Mburumba Kerina – Strategist of Namibia's liberation movement

HANS BEUKES I joined Mburumba Kerina and Jariretundu Kozonquizi as a petitioner from South West Africa at the UN in September 1959 after making my escape from South Africa. An extract from my book Long Road to Liberation tells what I want to say of importance about Mburumba Kerina on his death:At breakfast on the morning of my arrival in New York, he showed me letters he had been sending correspondents at home. From his vantage point at the UN, he had advised them in detail about the steps they needed to take for them to be taken notice of by the international community as represented at the UN.If I should have forgotten the details of our conversation, an extraordinary set of documents that I would come across years later, refreshed my memory. As part of memoranda submitted to the International Court of Justice in the course of the South West Africa Cases, 1960-1966, the Agents for South Africa produced copies of letters and telegrams that had been sent by Mburumba and Kozonguizi to their correspondents at home. These had been intercepted and copied before delivery, and circulated as well among delegates at the UN. The intention was to call into question the integrity of the petitioners on whose testimony the case against South Africa was built.To my mind the letters bear witness more eloquent than any memorial hewn in stone to the heroic efforts of two young Africans to lead their people out of bondage.The communications were addressed to among others to Andimba Toivo ya Toivo and Sam Nujoma. Toivo was one of a group of Ovambo 'contract labourers' who had formed an Ovambo People's Organisation in Cape Town. He was expelled to his tribal area in 1958, after sending an appeal to the UN, the script of which he had been sent to read into a tape recorder by Mburumba. Nujoma was employed on the South African Railways; he joined Kozo to recruit Ovambo workers for the SWANU – SWA National Union - that Kozo, on being expelled from UCT in 1958, had set out to build up.In a letter dated 14 February 1959, Mburumba exhorted Toivo to organise an Ovamboland People's National Congress. The letter opens with “Toivo, please,” and comes with an entertaining suggestion for getting the tribal chieftains – who were in the regime's pay – inveigled into joining the cause: “make them first vice-president, second vice-president, third vice-president, etc., etc., et., this will break the inter-tribal rivalry that may come about.” And then he proceeds to the business at hand:The first task of the Congress should be a petition to the prime minister of South Africa of South Africa with copies to the Windhoek Advertiser, New Age, United Nations, Africa Weekly, Rev. M.Scott, etc. This petition should ask four things. Of course, a copy should be sent to the Chief Native Commissioner. These four things should be as follows: Ask for -(a) Direct African and Coloured People representation in the Government of South West Africa.(b) Introduction of Universal Suffrage in South West Africa irrespective of Colour, Creed, Religion and National Origin.(c) Immediate liquidation of South West Africa Representation in the Parliament of South Africa. (d) Immediate placing of South West Africa under the United Nations Trusteeship System.Mburumba shows an awareness of the thought processes of his countrymen – evident in the pain he takes to make things clear.“Toivo, I urge you not to accept part of these demands. Tell the prime minister of South Africa that you want all four to be granted and no compromise whatever. Please remember Toivo, I will play this up here at the UN. But to make it effective, the Congress should petition the president of the United States and the prime minister of Russia...Mburumba also directed himself to the lack of cohesion amongst the people of his country. So he informs Toivo:“I shall also suggest that representatives of the African people from South West Africa be invited to the UN. At the UN we shall stand together... Fear not my friend. Kozonguizi is also working hard in the South, together we shall have more than 300 000 African people behind us. Together we shall smash those Whites out of the government without using force but our brains.”I expressed only two reservations to Mburumba's ideas when he showed me this letter. I thought that his choice of 'Congress' in the title of the organisation he had proposed might lead to an unfortunate conflation with the South African congress movement in our people's minds. I also queried the limitation of his organisation to the Ovamboland region only, when what was needed was a political organisation that encompassed all population groups.In a letter to Sam Nujoma the same day he wrote:“After careful and thoughtful consideration of our situation I think it is advisable for you, Mr Nujoma and your friends to think about the possibility of turning your organisation into a full fledge national organisation representing everybody in the whole territory. I further suggest that it would be to our advantage if you can change the name of the Ovamboland People's Organisation to the South West African National Congress. This can mean that we who are representing you at the UN now have power behind us. It is very good to start with a regional organisation but now your tactics should be geared to the achievement of something greater for South West Africans. Other African states would support us strongly if we can have such a national organisation. Please inform the UN if you change the name of the present organisation to that of S.W. African National Congress, this is very important for our position here. I am sending you under separate cover a copy of a constitution for the Congress that I have proposed and a manifesto to be distributed widely if you approve of the idea.An urgent telegram that Mburumba addressed to Nujoma – on the eve of the massacre that would leave many dead and wounded in Windhoek – reveals his sense that his countrymen needed detailed tutoring and that he harboured hopes they would look to him for leadership.“Mr Nujoma, continue to attack the Government openly in public. Do not stop. In the meantime, as soon as I think of something important I will inform you. Refuse to move to the new location. Tell the people not to move. I will send you a statement which you should read to them and translate it into Ovambo, Herero, Nama, etc.“Also try to organise mass public meetings every Saturday. Talk to the people, tell them to stand together.”Our paths separated after my departure for Oslo where I studied and settled. But in subsequent years we took up contact again. And every time I visited Namibia, I made a point of seeing Mburumba. The last time it was to introduce to him Kate Lowenstein, the daughter of Allard Lowenstein, who happened to visit the country. Lowenstein was the man who had visited Namibia at the request of Mburumba to make inquiries about the conditions under which people lived. During that visit he met me and helped me escape from South Africa. Al Lowenstein was joined by two students, Emory Bundy and Sherman Bull – all of them joined us as petitioners together with the Rev. Michael Scott. This secured the US support for a UN resolution to send the conflict with South Africa for trial at the International Court of Justice.· Hans Beukes is a close friend of the late Kerina and one of the five Namibians who petitioned the United Nations for Namibia's independence in 1956.

Mburumba Kerina – Strategist of Namibia's liberation movement

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Namibian Sun 2026-06-05

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Mburumba Kerina – Strategist of Namibia's liberation movement

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Namibian Sun 2026-06-05

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