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Yale-UN Oral History Project 
Theo-Ben Gurirab 
November 3, 1999 
New York 
Interviewer: Jean Krasno 
Jean Krasno: First, President Gurirab, for background purposes could you please explain 
where you were born and educated and when you were first involved in the independence 
of Namibia? 
Theo-Ben Gurirab: My biographical data is readily available and I'll give you a folio 
on that, but I was born 23 January 1939, in a small railway town 142 kilometers east from 
Swakopmund, our coastal town. Actually, in my language the name of the place is 
generally known as Usacos. At the time of my growing up, it was the main railway 
conjunction in the whole of the country. As I was growing up, I felt that I was actually 
living in a paradise. Little did I know that I was living in the headquarters of racism. The 
communities were divided along racial lines not only between the whites and the blacks 
but also among the different black communities. But it was a fun place at that to have 
been growing up in. That is where I started my schooling. Unlike a much larger number 
of my siblings and cousins, I was one of the fortunate ones who did not go through the 
rigors of looking after cattle and doing household chores that they were required to do in 
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the village and many settlements in and around Usacos. I was fortunate in the sense that I 
had early education at a missionary school where I had my primary education. 
I did my secondary education and teacher's training at Okahandja which is about 75 
kilometers northwest of Windhoek, the capital city, at a place called Agustinium. It's a 
place that links in so many different ways the history of Namibia to the reformation led by 
Martin Luther in Germany many centuries earlier. The people who were associated with 
setting up that educational and training facility in Namibia were Lutherans to begin with 
and some money had been made available to those missionaries to set this school. Its 
importance for me, more than the connection with the church is that it was at that time the 
point of convergence of all the African students, those who were eligible or who had an 
opportunity one way or another to attend schooling and to have come together. It was not 
the intention of the colonial administration nor was it the intention of the school 
administration, for that matter; it was the economical situation. It was cheaper to bring 
all of us together at one place rather than to set up schools and training facilities in 
different parts of the country. What initially we did not realize ourselves was that by this 
arrangement, it was possible to bring together at one place the future leaders of Namibia 
from all parts of the country. It was there that most of us met. It became the hub of the 
political consciousness raising in the fullness of time. It was that school and the one next 
to it, not far from there, a catholic school at Dobra. 
To come back to my early education, it was there that I did my secondary education and 
teacher's training. I qualified as a teacher in 1960 but chose to go to Walvis Bay, our 
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harbor town, to work in fishing factories. They paid a little more than other job 
opportunities that were open for blacks. My intention was, while I qualified as a teacher, 
that I wanted to further my studies. I had not thought that it would have been possible for 
me to have gone abroad, but I had plans that i f I had enough money saved that I would 
find a way to further my studies in South Africa. But politics came into being in the mid-
50s as far as my own participation from 1957 onwards. Actually, the political 
consciousness raising started while I was at Agustinium between the years 1958 and 
1960. The African political resistance movements were being formed, including SWAPO 
now the ruling party, as well as S W A N U and others. From time to time, some of the 
initial leaders of that process, that movement, would come discretely at night from 
Windhoek to the school and provide political education classes and gatherings for us. 
But that is where it started. 
African teachers were not allowed by law to participate as, i f one is generous, as civil 
servants in any political activity. But pressure was mounting and we became responsive 
to the demand because we were the educated lot among the people and we should also 
take a lead in the political mobilization of the people, to talk to the people about the 
problems there were and what they could do to demonstrate and to protest and so on. 
That is how my political activities started. I had to be discrete; that was the requirement 
by law while I was a teacher. But I nevertheless got myself involved in political activities 
until 1962 when I decided to clandestinely leave the country and found my way newly 
self-governing Tanganyika which I reached in October 1962. 
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JK: When you talked about many of the leaders of Namibia started gathering at the 
secondary school where you were, did that include Sam Nujoma and Hage Geingob and 
some of these people? 
TG: Not Sam Nujoma, but Hage Geingob and myself, Mdibo Amuteja (?). We came 
at different times. Hage Geingob and I came together. But there were others ahead of us. 
Not necessarily in the previous generation but I am talking about when the political 
activism started. There were people who were older than us but the same generation as 
we were. They were older than us significantly. They would be of Nujoma's age group. 
But he was a worker; he was not at that school. Our Deputy Prime Minister, Henrick 
Bredboy is older than us and was also a teacher there. He got his training there. 
Eventually, my generation of current Namibian leaders in the government and parliament, 
even in the private sector, come from Agustinium, the majority of them. 
JK: So, then you left in 1962. Where did you go from there? You went to 
Tanganyika? 
TG: Yes, but it was a long, long journey. I left the country under a false pretense. I 
cooked up a story, which succeeded and helped me to where I am today. The story being 
that I and my friend who left with me, Jan Bamba Weethap (?) who lives now in Sweden 
and shuttles between Sweden and Namibia, was that we were actually natives, native 
meaning nationals - our countries were not independent and we were not citizens - from 
now Malawi, then Yasaland. The story was that we had been in South West Africa 
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(Namibia) under contract, working in the local factories in Walvis Bay and that we had 
overstayed the terms of our contract. We were good people; we did not violate any laws 
but we were advised that we should leave the country. We had a friend in the 
magistrate's office who was very skillful and helpful, indeed, who issued us with two sets 
of documents to that effect. One was a voluntary deportation order with all the 
appropriate quotations on it and one a traveling pass which blacks were required to be in 
possession of. So, on that basis, we left Walvis Bay by train and traveled through the rest 
of the country, through South Africa, through Botswanaland - Botswana was not 
independent then - through Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, through Northern 
Rhodesia which is now Zambia, up to Tanganyika which is now Tanzania. 
JK: When did you become a member Of SWAPO? 
