Cassinga
“Some scholars have written about it, but their accounts deliberately manipulate and distort the facts and are filled with falsehoods.”
These were the words of Cassinga survivor Paulina Kashinasha Kalo at a very sombre commemorative ceremony in remembrance of the hundreds of Namibian men, women and children massacred at the former Swapo refugee camp at Cassinga in southern Angola.
Kalo, who is the spokesperson of the Cassinga survivors, echoed the clarion call by Safety and Security Minister Charles Namoloh, who urged survivors to tell nothing, but the truth about the day Cassinga suffered airstrikes and an invasion of paratroopers in the early hours of May 4, 1978, leaving 300 children, 294 women and 165 men dead, and misplacing 200 Namibian refugees.
He also told survivors of a former Swapo military camp, Vietnam, which was attacked at 13h00 on the same day to also tell their truth about their ordeal at that camp, believed to have hosted close to 2 000 people.
Namoloh led a delegation of close to 300 people, including Vietnam and Cassinga survivors, mainly women, journalists and government officials from Namibia to commemorate Cassinga Day in that country.
It was at Cassinga that Kalo reminded her fellow survivors that the history of what happened at Cassinga on that dreadful day is yet to be written, before saying much of it has already been distorted: “Some even claim Cassinga was a Swapo military base. We know that this is not true, because we were here. Cassinga was a refugee camp.”
She stressed it is imperative that as survivors of the South African massacre they document their own accounts, based on what they experienced at Cassinga and Vietnam: “I hope we will take up this challenge. We must do it.”
Kalo also said more has to be done for those killed on that day, including the erection of befitting memorial sites, rather than simply remembering the events of that day. Just two days prior to the Cassinga commemoration, Namoloh told survivors and journalists at the former base, known as Vietnam, that plans are underway for memorial shrines and sites to be erected at both sites.
At the time teary-eyed Vietnam survivors could not believe that besides to Aloe Vera plants there was nothing to mark the graves, as some stepped over graves of their fallen comrades. At Cassinga, survivors witnessed how the two mass graves there were overgrown with grass, with no proper road leading top the place.
The Swapo Youth League laid a cement floor over both graves in 1983. However, the upper slab on the smaller grave is completely eroded and dilapidated. What remains is mostly sand, lined by thin borders of cement, while the bigger grave has also turned to sand in parts.
No wall or enclosing structures have been built around the graves and it appeared as if the grass around the graves was cleared only days before the Namibia delegation arrived there.
The shuttered houses, which made up the five sections of housing Namibians at Cassinga, remain in that state as green shrubs and grass encroached. Fears are that if not preserved the houses could whither away in the extreme and harsh climatic conditions of that country.
“Today, as we remember and pay tribute to our comrades who died at Cassinga, we should also introspect about what remains to be done,” Kalo said.
“When we walk away from this place we need to ask ourselves these pertinent questions. What more can we do to honour the legacy of our heroes and heroines who are resting here? How can we offer them something more than a ceremony and a moment’s gratitude? How do we ensure that Cassinga Day is more than just a single day of remembrance?”
It is Kalo’s belief that as Cassinga survivors and as a country, Namibians have an historical obligation to do more.
“There is no better way to remember and show our deepest respect to our fallen compatriots than to erect a monument here honouring them, a noble shrine wherein their glory is laid up to be eternally remembered by present and future generations of our country. This must be one of our top priorities.”