Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 34)
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- Democratic Palestine : 20 (ص 34)
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don’t think there will ever be a peaceful solution unless you
bring the Palestinians and their representative, the PLO, to the
table to talk about the situation...
Also, we have to find some way of educating the American
people, for they have been led to believe that the Palestinians
are nothing but terrorists. They don’t know the history or the
sufferings of the Palestinian people... I don’t know how we
educate the American people on that, because the media is
controlled by the defense industry and the Reagan Adminis-
tration; the Israeli lobby is the strongest lobby in the United
States. The sooner we are able to encourage the kinds of
politicians who have principles, but of course, one has to
question the nature of the democracy of our own society, and
that becomes a long story...
SWAPO
INTERVIEW WITH SWAPO PRESIDENT SAM
NUJOMA
How do you describe the current struggle being
waged by SWAPO?
We have declared the year 1986 as the year of general
mobilization for final victory. This year alone, our combatants
managed to bring down four South African military convoy
planes and four helicopters. Of course, there is a news black-
out on Namibia, so very little is known about our struggle at
present. Actually, our combatants are facing the occupying
troops daily and inflicting heavy casualties on their forces.
That is the military situation...
In Namibia, we were not allowed to hold public meetings for
the past five or six years. But early this year, our people defied
this rule and called a meeting without the consent of the
authorities. The meeting went on, but later the organizers were
picked up and brought before a court of law. The judge said
that they cannot go on preventing SWAPO from holding mee-
tings, whereas the other so-called parties are allowed to hold
meetings, for then we would have no other alternative but to
continue with the armed struggle. As a result of this court
decision, our people mounted a challenge. They called a meet-
ing July 27th, which was attended by the overwhelming majo-
rity, including whites. The attendance was estimated at
25-30,000. From that time, our people have continued to hold
meetings. The security police no longer interfere. We hope this
will continue.
We very much appreciate the support we receive from the
international community. At the moment there is nothing
going on concerning the international political effort to find a
solution, because the Reagan Administration introduced the
so-called linkage, requiring that the Cuban internationalist
34
troops be withdrawn from Angola before Namibia can be
decolonized. We reject this, because the two issues cannot be
linked. The Cuban troops are in Angola on the invitation of
the legitimate government there and can only be withdrawn
through an agreement by the two sovereign states (Cuba and
Angola). Namibia has been on the agenda of the international
community for the past forty years. It is the reponsibility of the
international community to see to it that resolution 435 is
implemented. Now we are appealing to the international
community to condemn the US administration for introducing
this irrelevant issue of linkage.
‘Israel’ supports the apartheid regime in South
Africa. How do you see these relations?
It is quite surprising that there is a good relationship between
Israel and South Africa today, because it is a known fact that
during the second world war, the party that today rules South
Africa was on the side of the fascists in Germany. These are the
people who were eliminating the Jews, but today the former
Nazis in South Africa are cooperating with the Israeli regime.
We condemn this alliance between the two, because the Israelis
are fighting the Palestinian people, and want to subjugate
them, while the apartheid regime wants to subjugate the black
people in South Africa and Namibia. The two are cooperating
in this field, and I think it is high time for the PLO and
SWAPO to also strengthen our ties.
How do you evaluate the US and Western Euro-
pean sanctions against South Africa? How will this
affect your struggle?
If sanctions are imposed by all the freedom-loving countries
in the world today, I am sure this would mean making headway
with the struggle in both Namibia and South Africa. However,
the western European countries, particularly Britain and the
Federal Republic of Germany, are reluctant to impose com-
prehensive, mandatory sanctions against South Africa,
because of their own economic interests. We look at this as
racism because when it comes to their own interests, they
impose sanctions. For example, Britain imposed sanctions
against Argentina, but today Thatcher says that economic
sanctions don’t work when it is a question of South Africa.
We, struggling here, feel this as racism. If one white man is
killed, you can hear the whole world condemn that. Yet if
hundreds of blacks or Arabs are killed, they don’t care.
Perhaps they assume all these are just like flies! ®
\ bef
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