Geingob causes Cassinga ‘commotion’

President Hage Geingob says he could have been a victim of the bloody 1978 Cassinga attack had it not been for a truck driver who refused to transport him to the camp to undergo military training, days before the attack.

Geingob’s Cassinga Day message, issued yesterday, has set tongues wagging, especially over his claims that he was en route to Cassinga to undergo military training days before the camp was attacked by South African military forces.

This is despite the ruling Swapo Party, which Geingob leads, and survivors continuing to maintain that there were no military activities conducted at the camp.

Varying views

Critics claim Geingob’s remarks could be seen as a justification for the SA army’s attack on the camp, with the latter having claimed on several occasions that the facility was not only a refugee camp but also a military facility.

The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was set up by the Government of National Unity to help deal with what happened under apartheid in that country and Namibia, also found it to have been a military training camp.

On the morning of 4 May, 1978, the South African Defence Force launched an air strike on Camp Cassinga near the village of Cassinga, followed by a deployment of paratroopers. The camp was inhabited by exiled Swapo sympathisers and their families.

A life spared

Sharing his account in a statement issued yesterday to commemorate Cassinga Day, Geingob said his life had been spared by a nurse he said was called Dr. Shinyafa.

"In 1978, just a few days before this massacre, I was on my way to join the comrades at the Cassinga training centre, following Comrade Sam Nujoma’s directive that all leaders be trained militarily. I travelled from Lusaka, Zambia, to Lubango, Angola, and awaited my transport to Cassinga. One comrade, a nurse that we called Dr. Shinyafa, arrived with a truck but refused to take me to Cassinga," Geingob said of the fateful events surrounding Cassinga.

"Only a few days after this incident, Cassinga was attacked, and I realised that the refusal of Comrade Shinyafa saved my life," the president recounted.

At a Swapo gathering held in Oshakati yesterday, the party’s secretary general, Sophia Shaningwa, took a swipe at those she accused of "trying to distort the Cassinga history".

"We are aware that some of those who colluded with the enemy always try to deliberately give a contradictory account of events, as well as distort the history with regards to Cassinga to confuse the Namibian people, but history can never be changed, neither can it be rewritten," she said.

Different operations

Human rights activist Phil Ya Nangoloh, meanwhile, said the Cassinga training camp did not solely house refugees. He claimed Swapo also used the camp to house commanders of the then People’s Liberation Army of Namibia (PLAN), notably Commander Dimo Hamaambo.

Ya Nangoloh made the remarks in response to Geingob's statement yesterday.

"Cassinga was a military and refugee camp. It was a transit camp. Dimo Hamaambo, a commander, was based there; there were also other commanders there at the same time," Ya Nangoloh said.

This would justify the attack by the then-South African Defence Force (SADF) on the centre, he argued.

"From my point, it can be, if somebody, a military person, if they [SADF] wanted to attack PLAN, they can attack any place where a commander was; it was a military camp, yes," Ya Nangoloh said.

Claims clash

Under conditions of war, the refugees housed at Cassinga were meant to be housed far away from PLAN commanders, he said.

"By war law, refugees should have been kept far from military people; it was a violation of the law on war."

Labour minister Utoni Nujoma, speaking to Namibian Sun after the Swapo Party’s Cassinga Day commemoration yesterday, dispelled claims that the camp was used for military purposes.

‘I was there myself as a PLAN combatant; all the commanders of PLAN – General Martin Shali, as you heard him on television, we were there at the front while we had a refugee settlement," said the former PLAN combatant.

According to Nujoma, Cassinga also served as a rendezvous point for Swapo members who either chose to study abroad or join PLAN for military training.

"We had a refugee settlement for refugees that were coming from home so that they could be prepared for further education, and those that were prepared to join PLAN so that they could also go for military training, so it was purely a reception centre for our people who were fleeing the brutal apartheid system," he said.

Nujoma also justified the presence of military officials, saying it served as a deterrent to UNITA rebels.

Former Swapo mouthpiece Namibia Today editor Asser Ntinda denied claims that Cassinga was a military training centre when contacted by Namibian Sun. Swapo spokesperson Hilma Nicanor refused to comment, saying she had not seen Geingob’s comments.