Prevention of theft of official vehicles of the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) in the Gauteng Province

摘要

The South African National Defence Force (SANDF) was formed in 1994 after theintegration of different “defence forces” into one large force. The sole existence of theSANDF is to protect the borders of the Republic of South Africa and its inhabitants.Resources such as vehicles make it easier for the SANDF to conduct mobile patrolsand other operations to ensure that the organisation is always combat-ready.Motor vehicle theft is a crime that affects both individual citizens and organisations inSouth Africa; the SANDF is not immune to the crime. Many SANDF motor vehicles arestolen almost every day, and in most cases, these vehicles are taken without a trace.While there are security measures in place aimed at preventing theft of SANDFvehicles but these methods have proven futile.A literature review formed the basis of the study. Once the main theory and ideologieswere identified, unstructured interviews were undertaken to gather information fromvarious stakeholders. Observations were also conducted to determine behaviouralpatterns within military bases/units with regard to the parking of SANDF vehicles, evenwhen the vehicles were parked in urban settings. Essentially, there is a problemregarding the security of SANDF vehicles and also the security within military bases /units. This study indicated that the SANDF loses vast amounts of money due to motorvehicle theft in Gauteng Province. The findings also revealed that the current vehiclesecurity measures are outdated, ineffective and inadequate in preventing SANDFvehicles from being stolen.The recommendations are that the SANDF must invest more of its budget on vehiclesecurity, rather than continuing with fruitless and monetary expenditure by conductingBoard of Inquiries (BOI) or lengthy investigations in an attempt to relocate stolenvehicles or to determine how a particular vehicle was stolen. The SANDF requires acomprehensive system that should prevent the theft of its vehicles, as well as curbingthe misuse of vehicles which ultimately renders SANDF vehicles as easy targets.