Outjo Three fugitive thriving in UK

South African far-right fugitive Leonard Veenendaal - wanted for a murderous attack on a United Nations office in Namibia and the killing of a policeman during his escape from custody in 1989 – is still living freely in the UK, amidst Namibia’s sluggish attempts to have him extradited to face trial. A protégé of infamous South African racist leader Eugene Terreblanche, Veenendaal runs his own payday loan company - Onesys Financial Limited – according to a report carried by British newspaper Daily Star. He and his pals Darryl Stopforth and Horst Klenz are accused of blowing up a UN office at Outjo on August 10 1989, killing security guard David Hoaseb in the process. Though the trio were arrested in December 1989, Veenendaal and his two co-accused escaped from custody while being escorted by the police from Outjo to Windhoek. A police constable, Ricardo van Wyk, was shot and killed during the escape, before the three men fled to South Africa. TRC rejects amnesty In 1997, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission turned down Veenendaal’s plea for amnesty for his Namibian crimes and when extradition to Namibia appeared inevitable, he left South Africa for the UK. In 2008, the Namibian Ministry of Justice indicated that bringing the Outjo killers to justice was a matter of urgency, but five years later Veenendaal and his co-accused are still roaming freely in the UK and South Africa respectively. Utoni Nujoma, then deputy minister of justice, told Insight magazine years back that his ministry would “vigorously pursue the issue” of bringing Veenendaal here to answer for his alleged crimes. “The families of the victims of these terrorist activities want to see justice,” Nujoma, who is now the minister of justice, said at the time. The Prosecutor-General’s office said at the time that it was waiting for the original docket to be translated from Afrikaans, but no progress has been reported in this regard yet. A local political analyst, who preferred anonymity, said the justice ministry and the Prosecutor-General need to brief the nation on the status of attempts to bring the so-called ‘Outjo Three’ to justice. “Veenendaal’s status in the UK is unclear. He seems to have been granted some kind of right to stay on human rights grounds following an appeal against deportation,” the analyst, who has followed the matter with keen interest for years, said. “Any attempt to have Veenendaal brought here for trial may be complicated by the fact that his wife was granted British citizenship in May this year. However, it should be possible to extradite Stopforth now that he has resurfaced [in South Africa].” In August Veenendaal refused to talk to a Daily Star reporter about his shady past when he was approached in the industrial yard in Wisbech where he runs his business. He also has a family website on which he says he, his wife Tracy and sons Darryl and De la Rey are “fiercely proud” of their “rich historical and cultural background”, the British newspaper reported. With his sons promising rugby stars - Darryl plays for Bedford Blues in England’s Championship and De La Rey has played for England Counties under-20s – the family seems to be eternally assured of safety in the UK, and out of reach for the Namibian government. The British Home Office has thus far shown no willingness to help extradite the accused terrorist and this, capped with Namibia’s lax attitude towards the matter, makes is hard to predict whether the families of Haoseb and Van Wyk will live to see justice prevail in the killings of the two officers. After all, Namibia has no extradition treaty with the UK, although the government may apply through the British courts for that to happen. The Ministry of Justice and the Prosecutor-General’s office were not available for comment at the weekend.