DA MP Chris Hattingh has told Parliament there are allegations that some MPs are receiving military veterans’ benefits.
According to Hattingh, this is because the Department of Military Veterans (DMV) did not apply the legally required means test for years.
He raised this at a meeting of the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans on Wednesday, 11 November.
“The years of non-application of the means test, as required by the Act, mean that for many, many years no means test was applied. That is problematic. The 2023 regulations provide for a check on other state pensions and social grants, and the revised regulations include a test aligned with the old-age grant. But there are even allegations that members of Parliament are beneficiaries of military veterans’ benefits. So it appears that the legal requirement, as stated in the Act, was for many years not applied. That flies in the face of struggling veterans,” he said.
Hattingh said veterans in real need were being let down while well-off people were paid.
“There are also veterans from the statutory forces who are in dire need of benefits. People who, through the conscription system, suffered for many years, were denied a proper education and didn’t have opportunities to be employed, and they are really suffering. But then we have the situation where there are people, and I don’t want to refer to fat cats, who have had the opportunity for many, many years to accumulate a pension and are really well off, and who, because of the non-implementation of the means test for many years, are receiving military veterans’ benefits. That is totally a disgrace. It certainly cannot be tolerated,” he continued.
He asked how many veterans had received benefits they should never have got, how much money was involved, and whether the department had a legal opinion on applying the means test retrospectively.
ANC MP Tshilidzi Munyai rejected the “fat cats” description.
“The fat cats were those who were paid in advancing, preparing and defending the regime. Those were the fat cats. Not those who were really in exile, underground, subjected to all forms of torture and jail.”
The department’s chief financial officer told the committee that the means test is now being applied. Among the pension applications, 5,500 came from government employees, and the means test excluded them.
The remaining 7,624 applications are being checked against SARS records to verify applicants’ income.
The Military Veterans Act limits benefits to veterans who meet a means test. In its October report on the department’s 2025/26 annual report, the committee noted that the DMV would only start applying means testing to pensions from 2026/27.
Hattingh did not name any MP.