The star News Online
Thursday, December 14, 2006
A defence force inquiry into Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka's latest "gravy plane" fiasco has been broadened to include all her air travel for the year.
Mlambo-Ngcuka is in the middle of another storm, this time relating to the chartering of a plane owned by information technology billionaire Mark Shuttleworth.
According to reports, the Swiss plane chartered for her trip to the UK at a cost of R4,55-million broke down on Monday and another had to be chartered from Shuttleworth.
The deputy president is also reported to have travelled to Australia recently on a plane hired for R3-million,while another official trip to Portugal and Ireland involved the hiring of a plane owned by businessmen Raymond Ackerman and Aaron Searll.
Mlambo-Ngcuka is entitled to fly in the SANDF's Falcon 900, but there is a shortage of available VIP pilots.
Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota announced at the weekend that a board of inquiry would look into his department's chartering of the Swiss plane. It would also include a probe of the alleged leaks to the media, amid security concerns.
Yesterday, Lekota's office announced that the inquiry would now span the period between January 1 and December 10 this year.
In a statement, the Defence Ministry reiterated that it was responsible for the deputy president's air travel.
In his reaction, Democratic Alliance defence spokesperson Roy Jankielsohn said the defence force's price tag for transporting VIPs would continue to rise as long as the air force's capacity deteriorated.
"The SAAF faces a major crisis due to shortages of pilots and technicians as well as a lack of maintenance of airfields," he said, adding it appeared that a lack of funding was the main reason for the deteriorating capacity.
He said that, between 2004 and October this year, 535 technicians and 70 pilots had quit the SAAF.
"The SANDF's exit mechanisms, designed to get rid of white individuals, together with racial quotas for senior positions, is mostly to blame for this situation."
The SAAF now faced a crisis of who would fly and service not only VIP jets, but also various other aircraft that were costing taxpayers billions of rands over the next few years.
Lack of funds, together with the loss of skills, meant that the air force was operationally ineffective. The most modern military hardware would mean nothing if there were no individuals to operate it or technicians to service it, Jankielsohn said.