TG: SWAPO was formed in 1960 and I officially became a member in 1961. 
JK: When did you first become involved in the United Nations? 
TG: In 1963, while I was in Tanganyika. I won a U N fellowship. It was a U N 
fellowship that brought me to the United States in June 1963 as a student at Temple 
University in Philadelphia. English was not our official language nor was it spoken 
widely in Namibia at that time. We were required, therefore, initially to do some 
brushing up of the language and science and math courses. Then I eventually became a 
student at Temple University where I did my undergraduate studies in political science 
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and graduate studies in international relations. My personal association with the country 
started in 1963 and continues, I should think. 
JK: SWAPO achieved a very unusual status at the U N . It became an official observer 
of the U N . How was that established and what were the forces that came together to 
actually establish that status for SWAPO? 
TG: Yes, there were a number of forces. First was that when the Organization of 
African Unity (OAU) was founded on the 25 t h of May 1963, just shortly before I left Dar 
es Salaam, Tanzania. Perhaps within a year of its founding, one of the committees set up 
by the Organization of African Unity was called the Liberation Committee. The full title 
is The Coordinating Committee for the Liberation of Africa, but it is briefly called the 
Liberation Committee, which was headquartered in Dar es Salaam. It called together the 
leaders and representatives of all the existing national liberation movements of Africa, of 
Mozambique, Angola, of Rhodesia, even Kenya and Uganda, that were not independent, 
Guinea Bissau, all the countries that were not independent. They were mostly from 
eastern, central, and southern Africa. The question was for these leaders to indicate to the 
Liberation Committee the ways and means by which they as the people from the countries 
consent, propose to proceed to find freedom, to achieve freedom and independence for 
their countries and their people. They were, therefore, asked after that initial meeting to 
go back and prepare so-called programs of action, setting out their objectives and goals. 
This was done in order for the Liberation Committee to not only recognize those 
movements that in their judgment deserved to be recognized and supported, but secondly, 
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and more importantly, to go out throughout the world, the independent African countries, 
and other countries of the third world to mobilize support for those movements. We did 
so. SWANU, the party of our compatriot that you mentioned, Moses Katjiuongua, who 
was one of the prominent members, were the two movements. Both of us presented our 
programs of action. In our case, SWAPO, we said in addition to the United Nations 
mobilizing the international community for supportive assistance, we would also organize 
a military resistance body. We specifically asked the Liberation Committee and the O A U 
member states to assist us to train our combatants to launch the armed struggle. S W A N U 
felt that the objective conditions in Namibia and the practicalities of how to get from 
whatever to Namibia was such that they did not think the time was right for launching the 
armed struggle. Others like Guinea Bissau opted for armed struggle in addition to 
political campaigns and diplomatic activities. But the long and the short of it is that both 
SWAPO and S W A N U were recognized as befitting support and were supported until 
finally, the O A U decided that it was SWAPO that was doing most of the campaigning 
and had gained recognition and support beyond the O A U member states internationally, 
including by the U N . So, that was how the U N and the O A U worked together. So, that 
was one thing. 
Secondly, on that basis, in 1972, at a summit held in Rabat, Morocco, the O A U decided 
to actually recognize those liberation movements that in their judgment (of the O A U 
member states) and as recommended by the Liberation Committee, should be supported. 
Resources were scarce and therefore, it didn't want to waste money on organizations that 
did not have a chance to make a difference. In the case of Namibia, S W A N U was not de-
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recognized, per se, but they somehow were not present and did not do what was expected 
of them. After that exercise, the OAU, in 1972, recognized liberation movements as the 
sole and authentic representatives of their people. They campaigned for recognition and 
support and assistance in the international community. The O A U member states, 
therefore, when they came to the U N , in the resolutions in the General Assembly, inserted 
the action taken by the O A U and initiated a similar action here within the U N and gained 
support. So, it was on the basis that in 1972, SWAPO was recognized as the sole and 
authentic representative of the Namibian people. And step-by-step I was directly 
involved from that point onwards. 
We reached a point where in the late 70s; SWAPO was recognized as the Permanent 
Observer, as opposed to an observer in 1972, a Permanent Observer. There is a 
difference in quality between the two. I was eventually provided with a seat in the 
General Assembly. 
JK: So, you became the representative. 
TG: I became the representative here. 
JK: About what year was that? 
TG: The initial recognition came in 1972, but this recognition that elevated SWAPO at 
the level similar to countries like Switzerland, the Holy See that represents the Vatican, 
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intergovernmental organizations like the Organization of American States [OAS], the 
Organization of African Unity [OAU], and so on. It was only SWAPO and the PLO, for 
Palestine, of the liberation movements who enjoyed that status. 
JK: That's right; it was very unusual. 
TG: Only the two of us. That was in 1978. 
JK: That then coincides with the Resolution 435, so what is the connection because it 
is the same year? 
TG: Not necessarily, there is no direct connection, a heavy coincidence, the two things. 
Because the adoption of Resolution 435 started following the election of President Carter 
in 1977, not so much the election, per se, but as a consequence of the election of 
President Carter, Ambassador Andrew Young became the U.S. ambassador to the U N . 
Cyrus Vance became the Secretary of State. Richard Mute (?) became Assistant 
Secretary of State for African Affairs. These people had a different approach to African 
issues than their predecessors. It was they who initiated consultations among the 
members of the Security Council, initially the Western members of the Security Council. 
You have the Western Permanent Members the U.S., Britain, and France, but at that time 
between 1977 and 1978, you also had Germany and Canada as Non-Permanent members 
on the Security Council. The five of them together started what is now known as the 
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Western Contact Group on Namibia. They started a long, drawn out negotiating process, 
which eventually culminated in the adoption of Resolution 435. 
