Major evidence of the torture of Namibian detainees has been presented to the Windhoek Supreme Court in the form of sworn affidavits from 13 witnesses. The affidavits provide further confirmation that electric shock and other forms of torture are a regular practice among South African police interrogators in Namibia, despite denials by the SWA Administrator General, Justice Steyn, that such assaults upon detainees have become "institutionalised" in the territory and "condoned even by the courts of law".
Recent events in Namibia indicate, in fact, that moves by the Administrator General to dismantle some of the more overt manifestations of apartheid in the territory have not resulted in increased freedom of political activity for the liberation movement SWAPO. In particular there is no evidence to suggest that the South African government has any intention of withdrawing its troops from Namibia prior to proposed elections taking place, but is, on the contrary, expanding its military airstrips and other installations in the north of the country. In a radio broadcast on 12 December the S.A. Minister of Foreign Affairs Pik Botha warned that if the "threat" to Namibia became "great and severe and imminent", South Africa was fully prepared to expand the number of troops already in the territory.
The Windhoek Supreme Court torture evidence arises out of an incident in Ovamboland in December 1977 in which eleven members and officials of SWAPO were arrested and detained without charge under new security legislation enacted by the Administrator General. One of the eleven, Bernadus Petrus, Chairman of the Windhoek branch of the SWAPO Youth League, has continued to be held in detention under Section Six of South Africa's Terrorism Act. The affidavits, while directed at the South African security police, are also an implicit condemnation of South Africa's military occupation.
On 12 December 1977 an urgent application was brought before the Windhoek Supreme Court by Franciscus Petrus asking for a restriction to be placed on the South African Police preventing them from directly or indirectly subjecting the applicant's son Bernadus Petrus to "unlawful duress, assault, or electric shock treatment." The action was brought against the South African Minister of Justice and Police Jimmy Kruger, and Colonel Willem Frederick Schoon, head of the Security Police in Ovamboland. The Court was requested to issue an interim order offering Bernadus Petrus "appropriate relief and protection" and providing for more frequent visits by a magistrate.
In a sworn affidavit, Franciscus Petrus said that prior to his arrest in Ovamboland on 2 December, his son Bernadus had been in excellent health. However on 3 December Franciscus had received reports that Bernadus's face was now swollen and his eyes were red. Franciscus Petrus further maintained that his son had been maltreated and assaulted and that he had evidence of the use of electric shock torture by the Security Police. He said that under Section Six of the Terrorism Act he had no means of access to his son and feared that further ill-treatment would result in "untold physical and mental havoc".
Tauno Hatuikulipi, SWAPO's National Treasurer, said to a sworn affidavit confirming Franciscus Petrus's allegations that when he had seen Bernadus on 3 December, the latter's face had been "so swollen that he was not immediately recognisable".
A further twelve sworn affidavits handed in to the Supreme Court were by Martha Ford (Secretary of the SWAPO Women's Council), Hosea Mbandeka, Lamek lithetha, Dr. Ritva Kalliokoski, Sakaus Shivute, Saltier Enjala, Naftali Shigwedha, Reinhold Ipinge, Pastor Naboth Imene, Willem Dawid Imene, Johannes Katuima and Raula Shimbode. All the affidavits contained allegations about detainees being assaulted and given electric shock treatment by the Security Police.
On 13 December, however, the Supreme Court rejected Franciscus Petrus's application as "not urgent". Mr. Justice Hart, presiding, referred to police evidence that Bernadus had been well-treated. An interruption by the applicant's legal counsel, David Soggott, to the effect that last-minute news had been received from a magistrate who had visited Bernadus Petrus that the latter had made a statement alleging assault, was overruled. Leave to appeal against the dismissal was refused later that week on the grounds that the case would in any event not be heard until late 1978 and would lead to "waste of time". On 23 December Franciscus Petrus further presented a petition for leave to appeal against the Supreme Court's judgement.
The affidavits supporting Franciscus Petrus's application together amounted to over 100 pages of text with five photographs allegedly showing the results of electric shock treatment to the legs and genitalia of Reinhold Ipinge. All the appellants had been detained over the period April 1976 to December 1977 and all but one released without charges brought against them.
Naftali Shigwedha (51), headman at Epembe Villlage in Ovamboland, said that he had been arrested in March 1977, taken to a darkened room at Oshakati and accused of slaughtering an ox to feed SWAPO guerillas. A white police interrogator beat him repeatedly with a piece of heavy electric cable. He was blindfolded, his ankles and wrists tied together, and forced into a crouching position in which an iron bar was inserted under his knees and over his elbows. He was then suspended naked and upside down, between two 44 gallon petrol drums; water was poured all over him and he was given repeated electric shocks through wires attached to his temples. Later the wires were attached to the inside of his leg, to his genitalia and under his armpits. "I cannot coherently describe the extreme pain I suffered, and words are insufficient to describe the feeling of one's body being torn apart", he said.
Raula Shimbode (25), a nurse at the Catholic hospital in Windhoek, was arrested for being "a friend of the terrorists" and taken by road to the Oshakati military camp several hundred miles to the north. In the "dark room" she was hung up by her wrists and given electric shocks through her ear lobes until she lost consciousness. The next day she suffered a haemorrhage in her cell and an apparent miscarriage. Weak from bleeding, she was deposited on the main road outside Oshakati, where a white policeman suggested she ask Sam Nujoma, the exiled President of SWAPO, to get her back to Windhoek.
A further three affidavits were sworn by students expelled from the Ongwediva High School in October 1977 after a SWAPO public meeting had been held there. The three were later detained at the Oshakati military camp. Reinhold Ipinge, who stated that he was electrically shocked through the penis and the back of the neck, was examined by a Windhoek general practitioner, Dr. Johannes Wickens. Electrical burn marks were found on Ipinge's legs, groin and genitalia. Dr. Wickens also testified that the symptoms described by Ipinge and fellow detainee Hosea Mbandeka - involuntary jerking of the body, jaws snapping together so that they bit their tongues, and involuntary urinating - were well-known physical responses to electrical shock.
Johannes Katuima was arrested by the army in December 1976 and taken to Onono camp. He was electrically shocked and detained for seven months before being released without charge.
Pastor Naboth Imene, the only appellant to be charged after torture, is currently serving a five year sentence imposed under the Terrorism Act in July 1977, on conviction of aiding and abetting SWAPO guerillas.
