Farm protesters continue to defy Govt order to leave

DEFIANCE is the message at Ongombo East, as the 300-strong group squatting on the fringes of the farm outside Windhoek, stay put despite being ordered to leave.

They were given a 48-hour deadline to leave the area by Lands and Resettlement Minister Alpheus !Naruseb on Friday, and again yesterday, when the group’s leadership were once again summoned to Windhoek and given a final warning.The group met with both representatives of the Lands and Resettlement ministry, as well as with the Minister of Safety and security.Safety and Security minister Nickey Iyambo was apparently adamant that the group leave before they are forced off the land.On Sunday, the //Naosan /Aes Committee waited anxiously for the authorities to arrive and have them removed – which didn’t happen.The committee leaders were summoned to Windhoek on Friday morning, where !Naruseb apparently lashed out at them for the unrest in the area.The group descended on the farm earlier this month, bent on ousting the owner of the land, which is registered as a closed corporation.They all claim roots on the farm, and say their conflict with the owners started in April, when, they say, they had to struggle to get an elderly woman among them buried on the land. The woman was buried on the farm.The Police maintained a presence at the farm throughout the day on July 4 to keep the committee from entering the farm, and ordered them to settle on a piece of State-owned land on the neighbouring Ongombo West farm.Since then, the group has stayed put, despite a previous call by the Minister for them to leave and return to Windhoek.Members of the Police’s Special Field Force kept guard at the scene throughout Sunday, as the group demonstrated, brandished placards and sang in defiance of the reinforcements which were said to be on their way.The reinforcements never came, however, and by late afternoon, the group remained as they were.’We’re not moving to Windhoek. We’re moving onto the farm if anywhere,’ group spokesperson Sululu Isaacks told The Namibian on Sunday.The Ministry of Lands is today set to hand over part of the expropriated Ongombo West farm to members of the Namibian Former Robben Island Veterans.Group members include retired minister Andimba Toivo ya Toivo, CoD leader Ben Ulenga and former Swanu president Hitjevi Veii.