The Killing of Elifas

 

 

The Killing of Elifas

 

By Gavin Cooper

Independently published. $23

 

 

On 16 August 1975, Chief Filemon Elifas was shot dead outside a liquor store in Onamagongwa in Namibia. 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 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. These were known as the Swapo Six, and they would be tried for the murder. They were Aaron Mushimba (Swapo’s secretary for Ovamboland), Andreas Nangolo, Hendrik Shikongo, Rauna Nambinga, Naimi Nombowa and Anna Nghihondjwa. Two of them, Mushimba and Shikongo, would be found guilty and sentenced to death, but the verdict was ultimately overturned by the Supreme Court of Appeal in South Africa, when it was revealed that police had obtained information from within the law firm representing the accused, which meant that attorney-client privilege had been violated. The Killing of Elifas gives a broad picture of the political and historical pasts of Namibia, which under German colonial and later South African rule, until its independence in 1990, was South West Africa. This is a very useful and readable account of this history, which is the context of Elifas’ murder. The book goes back into history to discuss the oppression of the indigenous people suffered genocidal attacks by the Germans and oppression under the South African Government.

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