Another National Key Point revealed: full list must be tabled

In a reply to a DA parliamentary question, the Minister of Home Affairs has revealed yet another National Key Point - the Government Printing Works (GPW) building in Pretoria. If it is possible for the Minister of Home Affairs to reveal a National Key Point then the Police Minister, Nathi Mthethwa, must come clean on the rest.

I will be writing to Minister Mthethwa today to request that the review into the National Key Points provides a full list of the NKPs as well as the criteria used to classify them as such. Furthermore, the DA will be submitting questions to each department to determine other National Key Points.

The DA's Shadow Minister of Home Affairs, Manny de Freitas, asked whether there were any buildings under the Department of Home Affairs which were classified as National Key Points. Minister Pandor revealed that the GPW Head Office is a NKP and also provided the criteria for classifying it as such:

• Strategic Importance
• Irreplaceability
• Inter-dependence
• Effect on morale

Furthermore, this information was also voluntarily provided in the Home Affairs portfolio committee by the Department earlier this year.

Yet in response to a DA parliamentary question, Minister Mthethwa refused to provide the list to Parliament because of "security concerns." If the Minister of Home Affairs can do it, so can the Minister of Police.

It is becoming increasingly clear that some members of the Executive are using the National Key Points Act in order to hide information which might embarrass the government.

Each time we have asked for the list of NKPs to be tabled, both cabinet ministers and the chairperson of the police portfolio committee have cited security concerns for not providing the list. This is ridiculous considering they are quite willing to inform us that Nkandla is a National Key Point, air force base Waterkloof is not and that the GPW head office is.

Government should not be allowed to determine willy-nilly what is a National Key Point and what is not. This should be determined by Parliament, and subject to effective oversight.

This selective use of the National Key Points Act must end and the full list revealed to South Africa.

Statement issued by Dianne Kohler Barnard MP, DA Shadow Minister of Police, July 8 2013

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