Phil ya Nangoloh

Phil ya Nangoloh (born on 22 September 1954 in Ogongo in the Omusati region) is a Namibian human rights activist who founded the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) in 1989. NSHR is now known as "Namrights".

Accused of spying

In search of better educational opportunities Phil ya Nangoloh left Namibia in 1974 and went as a temporary agricultural worker to Angola. He was later imprisoned in Zaire under the pretext of spying for Rhodesia and. As a consequence, he was handed over to the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO) and transferred to Lusaka. In January 1975 he joined SWAPO and became a member of its military wing People's Liberation Army of Namibia (PLAN).

Later ya Nangoloh was sent to the Soviet Union in order to complete a degree in radio engineering. Following a visit to Finland, he came under renewed suspicion of espionage and was finally expelled from the Soviet Union. His application for political asylum in Switzerland was rejected and in 1981 ya Nangoloh went to the United States on a UN Council for Namibia bursary to study electrical engineering. In the late 1980s ya Nangoloh returned to Namibia, where he campaigned for the release of detainees by SWAPO in exile.

Alleged spy accuses

In February 2007, Phil ya Nangoloh reported that former President Sam Nujoma has long term links with South African intelligence and the CIA dating as far back as March 1960, when Nujoma travelled to Congo-Kinshasa’s Katanga Province and met its leader Moise Tshombe:

In the late 1970s, SWAPO in-exile shared its London offices with 'superspy' Craig Williamson;

On pages 277 to 279 of his book "Where Others Wavered", Nujoma wrote “unhindered and continued access to raw minerals, strategic minerals and sea lanes” had motivated US policy towards Namibia in the 1970s and 1980s. On page 257 Nujoma credits his close friend, Dr Henry Kissinger, for having “raised our profile among the few countries that objected to our being sole and authentic representative of the people of Namibia”;

On 6 March 2007, in his Internet article entitled "Eliminating Political Opponents", Namibian writer Charles Courtney-Clarke says that Nujoma's confidant and economic adviser Maurice Tempelsman “arrived in Namibia in 1989 to ensure the control of the new Namibian government and De Beers' control of its diamonds”. Evidence reveals that Tempelsman, whose role in the confluence of public policy and private profit as a middleman for the De Beers diamond cartel, helped to shape practically every major covert CIA action in Africa since the early 1950s;

In Phil ya Nangoloh's view, Nujoma's CIA links explain why and how Namibia’s mineral resources remain under the control of Big Business, such as Anglo-American Corporation, Rio Tinto Group and Lonrho.

What's the big deal?

In May 2015, Charles Courtney-Clarke responded to ya Nangoloh's allegations:

"Namibian human rights activist Phil ya Nangoloh has a political agenda. His activities prior to independence of Namibia in 1990 and thereafter are partial to particular crimes in the human rights spectrum and anti-SWAPO. All political leaders are communicating with intelligence entities. The prime task of spies is to infiltrate leaders’ space. So what’s the big deal?

"The extent to which the CIA infiltrated SWAPO is directed entirely by the vested interests to the wealth of the country. The manipulation of the services of the United States (CIA) by corporate interests to influence affairs in Namibia for their sole corporate benefit is a fact – these days extensively practised western world wide.

"The point is to what extent does the SWAPO leadership REALLY understand what is going on in this economic colonisation context?? State governance of its faculties and assets is corroding in incremental steps with a constant increase in total debt all merging towards an exchange of hard assets in a settlement."

References

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