Govt dares Ya Nangoloh to prove massacre claims

Government’s top officials have challenged NamRights’ activist Phil Ya Nangoloh to substantiate his claims of the alleged massacre of eleven Angolan nationals in the Zambezi Region in 1999. Presidential Affairs Minister Albert Kawana told Namibian Sun that it is high time Ya Nangoloh stops bickering about irrelevant issues without proof. Kawana was reacting to a press release issued by Ya Nangoloh yesterday in which he claimed that 11 Angolans, who were detained in connection with the state of emergency declared in the Caprivi Strip in August 1999, were summarily executed. The eleven were identified as Leonardo Chicorocoro Cremantino, Dino Diaz, Komuntu Joao Jamba, Dionisio Kakelo Kakunda, Alberto Kapoya, Paulo Kasanga, Leonardo Kosenge, Mariano Manuel, Ventura Tavalish Marcello, Best Raymond and Januario Wabembe. Kawana said this was not the first time Nangoloh has made such claims. “I do not know why he cannot just finally give us proof of such claims. He is always out to cause problems in a country that is so peaceful. He sleeps, dreams, and plots against Swapo with such vindictive vengeance. “If indeed he has made such [allegations], again for the umpteenth time, Ya Nangoloh should save face and prove it. I personally challenge him to do so,” said Kawana. Namibian Police Inspector-General Sebastian Ndeitunga also dismissed the claims. Ndeitunga said in previous years Ya Nangoloh made similar claims about mass graves of people killed by Swapo and buried between Namibia and Angola, but when challenged to visit these sites, he chickened out. “There is no way Namibian police or soldiers can take a life in such a manner. I am not privy to the contents of the statement, but Ya Nangoloh’s gunning down claims are simply not true, but I call on him to prove this, if otherwise. “He cannot threaten us with any action, because the country is signatory to the Geneva Convention,” Ndeitunga said. In a statement issued yesterday, Ya Nangoloh said an anonymous, reliable and conscientious Namibian security force member had informed him that the said detainees were first demonised as Unita bandits before being mercilessly gunned down. “The massacre allegedly occurred soon after they had been arrested. The fact that the names of alleged victims do not feature on any subsequent government list speaks volumes, and strongly suggests that their fate or whereabouts are, indeed, unknown. “This state of affairs creates reasonable suspicions that the missing detainees might, indeed, have been massacred under the cover of the State of Emergency Proclamation 1999,” reads the NamRights statement.