By February 1982, the Administrator General in Namibia had still apparently not responded to an appeal by the Namibian Council of Churches for an independent public commission of inquiry into incidents in Otjiwarongo in which an unknown number of people lost their lives.
The appeal, made public in September 1981, followed a chain of violent events in the Orwetoveni township over the four days 7-10 August. The disturbances not only revealed the serious tensions existing between the police and the predominantly SWAPO-supporting contract labour force but also the filthy, overcrowded and impoverished conditions prevailing at the municipal compound in Otjiwarongo for contract workers from the north of Namibia. The Windhoek Observer, in particular, gave extensive coverage to the events, and was outspoken in its criticism both of the brutal and shortsighted behaviour of the police and municipal authorities and of the press and media dismissal of the incidents as ethnic 'faction fights'.
According to press reports, the chain of events was set in motion by the fatal stabbing on the Friday night of a Damara-speaking woman in the Orwetoveni township. This murder remained unsolved several months later but was apparently one in a series of knife attacks on women. A number of reprisal attacks on the homes of Ovambo-speaking residents occurred in the belief that the woman's killer was an Ovambo. The township remained in a tense state until late on Sunday afternoon.
On the Monday morning, by which time the township had quietened down, a force of Damara-speaking soldiers and/or police, together with members of the security police, made a 'belated arrival' and drove straight to the Ovambo workers' compound. The inmates were told to assemble on a soccer field outside while the dormitories were searched, apparently for weapons. A variety of knives and sticks were confiscated by the police.
Then, according to the Windhoek Observer, "a total of about 50 teargas bombs were hurled into the crowd of Ovambo-speaking labourers. With gas masks on, (the soldiers and/or police) set upon the defenceless Ovambos. They were beaten indiscriminately, so badly that a large number were taken to hospital where on Monday afternoon one of them was still unconscious, unable to move a finger. Some of the fleeing men tried to reach the Church premises where four or five tried to clear the fence by scaling it. They were set upon and beaten".
The Observer pointed out that none of the Ovambo workers acted aggressively when ordered to evacuate their compound; that the tear-gas attack was unprovoked; and that the baton-wielding police had the cover of machine guns.
In October, an inquiry was held in the Otjiwarongo Magistrates Court to determine whether four men arrested by the police - two of them soldiers and one a policeman - could be criminally charged with the death of two Ovambo-speaking men during the disturbances.
