Despite the brutal attacks by the apartheid regime, former President José Eduardo dos Santos stood firm and never wavered in his support for the people of Namibia and the region when he took over as leader of neighbouring Angola.

These were the words of Founding President Sam Nujoma during the burial of the late Angolan statesman on Sunday. 

Dos Santos died in a clinic in Spain last month and was laid to rest in Luanda on his 80th birthday.

Describing the late Dos Santos as a devoted Pan-Africanist, Nujoma said he last met him last year October in Luanda, when he returned to Angola from Barcelona, Spain, where he was hospitalised since April 2019.

On that occasion, Nujoma said, Dos Santos told him that he was going back to Barcelona for further medical treatment, until he heard the sad news of his passing on Friday, 08 July 2022.

“As Namibians, we will forever regard the Republic of Angola as our home away from home,” said Nujoma.

“During the darkest moments in our struggle against apartheid, it was Angola that has given us shelter, sustenance and support.”

He said Angola’s Founding President Agostinho Neto was very determined that Angola will not rest until the whole of southern Africa was free.

“We recall his prophetic words when he assured Africa and the world that Angola shall be on its own will, a revolutionary trench in Africa to Namibia, Zimbabwe and South Africa in the continuation of our struggle,” Nujoma said.

He said the independence of Namibia, Zimbabwe and the abolition of apartheid in South Africa was a practical reaffirmation of that
 undertaking.

After Angola achieved independence in 1975, Nujoma said the apartheid regime brutalised and violated Angola’s and other Frontline States’ territorial sovereignty, in its efforts to destroy liberation movements.