News24 - The SADC is expected to send a regional force into Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province by the end of this week.
- But Mozambique, where the president is not in favour of the deployment, has yet to sign the necessary documents for it to go ahead.
- The SANDF, which forms part of the mission, has deployed soldiers to parts of South Africa to deal with a wave of unrest.
The Southern African Development Community’s Standby Force is expected to be deployed to Mozambique on Thursday, but Mozambique has not yet signed the legal document allowing it to enter the country.
During a security cluster briefing on Tuesday, Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said 15 July was D-Day for the regional force’s deployment to Cabo Delgado.
“However, right up until last night, the status of force agreement had not been signed,” she added.
The deployment may be affected by the current instability in South Africa.
The military was deployed to Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, where riots have broken out, to support an overwhelmed police force.
Despite the riots, Mapisa-Nqakula said she did not believe the situation in the country warranted a state of emergency.
Military
“As you know, a state emergency actually in a sense, you take all the liberties from citizens and the military takes over the country. For now, we do not think we have reached that point.”
Defence chief Major General Simphiwe Sangweni said at the briefing that the military would not be at the forefront of the response to the looting.
“It would not be correct for the military to be on the forefront to deal with criminality,” Sangweni said, adding that soldiers would be deployed to areas where law enforcement officers needed support.
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The decision, however, will be sanctioned by the president.
