Following a series of violent assaults on multiracial hotels in Windhoek by White vigilante groups (see Focus No.3), the general manager of South West Breweries Hotels, Mr. J.H. Ainhirn, has sent back to the administration the "international" signs awarded to three of his hotels – the Kaiserkrone, Grand and Hansa – describing them as a "farce". In a letter to Mr. Adolf Brinkman, Member of the Executive Committee charged with Hotels, Mr. Ainhirn said that the selective "international" gradings had simply caused trouble. By singling out certain hotels as legally entitled to serve all races, the signs had attracted the attention of "narrow-minded whites" who reacted to the removal of petty apartheid in a brutal and disorderly fashion. Incidents had taken place in his hotels which, Mr. Ainhirn said, "to say the least of it, had been nerve wracking". He accused the Nationalist Administration of failing to take any steps to educate the white community to accept the new situation, leaving SWB Hotels entirely alone to face the consequences of the new legislation and giving them no assistance whatsoever in countering the thug rule that had come about.
SWB Hotels is the biggest chain in Namibia, owning nine hotels in Windhoek, Walvis Bay, Swakopmund, Tsumeb and Otjiwarongo. In June 1975, it applied for permission to open all its hotels to all races, expecting, Mr. Ainhirn said, that the new "international" gradings would be awarded on a widespread basis. This had not happened. He said that since the black patrons who had started to use SWB's "international" hotels "have enjoyed the privileges previously denied them in an orderly fashion, and have given us no reason whatsoever for these privileges to be discontinued", SWB would continue to open its facilities to all races in defiance of government rules and regulations and without the doubtful privilege of "official" international gradings.
This decision means, incidentally, that a large number of black delegates to the Turnhalle constitutional talks who have been staying in SWB's hotels are now doing so, strictly speaking, illegally. It also indicates a degree of dissatisfaction with Nationalist Party policies among both the German and English-speaking white communities in Namibia.
