Namibian Vote Puts Rebels on Political Spot

For 23 years, the guerrillas of the South-West Africa People’s Organization fought a bush war to wrest control of Namibia from South African colonizers and plant the principles of Karl Marx deeply in the sandy soil of the sparsely populated territory.

But today, as SWAPO sits on the verge of realizing its dream in Namibia’s first free and democratic elections, the rhetoric of war has given way to the practicalities of politics.

SWAPO leaders still call each other “comrade,” reiterate their devotion to socialism and promise a redistribution of wealth from the mostly white landholders to the black masses. But, having seen Africa littered with failed Marxist policies, they have promised a mixed economy, freedom of speech, no mass nationalization and protection for the property of whites who want to stay.

“Our policy is to leave the sad history behind us, to adopt a much more flexible approach and to write our future on a clean sheet of paper,” says SWAPO President Sam Nujoma, the bearded leader who has spent half his 60 years in exile. His efforts will be watched closely in neighboring South Africa, especially by whites who fear that a black government in Pretoria would usher in communism and force them out.

SWAPO is heavily favored to win at least a majority in the five-day Namibian elections, which ended Saturday. Initial results are expected to be announced late today. Ten political parties have been vying for power in the U.N.-supervised elections, and SWAPO needs a two-thirds majority to control the 72-seat constituent assembly and write a new constitution for Namibia.

No one knows for sure what SWAPO will do with the new power. Although Nujoma’s chief aides hold advanced degrees in political science from American and European universities, they have no practical experience in government. Until last June, in fact, SWAPO was only a liberation movement with a dream. Now it is a political party with a constituency to keep happy and, perhaps soon, a country to run.

The Marxist principles to which SWAPO held fast for so long have been dated by recent ideological changes in the Soviet Union. And today, African countries founded on Marxist principles, from Angola to Mozambique and Ghana to Tanzania, are embracing free-market solutions to their economic troubles.

This may be the first and last multi-party election in Namibia. SWAPO has long favored a one-party state, believing that the Western model of multi-party democracy does not work in developing African countries. But Nujoma also has said he would consult with all other parties in mapping the country’s future.

“If SWAPO doesn’t turn us into a Communist nation, we’ll be OK,” said Anton Ferreira, a white Namibian who waited in line more than six hours to vote on the first of five days of balloting last week.

A white woman standing nearby added: “If SWAPO wins, people are going to get used to standing in lines like this.”

Despite its talk of unity and conciliation, SWAPO’s history of planting land mines on white farmers’ land and allegations that it tortured black Namibians believed to be spies has made many here wary.

SWAPO’s foreign affairs chief, Theo-Ben Gurirab, says the organization regretted the torture. But others, including Nujoma himself, have not been penitent.

“I’m not regretting anything,” Nujoma said as voters went to the polls. “We lost hundreds of our comrades in the war because of information those traitors supplied to South African troops. Do you think we were stupid enough to let them carry on?”

Nevertheless, SWAPO now says it wants to establish a bill of human rights for Namibia. And Nujoma says the fighters of his People’s Liberation Army, who surrendered their arms to return to Namibia for the elections, will form the basis of a small national army designed only for defense.

Few of the country’s 80,000 whites, who account for less than 10% of the population but own 65% of the land, relish the prospect of a SWAPO government. But many agree with SWAPO that South Africa has siphoned off much of Namibia’s wealth over the years.

“We’ve been exploited by South Africa for 75 years, why not give Sam Nujoma a chance,” said J. P. D. Blaauw, a retired brigadier in the South African air force. Blaauw, who lived in Namibia as a child, flew from South Africa last week to vote and said he plans to move here permanently after independence.

SWAPO will face many of the same logistical problems that South Africa has faced in trying to administer the territory, which is twice the size of California, with a dozen ethnic groups and only 1.3 million people, 60% of them illiterate. To help the South African administration stage the first one-man, one-vote national elections in the vast, rugged landscape, the United Nations had to bring in more than 7,000 peacekeeping troops, police monitors, election supervisors and administrative workers.

An independent government in Namibia will have to accept, at least at first, its economic links with South Africa, whose government it calls the “apartheid colonialists.” About 90% of its exports go to South Africa and three-fourths of imports, mostly food, come from there.

Its primary port city, Walvis Bay, will remain a South African enclave even after independence.

SWAPO has promised over the years to redistribute the country’s resources and exert more centralized control over the economy. The main target for land redistribution is whites, especially foreign absentee landlords.

“There are white farmers here who own up to 20 farms. That is a crime,” Hidipo Hamutenya, SWAPO’s chief spokesman, says. “They will be asked to choose the one they like best and give the rest to the people.”

But SWAPO leaders also have said that farmers using their land effectively and producing food for the country will be left alone. And they say no land will be confiscated without negotiation with the owners.

SWAPO is counting on the country’s reserve of diamonds, uranium and other minerals, which now make up 75% of foreign exchange earnings, to help it improve the schools, health care and housing of black Namibians.

Although it once believed in nationalizing the mining industry, SWAPO now says it intends to negotiate new contracts with the mining companies. It specifically has said that the companies will be required to reinvest “a substantial part” of their profits in Namibia.

The mining companies, which currently have a tax rate of 60%, doubt they can afford to pay more. But they believe Namibia’s mineral potential has been largely untapped and that more mining companies will be lured here if trade sanctions against Pretoria, which still extend to Namibia, are lifted.

SWAPO’s biggest headache, though, may be dealing with the raised expectations of the black masses, most of whom are landless and 30% jobless.

“We will educate the people that independence is not a panacea, that they will have to work hard and produce,” Hage Geingob, SWAPO’s election director, recently told the South African magazine Leadership. “It would be a serious mistake to believe that independence is the time for people to make big claims on the state.”