SA Military Health Service Is Critical

Statement by Nicholas Gotsell MP – DA NCOP Member on Security & Justice:

The SAMHS fund is effectively insolvent at just 3.5% funding level. This leaves 36,000 military veterans and pensioners at risk of losing healthcare cover.

The Democratic Alliance demands immediate intervention following the revelation that the SA Military Health Service Regular Force Medical Continuation Fund (SAMHS) is facing imminent collapse, threatening the healthcare cover of approximately 36,000 military veterans and pensioners.

In a written reply to a parliamentary question posed by the DA, Angie Motshekga, Minister of Defence and Military Veterans, confirmed that the fund is only 3.5% funded, with a monthly shortfall of R40 million, constituting a staggering 50% deficit. Alarmingly, the fund has been disinvesting since November 2023, liquidating its capital base merely to meet monthly expenditure.

These figures, contained in the fund’s Actuarial Valuation dated 31 March 2025, paint a picture of a system in critical failure. A funding level of 3.5% translates to the fund being effectively insolvent, with no realistic prospect of meeting its contractual obligation to provide lifelong healthcare to those who bravely served our nation. It is also an insult to the brave men and women who serve our country and often make life-altering sacrifices to do so.

Worse yet, the Minister’s response offered no immediate plan to protect the 36,000 pensioners who depend on this fund. Instead, she points only to “ongoing engagements” with the National Treasury whilst her Generals continue to purchase luxury vehicles, host golf days under the guise of conducting community outreaches and acts outside their mandate by engaging malignant rogue states.

These so-called engagements have clearly failed to solve the fund’s imminent collapse. This is far from a bureaucratic cash-flow problem but in fact a moral crisis.

The men and women who served in the SANDF, and their families, were promised lifelong healthcare in return for their service, sacrifice, and honour. That promise is now being broken while the department engages in endless talks with Treasury.

Approximately 34% of the ongoing corruption and irregular expenditure investigations by the Hawks and SIU involve the Department of Defence and Military Veterans which, at a conservatively calculation, amounts to R2.1 billion to R2.5 billion. The Department of Defence and Military Veterans cannot be trusted to manage a petty cash box, yet we are expected to believe it can safeguard the lifelong healthcare needs of over 36,000 veterans and the future of every soldier in uniform. That trust has long been broken and is beyond repair.

The DA will not allow this to be swept under the carpet. We will use every oversight mechanism available to ensure that this crisis is addressed with the urgency it deserves, starting with a letter to the Minister of Finance, demanding immediate intervention.