WHEN the pioneers of the Namibian liberation struggle were arrested under the Terrorism Act following the Omugulugwombashe battle on the 26th of August 1966, it was widely anticipated that all the defendants would at least face the death penalty.
However, through the involvement of Joel Carlson who volunteered to defend the accused Namibians, they were only convicted to prison terms as opposed to the inhumane death penalty.
Referring to how Carlson rescued the Namibian men accused of contravening the Anti-Terrorism Act, an obituary entitled “Joel Carlson, 75, Lawyer Who Fought Apartheid in 50’s” cites that “the defendants – who had been beaten and tortured during months of secret, solitary confinement – faced the death penalty on conviction. But Mr Carlson took advantage of a recess in the trial to fly to the United States where he pleaded for help.”
These defendants were none other than the likes of Andimba Toivo ya Toivo and many others who faced trial in Pretoria for their links to the Omugulugwombashe battle. Ya Toivo himself acknowledged in Carlson’s obituary that had it not been for Carlson the South Africans might have subjected them to the death penalty. “Nobody wanted to defend us, but Mr Carlson took up our case and he saved us from the gallows. His actions embarrassed the authorities. That is why they had to sentence us to prison, not death,” recalled the iconic Ya Toivo.
Carlson was born in 1926 in South Africa where he studied until he ultimately became a lawyer. He rose to political prominence when he took a stance against the South African government. His notable support and defence of the oppressed black people started in the 1950s after the South African administration imposed the pass law which compelled all blacks to register as contract workers and carry a service book with them. Those who were not found with “pass” books were arrested or flogged. However, Carlson took it upon himself to provide legal aid to blacks accused of not carrying the pass book. It is with reference to this that his biography cites that “he championed the invisible potato labourers – poor men forced to work on farms after they were caught without identification papers required of blacks under the pass law.”
Even though he rose to international prominence as a powerful force against the apartheid administration, he was an unwanted man in South Africa. He was labelled as a “terrorist lawyer” and at times harassed by his fellow whites who favoured the apartheid system. Seeing him as a threat, the apartheid operatives developed sophisticated strategies to get rid of him.
His house was bombed and the apartheid agents also attempted to kill him through a parcel letter bomb. As though it is what others would call “God’s grace”, all attempts failed. Fearing for his life, he fled South Africa in 1971 and went to settle in Long Island.
He believed in a fair and just society, an ideal which he coined in his book entitled No Neutral Ground where he paraphrased that “for as long as a few exercise power over many, there will always be injustices.”
His contribution to the struggle was highly appreciated by the Episcopal Church of South Africa such that in 1969, the church in its publication entitled Your Witness noted that “Joel Carlson is the incarnation of the idea of civilization: he knows what is right and acts for the seeing of justice.” He died on the 25th November 2001 at the North Shore University hospital in New York.
By Timoteus Mashuna