Admiral swaps her navy whites for EFF reds

South Africa's first female admiral, whose navy career was torpedoed by fraud and assault convictions, is now a member of parliament. Her job is to monitor how the government spends taxpayers' money.

Khanyisile Litchfield-Tshabalala, who attained the rank of rear-admiral to widespread acclaim, wore red overalls in parliament this week when she called for "radical economic transformation" that would put "foreign white monopoly capital in its place".

The Economic Freedom Fighters MP will sit on the standing committee on public accounts, or Scopa - a watchdog whose job is to hold government department heads to account for their expenditure.

Party leader Julius Malema warned on Friday that his MPs in parliamentary committees would "ask the most difficult questions" of the government.

Just months after being named as one of the top 10 Women of the Year in 2007 by City Press and Rapport newspapers, Litchfield-Tshabalala was convicted by the Thaba Tshwane Military Court of fraudulently reporting the theft of a laptop computer at a seminar in Johannesburg and assaulting a subordinate who wanted to search her car at a parade in Pretoria.

The military court sentenced her to a fine of R6000 and R15000 was deducted from her salary against a claim for the stolen laptop.

"I paid the fine. I moved on," said Litchfield-Tshabalalaon Friday. As feisty as Malema, her new commander-in-chief, she said: "I'm not going to sit in the corner, crumble and die. I'm not going to do that."

Parliamentary rules exclude the appointment of an MP if the candidate has been convicted of a crime carrying a sentence of imprisonment of a year or more without the option of a fine.

The former University of Cape Town honours student, who studied for a master's in criminology at the University of South Africa, said that in retrospect the case against her could have ended differently had she been represented by an external lawyer and not one from the defence force.

"That court did find me guilty ... That woman, less than three months after that, set herself on fire - the judge. She said she was hearing voices and ghosts. Now you ask yourself what was [her] sanity like in the first place. Be that as it may, they said: 'You are guilty, pay the fine.'"

Sunday Times sister publication The Times revealed in 2010 that Litchfield-Tshabalala was working in the defence secretariat of the South African National Defence Force as a reservist despite regulations, published in the Government Gazette, stating that nobody with a criminal record could enrol as a reservist.

Litchfield-Tshabalala said the fact that she had been recalled by the military showed that it was not too concerned by the finding of the military court.

Litchfield-Tshabalala, a former Umkhonto weSizwe commander in Angola, was among the navy crew who sailed the arms deal frigate SAS Mendi from Germany to South Africa.