JK: Were you, as a representative of SWAPO, involved in the discussions that 
eventually formulated the language that went into the resolution? 
TG: Yes, I was the principal contact person and spokesman for SWAPO. The 
groundbreaking resolution, the mother of resolution 435, was adopted in January 1975. It 
was in that resolution for the first time that the United Nations specifically called for the 
holding of free and fair elections in Namibia under the supervision and control of the 
United Nations to give the Namibian people an opportunity to exercise their right to self-
determination and freedom and independence. But there was opposition to it until the 
election of President Carter's Administration and the process that I have explained. But I 
was also involved in Security Council Resolution 385 of 1976, which was initiated by 
then the U N Commissioner for Namibia, Mr. Sean MacBride, a former Irish foreign 
minister who was at that time in 1975-76, the U N Commissioner for Namibia. 
JK: About that same time, the Council for Namibia was established. What was the 
purpose of establishing the Council for Namibia and what did it actually do? What were 
its functions? 
TG: The Council was established earlier in 1967. In 1966, the U N General Assembly 
after the World Court had failed to give a clear ruling on the basis of which the U N would 
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have done something to force South Africa out of Namibia, out of frustration, the General 
Assembly said, "Enough is enough." By an historic resolution, a very far-reaching 
resolution 2248 of the General Assembly of 1966 terminated South Africa's mandate 
over Namibia. Following that, it set up the United Nations Council for Namibia in 1967 
and giving it a wide-ranging mandate. It gave it the responsibility to proceed forthwith to 
Namibia to establish itself inside the country and to organize the people and to assist 
them and organize elections and declare independence, and come back. That didn't 
happen. South Africa said, "Ha ha ha." Smart people that they were, they didn't 
challenge South Africa. That situation existed until 1970. The mandate had been 
terminated; there was no way to kick South Africa out of the U N ; and in the meantime, 
South Africa was still in Namibia. The Security Council was as a body skeptical about 
the action taken by the General Assembly. Some members felt that the General Assembly 
had gone beyond its mandate in having taken such a far-reaching action. Some people 
were more legally oriented. 
On the basis of that, in 1970, the Security Council collectively asked the Court. The 
situation had gone from bad to worse since 1966. South Africa had its own reaction and 
had stepped up repression and imposed bogus homeland policies similar to what you had 
in South Africa, in Namibia. Angered by that, the Security Council decided to seek an 
advisory opinion from the World Court, something to the effect that, "given the fact that 
the General Assembly had terminated South Africa's presence in Namibia and given the 
fact that South Africa, in spite of that decision, refused to comply, what can we do?" The 
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Court said that what the General Assembly did was legal and "whatever you can do 
within the competence of the U N Charter, you are free to do." 
JK: Had there been changes in the Court that made this reversal in approach to the 
situation? 
TG: The International Court: we elected new members to today, this morning, in fact, 
five additional members, some renewals of mandates and others as new members. There 
are 15 members of the Court. The Court is supposed to be apolitical, but we know as a 
practical matter that the Court has very often been influenced by those who wield power. 
Certainly the ruling in 1966 surprised lawyers, frustrated the United Nations, and utterly 
disappointed us, who had hoped that given the fact that our case was so just that the Court 
would rule in our favor. We were happy that in 1971, the American president of the 
Court, not that he decided, provided leadership. The current president is also American, 
no connection between the two things. But, whatever, had been done in the Court, the 
outcome was far reaching. The judgment was given in June 1971. It was an advisory 
opinion, which has really gone much farther than what the Court used to do, not only on 
the Namibian question but generally. So, responsibility was given to the Council for 
Namibia. It was a council of member states assisted by a Commission appointed by the 
General Assembly at the level of Assistant Secretary-General. When the Council could 
not proceed to Namibia, the Council started setting up machinery here at the U N and in 
the neighboring countries, Zambia particularly, in Africa, to begin to implement those 
things they could implement without being inside the country. Among the things that the 
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Council did was to provide the Namibians with travel and identity documents, issued by 
the Council and recognized by the member states. So, I was traveling all over the world 
with the Council for Namibia document. The Council also set up so many different kinds 
of scholarship and training programs for Namibians outside. The Council also through 
the Office of the Commissioner for Namibia started doing research into different aspects 
of Namibia's economy and the illegal activities of South Africa. After the advisory 
opinion of the Court, South Africa's presence in Namibia was declared illegal. So any 
action taken in Namibia by South Africa, any bad action -- and all of them were bad -¬
were deemed illegal. The Council was also researching into what specific things South 
Africa was doing following the ruling of the Court, while submitting annual reports to the 
General Assembly for consideration and action by member states. 
The Council, in 1975, set up the United Nations Institute for Namibia in Lusaka, Zambia, 
of which our now Prime Minister was the director. That institute adopted a more focused 
program of training in selecting young people that we were training as mid-level public 
administrators in different fields. It was a very successful program and a concrete 
example, more than anything else, of what the United Nations did to prepare the 
Namibian people for future responsibilities. I was a U N fellow. Some of us got U N 
fellowships and scholarships and obtained education in different countries all over the 
world. In terms of education and training and assistance to the United Nations Institute 
for Namibia and some other facilities we set up for education and health facilities in our 
camps, in Zambia and Angola, the United Nations provided not only the office of the 
Commissioner of Namibia and the U N Council for Namibia, but also the U N specialized 
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agencies, WHO, UNESCO, UNDP provided concrete material assistance to the 
Namibians under the care of SWAPO. 
