WORLD ‘Divide and rule’in Namibia SWAPO General Secretary Herman Toivo ja Toivo (left) and Secretary for Informa- tion Hidipo Hamutenya (right). By KERRY McCUAIG Despite 19 years of war, little seeps into the international media about events in Namibia. Reports which do appear have mainly been laundered through South African sources and invariably ig- nore the aims and objectives of Namibia’s liberation movement, the South West Africa People’s Organ- izations. “If you study the figures South Africa has given on the number of SWAPO sol- PHOTO — FRONTLINE diers killed since the fighting began, you’d find they surpass the entire popula- tion of Namibia’, notes Herman Toivo Ja Toivo, SWAPO general secretary. Recently in Canada to attend an inter- national conference of Black lawyers against apartheid, Toivo spoke to the Tribune about this cruical stage in Namibia’s struggle for independence. Colonized by South Africa since 1920, Namibia has been raped of its resources: uranium, diamonds, copper, mag- nesium, which have been siphoned off to feed Pretoria’s war machine. It has 100,000 troops stationed there, guarding foreign multi-national investments. Where these soldiers are regarded as enemies, combatants of SWAPO’s People’s Liberation Army receives the warm support of the Namibian people who feed and shelter them, even though this often brings brutal reprisals. Namibia’s neighbors are also attacked for their support of SWAPO. Over 70,000 refugees are housed in camps in- side the Zaire and Angolan boarder. Under the pretext of pursuing SWAPO soldiers, South Africa frequently enters their territory. As an example, Toivo cites an inva- sion of Angola this past summer. “‘There were no SWAPO soldiers even near the areas South Africa named. The truth is they wanted to go in and protect UNITA (the Angolan counter-révolutionary group), because it was under attack by “the Angolan national forces. To protect Second of Two Parts UNITA, they committed atrocities against the Angolan people,’ charges Toivo. But apartheid doesn’t limit its inter- ference to armed surpression. They are: prime masters at the game of divide and~ rule. Pretoria has ignored repeated inter- national demands for United Nations supervised elections. Elections that Toivo is quite confident SWAPO would win. Rather it has orchestrated an ‘‘in- terlum government’’, supposedly as a step in its strategy towards in- dependence. Established in 1983, the six groups, based on racial and _ tribal representation have formed a multi-party conference. Both Botha’s hope for a rig- ged election are no closer to being realized. Always lurking in the wings is the U.S. administration. A_ resolution. to Namibian independence has been ham- pered by Reagan’s introduction of ‘‘link- age’’ — i.e. South Africa will get out of Namibia, when Cuban forces leave An- gola. About 20,000 Cuban troops have been in Angola to help fend of Pretoria’s attacks since it won independence from Portugal in 1975. ‘‘What we now realize is the Reagan administration is not interested in South- ern Africa having peace and stability,”’ says Toivo. Its aim is to bail out the apartheid racist regime from the assault of the international community and the people of Southern Africa in particular, by introducing ail sorts of ‘constructive engagements’. ‘The Namibian situation is an inter- — national situation. All the members of the United Nations have a responsibility to — see to it that Namibia is decolonized. — However we see that some of the — member states are only playing lip ser- — , he notes_referring ~ to the so-called Western Contact Group. Established in 1978, the U.S., Canada, ~ West Germany, Britain and France were ~ vice to the question”’ to supervise South Africa’s withdrawal, but to date there has been no progress. — This impasse doesn’t surprise Toivo. — ‘“‘Their interests lie more in protecting — their multinationals investments than in — aiding our people to win independence.”’ The Group has since crumbled except — for the U.S. ‘“‘Even they are now shy — , SayS about going to the front line states”’ Toivio. “The industrialists who met with the African National Congress in Luska, — went back home and signed a letter along _ with their friends distancing themselves from Botha and the regime. They even went — the economy of the country depends on these people’’, notes Toivo. Liberation will be won, he states, but — that process can be quickened by stop- ping the foreign investments which — apartheid uses to prolong its genocidal wars. further to demand the un- conditional release of Nelson Mandela. ~ This is a sign of something to come. — Botha can not go it alone, he depends on, ~ U.S. aims to scuttle arms control Ina classic Cold War maneuver, the Reagan administ- ration has moved to shift the focus of this month’s Geneva Summit from the urgent issue of arms control to a more general and divisive discussion of Third World conflicts and problems of ‘human rights”’. ‘*The central issue,’ Reagan insisted in his address to the UN General Assembly October 24, is not the immi- nent threat of global nuclear war, but rather *‘Soviet expansionism’”’ in Nicaragua, Ethiopia, Angola, Kam- puchea and Afghanistan. “We cannot accommodate ourselves,’’ shrilled Reagan, ‘‘to the use of force and subversion to consoli- date and expand the reach of totalitarianism ... Marxism-Leninism’s war with the people becomes war with their neighbors’’. This extraordinary exercise in Orwellian rhetoric was unapologetically designed to grab headlines, to ‘‘take the propaganda initiative away from the Soviets’’ before the Summit meeting opens. During the days that followed Reagan’s UN speech, his minions fanned out across the globe carrying the same message: arms control is out; *‘Soviet expansionism’’ and “‘human rights”’ are in. This new direction should surprise no one. U.S. lead- ers have frequently invoked “‘linkage’’ of ‘Soviet beha- viour”’ in the Third World and elsewhere to progress in arms control, whenever they have wanted a public