Sadc: Hub of peace and security

sponsored divisions, regime change projects, exploitation, hunger and famine. To date, Sadc has proved its unity of purpose and vision that it has emerged a vital cog in the both the regional and continental security architecture since its establishment in 1992.

Sadc’s outstanding central area of collaboration has been envisioned security, peace and stability understood within a broadened human security framework in member states. No one doubts that of Africa’s regional blocs, Sadc is most peaceful and united of them all and has managed to defend its purpose of existence. It is important, therefore, to understand that peace and security – including food security – is from the outset, one of the cornerstones of integration in Sadc as the leaders believed that the formation of a security-stable community would help dismantle the enmities that plagued

regional relations during the colonial and apartheid era.
It is critical to note that for member states and regional leaders, institutionalisation of relations pointed to a means of stabilising and disseminating a particular order that is now synonymous with the region. Such institutions depict the power relations prevailing at the time of their establishment, which, however, can change over time, hence Sadc has moved with time and sought to harmonise and synchronise election frame works for its member states.

But Sadc has moved further to defend its territory by coming up with a Standby Force or brigade – a disciplined military outfit, always ready to do duty in trouble spots in the region and in on behalf of the African Union. This in itself underpins the required institutional framework to enable co-operation on security, both in terms of narrow military co-operation and regarding designated softer security issues, such as migration and cross-border crime.

The military cooperation moved forward in the early years after 1994 with the 1996 decision of creating an Organ for Politics, Defence and Security Co-operation (OPDSC) and later the signing of the Mutual Defence Pact (MDP) in 2003, and eventually the creation of the Strategic Indicative Plan for the Organ (SIPO) in 2004.
The only worrying factor is that the actual military cooperation, like military exercises, came close to a standstill after several developments obstructed military co-operation of which the British and

American-sponsored crisis in Zimbabwe and the subsequent withdrawal of donor support to, for instance, the Regional Peacekeeping Training Centre (RPTC) in Harare, are some of the examples. The RPTC is the backbone of the co-operation, but political differences between member states illustrated during the Zimbabwean crisis and following the mandate of the interventions in especially the DRC and partly Lesotho in 1998 all contributed to regional tensions, which are now over. Things seem to have picked up now with Zimbabwe seeminlgy over its most trying times through Sadc facilitation, and all countries have since declared that they have been able to form a regional stand-by brigade for the use of the African Union (AU) as part of its wider security architecture.

On 17 August, 2007, the Sadc declared its stand-by-force operational at a large parade in Lusaka, Zambia and at the same occasion signed a memorandum of understanding on the SadcBRIG (Sadc 2007).

Is this new regional military formation in its present form just a paper tiger, or is it “real progress” and an example of “successful” regional cooperation and integration? The answer is Sadc has moved a step further and has done tremendously well in the past few months so much that other regional groups should follow suit. Lessons from Libya beckon again and again.

Today, Sadc standby peacekeeping force or the Sadc Brigade, is ready to deploy troops anywhere in the region in a time of crisis. The Brigade that has finalised its structure, and that Sadc states had pledged over 6 000 troops to the Brigade for crisis deployment.

This means the burden of regional peacekeeping will now be evenly spread across all Sadc member states.
The Brigade is made up of troops from the 14 members of the regional body. South Africa, Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, The

Democratic Republic of Congo, Seychelles and Zimbabwe.
The Brigade is the regional chapter of the African Union’s stand-by peacekeeping force. The Brigade’s operational centre is in Gaborone, Botswana, the headquarters of the Sadc.
The troika of the Sadc organ on politics, defence and security has the mandate to deploy the standby force where needed. However, the troika will first consult with the AU, United Nations and the country in need of peacekeeping intervention. The Sadc Standby Brigade is important because the region now has a force that is not South African, or Zimbabwean or Namibian but Southern African.

When the African Union undertakes a mission, it is in a position to ask the Sadc to deploy the force to the AU mission. The operationalisation of the Brigade consolidated regional unity and reinforced the Sadc mutual defence pact that united the forces of the region. The most important factor is that the Sadc brigade will be able to guarantee peace, security and political stability, which are prerequisites for development.