The resolution that set up the U N Council for Namibia among other things mandated the 
Council to proceed to Namibia. In the absence of that, the Council was supposed to have 
proceeded to Namibia and to carry out its mandate with the fullest possible, direct 
participation of the Namibian people themselves. Because they could not proceed to 
Namibia, instead of that and because SWAPO had been recognized by the U N , the 
Council consulted the Namibians, who were outside as refugees in the neighboring 
countries, the largest concentration having been in Zambia and in Angola, to consult 
them, to involve them. The Council also undertook some of the actions, which 
independent Namibia virtually inherited, stock, lock, and barrel. For example, SWAPO 
was recognized as the sole and authentic representative of the Namibian people as a 
Permanent Observer in the U N system, but there were some international conferences like 
the Law of the Sea, for example, where as a liberation movement we could not represent 
Namibia as a country. The Council was set up by the U N to do that. The Council was 
virtually the government of Namibia. We were freedom fighters to liberate the country. 
So, that enabled the Council for Namibia to sign certain treaties and conventions and 
protocols prior to Namibia's independence, of course, after consultations with me and the 
other SWAPO leaders, on behalf of Namibia. When the Law of the Sea process started, 
for example, the Council for Namibia represented us and I was included in the delegation 
of the Council for Namibia. The Council signed a number of international agreements, 
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which at independence we inherited and accepted as valid international instruments that 
Namibia had entered into. 
JK: That is very important history for the record because that is something I had not 
known. 
TG: Exactly, and the Council also, as a part of its mandate, had power to legislate in 
the form of adopting decrees. And one of the most important decrees that the Council 
adopted, prepared by the Commissioner for Namibia in consultations with myself and the 
other SWAPO leaders, was decree "number one for the protection of the natural resources 
of Namibia." It was passed and in the subsequent resolutions of the General Assembly 
and even of the Security Council later, it was illegal and member states were prohibited 
and advised not to engage in any legal relationships with South Africa which may lend 
legitimacy to an illegal, occupying regime in Namibia. So that helped us to get through 
the General Assembly additional resolutions under which U N member states were 
prevented from fishing illegally in Namibia's waters. Because when the Law of the Sea 
Convention was passed, the Council for Namibia declared 200 miles exclusive economic 
zone for Namibia. When we went there, it was our first law in independent Namibia, to 
ratify what the Council had already done. The Council produced many, many documents 
that proved very helpful to us at independence. 
JK: This is a sort complex and analytical question. You were able to achieve a great 
deal within the U N , a very unusual accomplishment because there were other turmoils 
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and other liberation movements in other parts of the world that never achieved what you 
were able to do. What kind of leverage did you bring to bear to achieve this? In other 
words, how did you understand how the power structures worked and how did you bring 
that together to make this happen? 
TG: That question really deals with me and if I answer it, I would really be talking 
about myself. Because I was right in the center and I don't necessarily want to do that. 
But you touch on it. It is a question of understanding how the system operates. The 
United Nations operates not unlike the U.S. Congress through networking. The United 
Nations is structured around regional groups. There is an African Group; there is an 
Asian Group; there is a Latin American and Caribbean Group; there is the Western 
European and Others Group; and the Eastern European Group since the collapse of the 
socialist system in Eastern Europe. So, you get to know individuals. In order to network, 
you must know the key role players. In each social setting, there are leaders and there are 
followers. So, you get to know the key ambassadors. The chairmanships of the regional 
groups rotate on a monthly basis. You get to know individuals, not because they are 
chairpersons - there is more reason why you should know the chairpersons - but you get 
to know individuals and they get to know you. On that basis, you provide them with 
information and appeal to them; request them to assist the adoption of a particular 
resolution. 
When I became the representative of SWAPO here, I wrote a letter to the Office of the 
Commissioner, the new one, not the one that was before, to ask for a ticket. Because the 
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U N had recognized SWAPO and I was the formal representative and I felt it was logical 
that they should pay for the ticket for me to fly to Lusaka where our headquarters was for 
consultations. And he wrote back politely and said that there was no provision in the 
program of work of the Council for Namibia approved last year by the General Assembly. 
In other words, "The request that you have made has financial implications that were not 
provided for." I didn't know what this man was talking about. So, I started asking 
people and they said that before money is spent, the General Assembly must specifically 
approve a budget for the Council in which there would be a budget line for travel. So, I 
asked, "How do you do that?" They said, "When we consider the next report of the 
Council submission to the General Assembly, we must find a language included that 
would provide for that." That is how you get to understand the system operates. It has a 
lot to do with the person and how you are perceived. This is a very protocol conscious 
institution. The ambassadors are representatives of sovereign states. It was for an 
African liberation movement, or any liberation movement, a hostile environment. 
[interruption] 
The Western powers were seen as collaborators with Apartheid South Africa, with the 
illegal regime, because their corporations were in Namibia or in South Africa with 
extensions into Namibia. So, it was to us a question of how I managed it. I was not the 
first one; I succeeded Hage Geingob, who was the SWAPO representative here. Before 
him, there were others. But it was really during the years that I was here that we 
penetrated. The recognition came actually the year that I started and we continued to 
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strengthen not only SWAPO's standing in the system, but we started getting the General 
Assembly to adopt specific resolutions as building blocks. Eventually, I was accepted as 
one of the key actors in the system. I think the achievements had basically to do with 
winning over the hearts and minds of the delegations. 
JK: It is very interesting. I also wonder how the dynamics work. You personally 
pursued this and had a dedication to this. You learned how to get around the system and 
use the bureaucracy in different ways. But you also had to be persuasive. Part of 
leverage or part of power is whether you have benefits to offer or if you have some kind 
of coercion to threaten. But if you have neither of those things, what do you bring to 
bear? What I was wondering is, is there a kind of leveraging power in a kind of moral 
authority? In other words, did you appeal to people the moral issues of what was going 
on in Namibia? Was that part of your strategy? 
