The Killing of Elifas: The Enigma Surrounding the Murder of Chief Filemon Elifas

The Killing of Elifas: The Enigma Surrounding the Murder of Chief Filemon Elifas 

By Gavin Cooper (privately published)

Around 8pm on the night of Saturday, 16 August 1975, Chief Filemon Shuumbwa Elifas was shot down outside a liquor store in Onamagongwa, 8km from Ondangwa in what was then South West Africa. He died of wounds from a PPSH-41 submachine gun. He had inherited the chieftaincy after his father’s death, becoming the chief of the Ondonga in 1970 at the age of 38, and at the time of his death was the chief minister of the nominally independent Ovamboland region. In the wake of the chief’s murder, the South African security police (South Africa being the occupying power at the time) arrested more than 200 men and women. Many were tortured by the police as they attempted to extract information about the murder. In the wake of the mass arrests, many left the country. The author of this deeply researched book is the son of the advocate who represented the Swapo Six in what became known as the Swakopmund Trial. Cooper’s own story helps to enrich the narrative by, among other things, showing apartheid’s effect on young white men who had to do national military service after matric.