Protechnik was a front company established on 24 June 1987 by the

South African Defence Force The South African Defence Force (SADF) (Afrikaans: ''Suid-Afrikaanse Weermag'') comprised the armed forces of South Africa from 1957 until 1994. Shortly before the state reconstituted itself as a republic in 1961, the former Union Defence F ...

to perform quality assurance testing of chemical protective materials and equipment within a covert operation known as

Project Coast Project Coast was a 1980s top-secret chemical and biological weapons (CBW) program instituted by the apartheid-era government of South Africa. Project Coast was the successor to a limited postwar CBW program, which mainly produced the lethal age ...

. Founded by Dr. Jan Lourens, a bio-engineering consultant at Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, as Systems Research and Development (SRD), with funding provided by the Medical arm of the SADF. Protechnik's shareholders would include Medchem Consolidated Investments (MCI), WPW Investments (a firm belonging to

Wouter Basson Wouter Basson (born 6 July 1950) is a South African cardiologist and former head of the country's secret chemical and biological warfare project, Project Coast, during the apartheid era. Nicknamed "Dr. Death" by the press for his alleged acti ...

) the Luxembourg-based Charburn Enterprises. According to testimony provided in the Wouter Basson trial, Protechnik was involved in reverse engineering Chemical Agent Monitors. The company is now a subsidiary of Armscor.

Other SADF front organisations

* Badger Arms * Biocon (South Africa) * Civil Cooperation Bureau * Delta G Scientific Company * Electronic Magnetic Logistical Component *

Executive Outcomes Executive Outcomes is a private military company (PMC) founded in South Africa in 1989 by Eeben Barlow, a former lieutenant-colonel of the South African Defence Force. It later became part of the South African-based holding company Strategic Res ...

* Geo International Trading * Infladel *

Jeugkrag Jeugkrag (meaning "Youth Power" and also known as ''Youth for South Africa'') was a short-lived South African youth group, surreptitiously funded by the apartheid government's department of Military Intelligence in an operation known as Project Ess ...

* Lema (company) * Military Technical Services * Roodeplaat Research Laboratories * Veterans for Victory

References

{{reflist Defence companies of South Africa Chemical companies of South Africa Chemical warfare South African companies established in 1987