TG: It was a combination. The moral case was compelling and the political decisions 
of the General Assembly, later political decisions through resolutions, declarations, 
statements of the presidents of the Security Council, and also particularly, the law behind 
the moral appeal carried a lot. That was one. Politically, it became clear with each 
passing year that the Namibians themselves were the leaders of their liberation cause. 
SWAPO had been accepted by the Namibian people and what SWAPO was saying and 
doing was assumed to enjoy the support of the Namibian people. That strengthened our 
political hand. But also, we later became a factor militarily on the ground. We could not 
match South Africa's military might but as a guerrilla force, we asserted ourselves on the 
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ground in such a way that as Ambassador McHenry, my good friend who succeeded 
Ambassador Andrew Young as U.S. ambassador to the U N , put it, that, "Whether we like 
it or not," referring to SWAPO, "those are the guys with the guns." He was saying this in 
the light of attempts made by South Africa inside the country to find alternatives to 
SWAPO. People were being depicted as democrats; people were being depicted as being 
non-violent, people who had rejected the military option, people who were willing to 
carry on a dialogue, and people who were ready for an internal settlement, a bogus 
independence. We could spoil anything on the ground if it excluded us. 
So, we had moral force behind us; we had political solidarity both on the part of the 
Namibian people, the OAU, the Non-aligned movement, and the "peace-loving and 
progressive forces" as we called them of the whole third world, including also among the 
peace-loving forces individual senators and individual congressmen. Later, the Black 
Caucus came into being. We had progressive members of parliament in the United 
Kingdom, all Labor Party members. And particularly, in Europe beyond the United 
Kingdom, the Nordic countries, the Scandinavian countries emerged as European 
countries that saw the legitimacy of the struggle of the Namibian people led by SWAPO, 
recognized SWAPO, allowed us to open offices in key European countries, with offices 
in London, in Germany, in Paris, in Stockholm, Sweden, Moscow. A l l those things 
helped. What was the lone voice of the Namibian people became the voice of everybody. 
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JK: Fantastic, that is a beautiful pulling together of all of those forces. And what is 
fantastic is that you understood all of that and you orchestrated that here, a very important 
factor, very important. 
TG: Because this is where we coordinated all that and I was at the center of it all. 
JK: During 1988, there was a lot of negotiation going on outside of Namibia to try to 
bring about the agreement on the removal of the Cuban troops which had been linked to 
the whole process under the Reagan Administration. While that was proceeding and 
proceeding in a very positive way, inside Namibia it seemed to be quite different. There 
was a tremendous amount of turmoil. The students had boycotted, starting in the north 
and that had spread throughout the country, and not only students, but workers, and 
everybody. What was the connection or disconnection between what was going on on the 
outside and what was going on on the inside? 
TG: There was always a connection between what was going on on the outside. 
Freedom is one. The people had clearly come out not only as self-liberators by doing 
some of the things that you were saying in spite of the repression and militarization of the 
country by the Apartheid forces. In spite of all the attempts made by the Apartheid 
regime and its apologists abroad to say that Moscow controls SWAPO and Sam Nujoma 
is outside. They are the bad guys. There are other SWAPO people inside the country and 
they are the good guys. In spite of that, SWAPO was one. The Namibian people on each 
occasion where public attempts were being made to drive a wedge between those of us 
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outside and those inside, demonstrated that we were one people. Attempts included the 
installation of bogus internal governments. The last one was installed in 1985 during the 
period that you are talking about, from 1985 until 1989 when we started going back. That 
was the government in Namibia ostensibly run by blacks, by Namibians, some of them 
who were former freedom fighters like the friend you mentioned and others who had 
become part of that government. It was a way to confront the international community 
and the U N with a fait a complit, i.e., the Namibian people internally have decided to opt 
for this. If SWAPO and those who were outside wanted to come and join this thing that 
is accepted by the Namibian people, they are welcome to do so, but the days of armed 
struggle, a military solution, are over. 
In a way, to lend some legitimacy to that bogus effort by South Africa, the Reagan 
Administration in the 1980s through Chester Crocker tried to link Namibia's 
independence with the presence of Cubans in Angola, a dual policy of so-called 
constructive engagement. "You don't have to hit the South Africans over the head, you 
should talk to them," not a stick, but only a carrot, and a bigger carrot at that. In the 
meantime, to get the Cubans out, there would be a dialogue with South Africa, 
constructive engagement with South Africa. If the Cubans leave, it would expose the 
weakness of the Angolan government which is supporting SWAPO. It would also expose 
and weaken SWAPO. That was the strategy but it did not work. 
There was never a division on the question of freedom, self-determination, and 
independence between the Namibians at home and the Namibians in exile. 
22 
JK: OK, let me see if I can understand this correctly. There needed to be shown that 
inside Namibia there was solidarity with SWAPO and no matter what negotiations were 
going on on the outside. Because while they were going on, it was not absolutely clear 
how they would get resolved. So, was there coordination by the SWAPO leadership to 
maintain this pressure inside Namibia? 
TG: Yes, but actually, it was not only the SWAPO leaders. The resistance at home, 
which we used to call the first front, the natural resistance of the Namibian people, we 
linked that with the German occupation earlier. This was actually church leaders who 
had publicly taken a stance against South Africa's illegal occupation and condemned the 
Western countries for aiding and abetting South Africa or turning their backs on us. It 
involved youth and students who were boycotting schools and others were confronting 
the army and the police. It included women, women's organizations. We had different 
ways in which women inside the country would assist. We had a SWAPO women's 
council outside. Those had leaders inside. When they were victimizing these people, we 
had ways in which we were sending in money for them. Particularly the church leaders 
had opportunities to come outside to attend church meetings that were held in the United 
States, Geneva, and elsewhere. And so we used to arrange to meet them. 
JK: The Shejavalis. 