rela- tions ploy to cover their unwillingness to reach substan- tive agreements with the USSR. What is new and stunning in the Reagan maneuver is that it comes on the very eve of the most crucial Summit in decades — a meeting that was arranged by Reagan himself — and on the heels of a breathtaking series of arms control proposals advanced by the Soviet side. The Soviet agenda, as many experts concede, could add up to *‘a new beginning”’ for arms control if it was matched or met halfway by the Reagan administration. Central to the Soviet approach has been an urgent effort to ban the militarization of space before that costly and dangerous new round of the arms race gets under- way. As Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze told the UN, “‘the Soviet Union has countered the concept of Star Wars with the concept of Star Peace ... (we) are proposing a world without weapons in space.”’ The Reagan response is now crystal clear, and it is entirely consistent with his record over the past five years. The fact is that despite numerous opportunities and openings, and despite massive pressure from the world peace movement and many governments, not a single set of negotiations has borne fruit during the Rea- gan tenure of office. Indeed, the ground is littered with © 6 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 6, 1985 News Analysis Fred Weir the tattered remains of arms control treaties signed in the past, but discarded or hopelessly compromised by the Reagan administration. The only constant during these years has been a huge and exorbitantly expensive buildup of arms, and the introduction, one after the other, of new generations of offensive, first-strike weaponry by the U.S., culminating in the plans for Star Wars. If Reagan’s attempt to de-emphasize arms control deals a body-blow to our hopes for a peace agreement, his identification of ‘‘Soviet expansionism’’ as the ‘*number one problem”’ to be discussed at the Summit adds insult to injury. The five regional conflicts singled out by Reagan all involve sovereign nations which, with varying degrees of help from the socialist world, are struggling against right-wing insurgents who are equipped and paid by the CIA. ° Nicaragua, where the most opulent and pampered ‘rebel’? army in history cowers in Honduran bases, launching raids of destruction and assassination into Nicaragua. The Reagan administration has spent nearly a quarter of a billion dollars supporting these thugs, yet the contras have proven utterly incapable of taking and holding a single square metre of Nicaraguan territory, or of enunciating a political program that holds the slightest appeal for the broad masses of people in that country. The Sandinista government, on the other hand, was endorsed by 67 per cent of the population in a free election one year ago, and has shown itself able, in the difficult conditions of war and blockade, to mobilize the country and press forward with a sweeping program of social reform and reconstruction. It is impossible to see where, or how “‘Soviet expansionism”’ enters this pic- ture. e Angola and Ethiopia, where CIA-funded rebels pro- long the agony for two nations recently released from imperial rule. In Angola, Reagan complains, several thousand Cuban troops fight alongside Angolans against the ‘“‘rebel’’ UNITA forces led by right-wing darling Jonas Savimbi. However, UNITA operates from South African bases, and is frequently backed-up by the South African army. Without such support, the ‘‘rebellion”’ would collapse, and Cuban troops would go home. e Kampuchea, where a tiny nation was liberated from the miost horrific holocaust of the post-World War Two era by Kampuchean and Vietnamese troops. The Khmer — Rouge, who presided over the genocide of their own © people, now dominate the ‘‘rebel coalition’? which oper- ates from bases in Thailand — and receive millions of dollars in covert CIA assistance to continue the job of tormenting their homeland. e Afghanistan, where Soviet troops support a legiti- mate government against a large-scale ‘‘rebel’’ in- surgency based in Pakistan. Once again, huge sums are -being poured in by the CIA to prolong and intensify the conflict. During the past six years, the U.S. has spent over half a billion dollars on the Afghan ‘‘rebels’” — with an additional $250-million budgeted for the current year. The U.S. assists the Afghan insurgents with satellite intelligence, diplomatic support and training facilities. In all of these cases, the Soviet Union and other socialist countries are giving assistance to legitimate and sovereign governments. In every case, the ‘‘rebels’’ op- erate from bases outside the country, bases that are secured and protected through the intervention of the — United States. In most cases, the ‘‘rebels’’ are distinctly lacking in popular support, and are sustained only through the aid and comfort offered them by the CIA. If Reagan had a genuine interest in resolving ‘‘regional — conflicts’’, he might have come up with a constructive policy toward those many trouble-spots on our earth, ~ where great popular movements are struggling within the borders of their own lands, without much direct help — from outside, to liberate their peoples from repressive and dictatorial regimes. A short list of such countries would include South Africa, Namibia, the Philippine El Salvador, Chile, Guatemala, Palestine, Indonesia . In all of these cases, tyrannical governments are propped-up and armed by Washington. In declaring his bizarre agenda, President Reagan ap- parently has two purposes. First, to derail the prospectS — for substantive arms control at the Geneva Summit, and step-up the U.S. drive for military supremacy over the — USSR. Second, to launch unrestrained warfare against the newly liberated states, and the liberation movements — of the Third World. As the German newspaper, Frankfurter Rundschau, is aptly observed last week, such a platform is possible “only for someone who views the world through thi eyes of Rambo’’. 5