Towards the end of 1984 there were signs that the guerilla war for independence being waged by SWAPO had reached a new level of intensity. Claims by the South African regime that they had destroyed SWAPO's military capability were contradicted by the adoption of even greater repressive measures which affected not only the war zone but the whole country. At the same time SWAPO announced that its armed wing, PLAN, had opened a new front in southern Namibia. The new year began with an extensive sabotage campaign while the South African Defence Force, in what was described as a military exercise, carried out its largest ever manoeuvre in northern Namibia in January. This was widely interpreted as a threat to further invade Angola.
The tight censorship of all information coming out of the war zone means that journalists are dependent on the SWAPO Territory Force (SWATF) for their news. This consists in the main of figures for alleged SWAPO casualties which are widely recognised as part of South Africa's propaganda war against SWAPO. Journalists who have questioned the accuracy of the figures have been accused of 'trying to stir things up'. During 1984 SWATF reported the death of 584 SWAPO guerillas for the loss, by 20 December, of only 26 South African dead. Earlier South African statistics of war dead were recently challenged in an article by a British-based academic. The study compared official South African figures for 1982 (77 military personnel killed in action) with his figures which indicated 850 South African armed forces dead for the same period. It was estimated that at least 2,500 South Africans had been killed since the war began in 1966. Periodic communiques issued by the SWAPO Information Department in Luanda help to redress the balance in statistics. In June 1984 it announced the death of 94 South African soldiers during February and March alone.
In an end of year press conference SWATF claimed to have destroyed SWAPO bases and eliminated almost all guerillas in the war zones. They described the Kaoko bantustan as being free of insurgency action, and said that only 23 guerillas remained in the Kavango bantustan and not more than 30 in the Ovambo bantustan. At the same time they predicted an influx of guerillas coming south from Angola between December and February. Such predictions have been used before to mask the contradiction between SWATF figures and actual guerilla activity. Reports in January said there had been no decrease in SWAPO activity in northern Namibia since the Lusaka agreement on South African troop withdrawal signed between Angola and South Africa in February 1984.
DEFOLIATION
Another indication of intense guerilla activity was the announcement in December that an area of the Ovambo bantustan along the border with Angola was to be defoliated. According to Brigadier Joep Joubert the so-called cut-line would be 110 kilometres long. It would extend from Okwayoufuko in the west to Olupale, north of Nkongo, in the east. No details were released as to the methods of stripping the vegetation. However, in earlier exercises of this nature chemical defoliants were reportedly used.
No mention was made of people living within the designated area. However, residents of the Ovambo bantustan may not cross the cutline and those wishing to visit friends and relatives in Angola are now required to cross the border at one centralised border point, near Ohauwanga.
SABOTAGE INCREASES
Figures released by SWATF acknowledged a great increase in the number of acts of sabotage during 1984: 94 as compared with 41 in 1983. Attacks were by no means confined to the war zones — in the second half of the year Windhoek, Brakwater, Swakopmund and Tsumeb came under attack. PLAN combatants continued to concentrate on strategic targets such as railway lines, power stations, and administrative offices to link their actions with popular struggles in the country. For instance, in July 1984 a bomb explosion caused an estimated R10,000 worth of damage to the offices of the National Building and Investment Corporation in Katutura. Nasboukor, as it is known, is responsible for housing in the black urban areas. Poor housing is a cause of frequent protest in the black community. The garrison towns of Ondangwa and Oshakati came under several attacks in July. The latter was heavily bombarded with mortar fire.
The last day of 1984 saw the beginning of a new wave of sabotage actions when the Post Office at Ondangwa was completely destroyed. The building housed eight administrative offices and valuable telecommunications equipment. A week later a bomb planted close to the entrance to the Ondangwa military base killed one member of SWATF and injured six others. Further attacks notably on rail lines and electricity supplies were reported from elsewhere in the north as well as Tsumeb and Windhoek.
In December PLAN's chief of staff announced that SWAPO had intensified the liberation war and had started to operate also in the south of Namibia.
REPRESSION
There was evidence of increased repression countrywide. Members of the Council of Churches in Namibia (CCN) were stopped at a roadblock about 25 km north of Windhoek. Military roadblocks are reportedly now common all over Namibia.
The authorities banned all meetings due to be held in Windhoek during the weekend of 8–9 December. This action affected in particular gatherings planned to commemorate the Windhoek massacre of 10 December 1959. On that day police shot dead at least 11 and injured over 50 people who were protesting at the forced removal of black Namibians from their houses near to Windhoek's centre to the segregated township of Katutura. At least three meetings had been planned although only one went ahead on the evening of 10 December, with an estimated two hundred people in attendance.