23 
TG: Before him also, Shejavali was one of them. Dumeni was another. There was the 
Bishop, the old man who resembled in a curious way Dr. Martin Luther King's father. 
JK: Was he the Bishop before Dumeni? 
TG: Yes, Bishop Auala. His students used to come out and we would meet them, 
Reverend Kamieta, who is now our Deputy Speaker. So these people were able to come 
out. Occasionally, a student came out. There were various ways in which we were able 
to communicate. We also we had our friends from outside in Europe and the U.S., 
Canada, people who were not necessarily visible as leaders of liberation support groups, 
the anti-Apartheid movement and so forth, people who were behind us. They would go in 
as academics, say all the right things to reporters that the regime would want them to say. 
They were able to go and stay two or three weeks, go around and play ball with the army 
and the police and bring out information and we would in turn send in information. 
There are so many examples that I could site of people that we used that way. 
JK: The boycotts in 1988, i f I am correct, started spontaneously with the rape of a 
young girl in a school. 
TG: Yes, but actually, it was something that had been going on since the 1970s, a 
whole generation of people. The first mass student uprising started in 1974-75, with the 
collapse of the fascist regime in Portugal and the independence of Angola. That started a 
large wave; thousands of young people had gone out of the country, but that tradition had 
24 
remained. The more the country was being militarized, the more the students were 
refusing. Because schools were taken over across the country; also in the north they were 
taken over by the army. It was the soldiers who became teachers and were teaching the 
children armed with AK-47s and other machine guns wearing uniforms, military fatigues. 
They were teaching the children and the students refused. Some were killed. It was not 
spontaneous in the sense that it just happened. These were manifestations of political 
education and campaign that had been going on since the formation of SWAPO. It was 
spontaneous in the sense that students expressed their opposition to the South African 
presence across the country. 
JK: Did the students understand the negotiations that were going on outside? 
TG: Very clearly, very clearly. 
JK: They knew that what they were doing put additional pressure to the outside 
negotiations. 
TG: They understood that we defined the struggle on three fronts. We called the first 
front political resistance or national resistance as the first front. That is the Namibian 
people themselves rejecting colonialism and Apartheid and demanding freedom and 
independence. We were a contingent of those people outside. Peoples' resistance was 
the first front. The second front was the diplomatic front. The pursuit of the second front 
was making connections with the U N , with international organizations, sympathetic 
25 
parliamentarians, church leaders, liberation support groups. That is the second front 
altogether is by explaining the aspirations of our people to our friends -- the 
internationalist forces we called them - that we were able to get assistance, including 
weapons. With that we launched the third front, that is the armed struggle. The focus 
was always the people. However many were outside, we were a small fraction of those 
inside. The real resistance was inside the country. 
JK: Do you have more time or do you have an appointment now? 
TG: I have two more appointments if you have time to wait. 
JK: I could wait. So, we will just interrupt for a while and begin again. 
[interruption] 
JK: Now we are going to pick up where we left off. There are three more areas that I 
wanted to talk to you about. I will name the three now so that we can kind of think about 
them. I would like your interpretation of what happened on April first in the north. I'd 
also like to talk to you about security issues during 1989 within Namibia in general. And 
the other part that I would like to talk to you about is that many people say that once 
U N T A G was established in Namibia, it was basically a piece of cake. Independence was 
going to happen and it wasn't a difficult operation. I just wanted to get your 
26 
interpretation of that, whether that is really a fair assessment. Let's start with your point 
of view on April first; what happened on April first? 
TG: A combination of things, everybody is in one way or another responsible for the 
tragedy of April first. First, all throughout the 435 negotiations which preceded the 
adoption of 435, but we call them 435 negotiations, there was this one issue that was 
controversial and could not be resolved and really touched the very core of the conflict 
between the two to the conflict and the two parties that signed the cease-fire agreement at 
the end, namely South Africa and SWAPO. The issue is confinement of forces. The 
language is "confinement of forces to base." South Africa maintained that the SWAPO 
terrorists do not have military bases inside the country. They were doing that 
deliberately. That is what that really meant. "They do not have military bases and you 
people should not say to the negotiators, the Western Five, the Front-Line States and so 
on, you should not try to accord SWAPO an advantage to erect military bases inside the 
country which they do not have presently. They come into Namibia and carry out 
terrorist activities and they run back. They are not really present here." OK, that was 
their contention. Therefore, South Africa was opposed to SWAPO being given military 
bases inside the country. That was South Africa's contention. 
We were saying, "We are a guerrilla army. We are not a conventional army. We do not 
operate out of structures. A guerrilla army operates in small units and we are everywhere 
in the country." The South African government itself virtually on a weekly basis, through 
the signature of the Foreign Minister of South Africa, would write - and this is something 
27 
that is on the record; you can check as a part of this study - and complained about 
activities carried out by SWAPO inside the country, about incidents carried out inside the 
country. Therefore, South Africa knew our presence. Guerrilla armies do not operate 
from bases. It was therefore necessary for the United Nations, the Western Contact 
Group, and the Front-Line States to insure that those SWAPO military units that were 
inside the country, in their country, in Namibia, once the cease-fire is made, hopefully 
prior to the date of the announcement of the cease-fire, should be informed through 
channels that we knew to gather at two or three, depending on how many we had, 
locations and be confined to base. That argument had not been resolved. 
