucible of creativity, now revels in its coarseness, its offerings devoid of the transcendence that once defined them. This vulgarization is not merely a cultural decline; it is a betrayal of what Afrikaans could have been. Worse still, the language has been weaponized, twisted into a tool of division and domination. Instead of fostering unity or advancing shared cultural ideals, Afrikaans has, in many instances, become a vulgar racist instrument, used to swear at, insult, and demean fellow South Africans. It is no longer the kombuistaal—the 'kitchen language' spoken by ordinary people, workers, and communities with a shared sense of humanity. Today, it often feels like a language of the gutter, its words dripping with the venom of exclusion, separatism, and white supremacist undertones. The sjambok of Afrikaans is brandished not to uplift but to lash out, to assert dominance over others, and to entrench division in a nation already scarred by its past. This transformation is deeply striking, a wound to the soul of what Afrikaans once represented. The language's potential to bridge divides has been squandered, replaced by a rhetoric of cultural self-determination that often masks a desire for isolation and superiority. Figures like Kallie Kriel and Ernst Roets advocate for the protection of Afrikaans and Afrikaner culture, but their vision seems to protect little more than a hollow shell. What is there to safeguard when the language's modern expressions are so often crude, divisive, and devoid of intellectual or moral substance? Dololo—nothing. The Afrikaans they defend feels like a relic, its vitality drained by a refusal to evolve, to embrace inclusivity, or to reclaim the universal aspirations of its literary giants. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. 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Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Next Stay Close ✕ Where is the Afrikaner intelligentsia in this moment of crisis? Have they, too, abandoned their language, repelled by the rudeness and crudeness of its contemporary manifestations? One cannot blame them entirely. The Afrikaans of today, in its worst incarnations, is a far cry from the language that once produced works of global significance. Its descent into a tool of racial and cultural exclusion has alienated those who might have carried its torch forward. The intellectuals, the artists, the thinkers who could have revitalized Afrikaans seem to have retreated, leaving the language to be defined by its loudest, most divisive voices. The centenary of Afrikaans as an official language should have been an opportunity to celebrate a living, evolving culture—one that uplifts, unites, and inspires. Instead, it serves as a requiem for a language that has lost its way. Afrikaans could have been a beacon, illuminating paths toward mutual understanding and cultural richness in a diverse South Africa. Yet, in its current state, it often feels like a sewer, its potential drowned in the muck of prejudice and pettiness. To reclaim Afrikaans, to restore its dignity, requires a radical reimagining—a rejection of its role as a weapon of exclusion and a return to its roots as a language of humanity, creativity, and connection. Without such a reckoning, the centenary is not a celebration but a lament, a reminder of how far Afrikaans has fallen from its once-lofty heights. Carl Niehaus is an EFF Member of Parliament (MP) * The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.
Eyewitness News
09-05-2025
- Politics
- Eyewitness News
Political parties in Parliament differ on whether whites-only settlements should exist
CAPE TOWN - Political parties in Parliament have differed on whether whites-only enclaves like Orania should be allowed to exist or should be integrated with the rest of society. They were taking part in an Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF)-sponsored debate in the National Assembly, which called the enclaves like Orania and Kleinfontein "a threat to nation building, non-racialism and social cohesion". EFF MP Carl Niehaus kicked off the debate and said that the settlements posed a threat to the country. READ: 'You'll find racists everywhere': Orania 'growing' 30 years into democracy "These are not mere settlements, they are deliberate hateful strongholds of racial segregation meticulously designed to fracture our nation and sabotage non-racialism." But FF Plus MP, Dr Corné Mulder, said that the communities of Orania and Kleinfontein did not originate overnight and had every right to exist. "They are the products of a long, negotiated process between responsible leaders. These negotiations led to the signing of an accord on Afrikaner self-determination on the 23rd of April in 1994."
