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PPE

Left-to-right: Colonel Sacha Tomes RHG/D, Commander BPST(SA), Will Hawley formerly IG, Rob Lorriman formerly WG, Major Mark Goodman RHG/D (V) formerly 77X LO to BPST(SA), Gareth Hodder formerly CG, Nick Lewis formerly CG, and James Erasmus formerly IG

On Monday 4th December 2017, the Final Parade took place of the British Peace Support Team (South Africa) (BPST(SA)).  In 1994, when South Africa’s Apartheid regime handed over after the ‘Freedom’ Elections, the British Army was asked to act as the impartial facilitator to oversee the process to integrate former adversaries to form a new South Africa National Defence Force (SANDF).  These former adversaries included the then South African Defence Force (SADF), Mkunto we Siswe (MK) the armed wing of the ANC, and the Azanian Peoples’ Liberation Army (APLA), as well as many other smaller organisations.

This having been successfully achieved, BMATT, later renamed BPST(SA), was asked to remain in South Africa, and went on to establish the Peace Mission Training Centre in Pretoria, providing peace keeping training and military advice to the SANDF and other countries in southern Africa. The Final Parade was hosted by the new British High Commissioner to South Africa, Nigel Casey CMG MVO, at the High Commissioner’s Residence in Pretoria. Many Guardsmen have served with BPST(SA) over the last 23 years, and a few were in South Africa when the final parade took place.