Now 435 was adopted in 1978. It wasn't implemented until 1989. So, during that 
intervening period so many things had changed. Actually, we had more people inside the 
country than we had in 1978. The Western countries felt, and wrongly so, that they had 
solved that problem. How? One was as part of the negotiations on linkage, the Angolans 
and the Cubans and South Africans agreed to sign a protocol, the Brazzaville Protocol, 
which was alter updated by the Geneva Protocol in August 1988, under which the 
Angolan government with the compliance of the Cubans and their friends the Soviets 
undertook to clear an area at the 16 t h parallel. South of that there would be no military 
activities of SWAPO. That having been done, the U N and the Western countries 
wrongly interpreted that situation to mean that Angolans and the Cubans and the Soviets 
would take care of SWAPO. They bought the South African argument that we were not 
inside the country. From time to time, we would go through there and carry out activities 
and come back. 
28 
JK: Were SWAPO representatives party to the agreement? 
TG: No, we were not. I will come to that. We were not participating. We had 
rejected linkage and we were not participating. Even though we were hanging around to 
talk to our friends. It was part of a package and rising out of that was a specific aspect 
that related to Namibia. It was a larger package that led to an agreement on the fate of the 
Cubans and certain things the Angolans would do and South Africa would do, and so on. 
That issue had remained suspended. We had discussions with the Angolans and the 
Cubans asking, "What does this mean? You have signed this; you are a sovereign state, 
but what do you mean? And you are saying that we should withdraw our troops that are 
inside Namibia across this area which has now been accepted as a no-go area into Angola. 
That we cannot do. We have forces as you know inside, in the country. What do we do 
with them? We cannot walk through with those forces." So, that thing remained 
unresolved. But once the agreement was signed by these countries, setting the date here 
for December 22 n d in 1988, which unfortunately is linked with the tragic plane crash over 
Lockerbie, Scotland. The U N Commissioner for Namibia, a Swedish fellow, Karl Bant 
(?) was also on that plane. He was on his way over here to attend that meeting. 
Somehow, mysteriously, the South African foreign minister, defense minister, and 
delegation coming for that meeting who were supposed to be on that plane changed their 
plane. It is a mystery why they changed it. 
29 
Anyway, there was a euphoria, a big ceremony, here just next door [to the president of the 
GA's office] in the ECOSOC chamber. The agreement was signed and that fixed the date 
of the first of April as the " D " day for the commencement of the implementation. In that 
excitement U N people started sending in their officials and we signed the cease-fire. We 
had our troops inside in the country. It was the fault of the United Nations and those who 
were advising them that they should have made sure that either SWAPO and South Africa 
had reached an agreement and had assumed the responsibility that they were not going to 
violate the terms of the cease-fire or whether they were going to work out something that 
even i f SWAPO forces were not given a place where they could go. They didn't have to 
call them bases, we were saying. In Zimbabwe they were called assembly points. 
Someplace where we could call our fellows who were armed people. You don't want to 
have that situation when you are going to have elections. We simply said that you should 
provide us with a place where we are going to instruct our fellows to gather without the 
fear of being attacked by the South Africans. That had not been done. So, when people 
assumed the problem had been solved, it was not solved. 
We also stand to be blamed because we did not do enough, SWAPO that is, in informing 
not only the people inside the country - there were a lot of people inside the country and 
they knew how to take care of themselves as they had been doing over the years - but 
those who were in the southern part of Angola, who had retreated because of combat who 
were on their way; the message did not reach them properly. Some of them ended up, 
unfortunately, in that tragedy. So, everyone has a responsibility. Nothing happened that 
you could say it was this party or the other. Unfortunately, when the event took place, the 
30 
Prime Minister of Great Britain, Margaret Thatcher, was in Zimbabwe. She went over to 
Namibia. I think it was arranged that the South African foreign minister came up to 
Windhoek and the two of them met with the now President of Finland, President 
Ahtisaari, who in a way, some people felt, panicked because the mission was going to 
collapse. He asked for advice, or authorization, whether he could ask the South Africans, 
because the U N didn't have troops then there, to take care of the situation. The Security 
Council said yes. The South Africans said, "Halaluya," and unleashed their armory. That 
is the tragedy of April first. 
JK: I understand that Marrack Goulding had had a meeting with Sam Nujoma about a 
couple of weeks before April first in which they had had a discussion on this issue. 
Marrack Goulding had explained to Sam Nujoma the interpretation that the U N had of the 
agreement that assembly areas were not going to be set up inside Namibia. 
TG: Yes, that's true. I know that Goulding is a wonderful professional. But that issue 
was never resolved. It was never resolved. There is not a U N person that can look you in 
the face and say that that issue had been resolved. It was never resolved. It was simply 
left suspended. The commitment that we had made which I had neglected to mention is 
that after these countries had signed the agreement at Brazzaville, and the Geneva 
Protocol, the Angolan government asked SWAPO, in the light of that agreement or 
protocol, that we would accept that protocol and would therefore not undertake new 
initiatives across that area that was announced, as I said, the no-go area. To that extent, 
we had accepted the Brazzaville-Geneva Protocol. It is a revisionist explanation. I 
31 
myself had a discussion with the first Commander Prem Chand in the delegates lounge a 
couple of days before he left. And I raised that issue, and that the issue remained 
unresolved. "How are you going to do it? You are going now to Namibia; you are going 
to start setting up your mission. That issue remains unresolved. How are you going to do 
it?" He said, "Well, I was not here when negotiations were taking place. I was told that 
the issue was resolved." I said, "I am telling you that it has not been resolved." 
I think that the U N people misled themselves that the indirect negotiations on linkage and 
our acceptance of the Brazzaville Protocol had somehow resolved that issue. But as far 
as the negotiations that I was involved with, that issue had never been resolved. 
JK: That is an important point to clear up, a very important point. When did you 
arrive in Namibia? 
TG: In June 1989. 
JK: In June 1989, how did you find the security situation there? Was there violence? 
Were there threats against you or your SWAPO members? 
