•  December 2000February 2001 Local News Headlines

Monday, February 26, 2001 - Web posted at 6:05:20 AM GMT

Two former Swapo 'rebels' ponder legal action
CHRISPIN INAMBAO

TWO of the alleged masterminds of a Swapo rebellion almost three decades ago have told rights activists they plan to institute "substantial" claims for damages against the Zambian and Tanzanian governments for unlawful detention.

Retired politician Andreas Shipanga and Phillemon Moongo, now a DTA parliamentarian, and hundreds of other Namibians were rounded up in Zambia 25 years ago for allegedly plotting against Swapo.

Late yesterday the National Society for Human Rights announced that in the light of Government's refusal to institute a national truth and reconciliation commission "some victims of human rights abuses are now considering legal action against the governments of Tanzania and Zambia"."

"At least two leaders of the so-called Shipanga rebellion, Phillemon Moongo and Andreas Shipanga, indicated their intention to sue the governments of Tanzania and Zambia for substantial damages suffered by them," the NSHR said in a statement."

"In the absence of a national truth and reconciliation commission in Namibia, we have no other alternative but litigate against those governments," the human rights monitor quoted Moongo as saying.

No comment was immediately available from the governments of Zambia and Tanzania over the planned litigation for financial compensation, nor could The Namibian reach Moongo and Shipanga for comment.

Approached for comment, a Government spokesman at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Information and Broadcasting, Mocks Shivute, said the Namibian authorities were unaware of the planned civil suits."

"We did not receive any statement ....we are not even aware....but that [the litigation] is their right," said Shivute.

Government has steadfastly maintained that Namibia does not need a South African-style truth and reconciliation commission, saying it would "open old wounds" and that it could result in witchhunts and bloodletting.

In one of the darker chapters in the annals of Swapo's liberation struggle, hundreds of people from the ranks of the Swapo Youth League and the party's military wing, the People's Liberation Army of Namibia, were detained at camps at Kamwala, Nampundwe and Mboroma camps in Zambia.

At the time Shipanga was a member of Swapo's Executive Committee, which was later renamed the politburo.

On July 18 1976 Shipanga and 10 others were transported in a military aircraft from Zambia to Tanzania for further imprisonment without trial.

On May 25 the then Tanzanian government under the late Julius Nyerere apparently caved in to international pressure and released the group.

Some of the detainees were allegedly executed and others tortured.

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