Pretoria - The South African National Defence Force (SANDF) has unveiled “lighter and faster mobility packages” to be used to fight crime along the country’s borders.
The SANDF showed off the 4x4 Toyota Land Cruisers this week during the launch at Pongola in KwaZulu-Natal, along the country’s border with Swaziland, which also links with Mozambique.
They are fitted not only with safety and security measures, but they also have medical support equipment and facilities for the troops patrolling on the ground.
They carry five passengers, excluding the driver and co-driver, and have a fifth seat.
It is called the “jump seat” to be used mostly during joint operations with other security departments such as the SAPS.
The SANDF’s Colonel Lucky Sangweni said the launch of the vehicles was to ensure the safety and security of people, as well as to protect the economy and the country.
“There is a high number of cross-border movement of undocumented persons coming from neighbouring countries into the country and vice versa.
“There is also a high influx of illegal goods and contraband into the country.
"In most cases, contraband and nicotine are brought into the country, it is very rare to find them going out of the country to our neighbours,” he said.
“We are sometimes faced with rare situations.
"This week, members of the SAPS confiscated rare stones intended to cross the border out of the country.
“There is also smuggling of illegal weapons, drugs and stolen stock across the border.”
The theft of livestock was mainly on the side of the Lesotho border, he said.
In Swaziland it was mainly dagga, and car theft at the Mozambique border.
He said car theft from South Africa to neighbouring countries was very high along the borders. “Our main focus is our South Africa-Mozambique border because over the past few years things have spiralled out of hand as criminals steal vehicles from all over the country and channel them to the area of Mangozi and up the Mozambique border because it is seen as the weakest,” he said.
That area had therefore become their main focus area, said Sangweni. He was confident enough to say there had been a huge improvement as a result.
There are 29 vehicles in KwaZulu-Natal, which will be used to patrol the Swaziland and Mozambique borders, with more expected to arrive.
A total of 435 vehicles will be distributed to the different border lines, with Mpumalanga and Limpopo next in line.
SANDF chief of joint operations Lieutenant-General Barney Hlatshwayo said the launch of the vehicles was achieved through the assistance of the CSIR and the University of Pretoria’s engineering faculty. Both institutions had assisted with the modification of the vehicles and in keeping their warranty.
“When we tried to modify the first batch of vehicles in the past we realised we would lose the warranty, but with the assistance of the university and the CSIR on safety measures, among others, we managed to secure the warranty of the cars even with the modification,” he said.
Hlatshwayo said KwaZulu-Natal would eventually have 102 vehicles, which would be of great assistance in the fight against criminal activities along their border lines.
The launch was accompanied by a demonstration by troops on how they caught criminals at borders.
Pretoria News