TG: We are talking about it now nearly ten years after and what I didn't know then, I 
know now. It is almost, one can say, a miracle that some of us came out alive. During 
the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission trials, so much information had 
come in of what was in store for SWAPO, anything from shooting down the plane in 
32 
which we arrived to some of us who were on the list to be killed, including those who 
were killed, not only Anton Lubowski but others, as well. How dirty trick operators were 
aiding and abetting not only financially but also in helping them with their election 
campaigns, providing them with weapons. The amount of money that was spent, the 
South Africans were forced later to admit that they had spent $100 million, and we think 
that that is a ridiculous figure, on one of the internal parties to defeat SWAPO. One of 
the things that I noticed in the disinformation campaign style through the media that was 
controlled by the enemy, was very sleek, certainly not Namibian. Sleek ways in which 
there was an extensive use of dirty tricks and disinformation campaign against SWAPO 
and individual leaders. 
Regarding security, the policing of the transition and the South African security presence, 
it was gradual withdrawal. The remaining bulk of South African troops and paramilitary 
forces were withdrawn while we were there, physically. To that extent, we were 
vulnerable. We are prominent people, so the fact that we were not attacked did not mean 
that SWAPO members were not attacked, those who were not known. So, the security 
situation was very tense. South Africa had trained killer units. We called them Koevoet. 
The south had 20,000 strong South West African Territory Force, an indigenous army 
that was created, not the South African Defense Force. It was an indigenous army that 
was trained as a countervailing force against the SWAPO army. The security situation 
was very tense. U N had something to do with mitigating it, but I think it was the large 
contingents of international observers and just people of all kinds who saturated the 
country that for fear that maybe they were being watched, they didn't do what they 
33 
intended to do. A lot came out in the South African Truth and Reconciliation 
Commission. 
Lastly, about U N T A G presence, i f I had said what I said about the second point, security 
issues, then U N T A G presence could not have been a piece of cake. U N T A G succeeded 
in Namibia, and this is a very important point for me to stress, because the Namibian 
people were ready to cooperate with U N T A G . What were its weaknesses? U N T A G , we 
saw was there to achieve freedom and the independence we had fought for and the U N 
has been a friend. Not perhaps the individual officers, we did not know them; they were 
faceless people. There were their thousands, but the United Nations blue flag and the 
blue helmets to assist the Namibian people, not SWAPO, per se, to achieve freedom and 
independence. The U N succeeded because the Namibian people cooperated with 
U N T A G and made its task possible. The political parties cooperated. We signed the 
Code of Conduct and pledged to abide by it and by and large observed the terms of the 
Code of Conduct. We insured SWAPO that our guerrillas who were now in civilian 
clothes with their weapons tucked away elsewhere, didn't make use of them. We were 
having regular meetings with the U N people, with representatives of the Western 
countries, to ensure that there was no violence against the United Nations people. But the 
bottom line is where the U N is failing, or was not as successful as in Namibia, was 
because the people were divided. This is the case in Cambodia and in Angola, also, or in 
Bosnia. The forces were not united in support of the U N . We welcomed the United 
Nations and gave them support. We made it possible for the United Nations to have 
scored a great victory. 
34 
JK: There were some groups within Namibia that did not necessarily support 
independence or if they did support independence, for example the DTA, supported it but 
they wanted it under their terms. It seems as though while everybody says they wanted 
independence for Namibia, it is an over simplification. 
TG: I am talking about the majority of the Namibian people. The D T A does not, as a 
political party, quite qualify in that context as the Namibia people. They are still 
suffering from that stigma. At the time that we came, they were defending the old order. 
They were the right hand of the South African regime. They were the leaders, some of 
them, of the Koevoet and the South West African Territory Force that I am talking about. 
We are talking about a political party which was created by South Africa, which was 
funded by South Africa, and which was serving South Africa. They were opposed to 
independence. I don't necessarily count them among the Namibians that I am talking 
about. There were those who were my schoolmates at the Agustinium. Some of them 
studied here. They left and went home and were recruited and they survived as 
politicians before 1989 because they were protected by South Africa. These people were 
despised by their families. They did not see their families. These are people who were 
provided with houses and places to stay under the protection by the South African army 
and police and the security units. In terms of freedom, self-determination, and the 
independence of Namibia, did not count among the Namibians I am talking about. I am 
talking about the large number of patriots who wanted freedom and independence who 
had been part of the long and bitter struggle led by SWAPO. 
35 
JK: That is a good explanation. It is just that sometimes people who don't understand 
what was going on inside Namibia simply say that everybody wanted independence for 
Namibia, therefore, it was an easy job for U N T A G while they were there. But i f really 
interview people and talk to people who were there in U N T A G on a daily basis, they 
really had to work hard to keep D T A and other elements, and Koevoet, under control, so 
that they didn't disrupt the process. There were many crises through that period in which 
if the U N , the Special Representative and the Deputy Special Representative, the CivPol 
and others had not worked on a constant basis, the process could have deteriorated. 
TG: Let's just back track a little bit. The original resolution that I had talked about in 
January 1975, which for the first time with a program called for free and fair elections 
under U N supervision and control, that idea was weakened later under 435 negotiations. 
Initially, the U N had the idea of only sending monitors, only monitors. This is on record, 
on paper. The fact that we had that military force in Namibia was solely because of 
SWAPO. We insisted. We knew the regime that we were fighting against. It was a 
fascist, military regime that is killing and destroying property and we, therefore, wanted 
an effective U N military presence with battalions. But also, we wanted the Special 
Representative of the United Nations which had assumed direct legal responsibility over 
Namibia to be the boss and to have veto power. We could not prevent the South African 
representative from forming a team with the U N Special Representative, but we wanted 
the Special Representative to have the overall authority as a U N territory. 
36 
JK: Well, we have run out of time, so I want to thank you so much. 
TG: My pleasure.