Gwen Lister’s political perspective of Friday 24th March 2006 is a naked conspiracy theory and crude spinning aimed at fuelling dissension between former President Sam Nujoma and incumbent President of the Republic of Namibia Hifikepunye Pohamba. Even though Lister attempted to cover up her unholy crusade of her anti-Nujoma campaign which is now premised/based on fuelling dissension between Nujoma and Pohamba by arguing that “not that one wants to fuel dissension between the two, except to say that it’s an open secret that all has not been well between Nujoma and the man he initially handpicked to be his successor to the presidency, Hifikepunye Pohamba, for some time now and these tensions may well be exacerbated if our Head of State decides to make some changes to his cabinet”, Lister is hard at work to bring a wedge between Nujoma and Pohamba, and she has been doing this for sometime now since the latter came to power, and perhaps what needs to be analyzed is what is she trying to achieve. What came out of Lister’s perspective and what she wants to achieve is to erode or weaken Pohamba’s support base in the party with a run-up to next year’s scheduled SWAPO Party watershed congress. Pohamba’s supporters are mainly Nujoma’s supporters or loyalists of which Pohamba himself was part in the party. Put otherwise, Nujoma’s supporters in the faction-riddled SWAPO Party, rallied behind one of their faithful Hifikepunye Pohamba whom they hoped will be able to hold the party together and to carry on with the legacy of peace and stability, national reconciliation and national unity for which a strong foundation was set by former President Sam Nujoma. Pohamba’s nomination to the presidency which Lister continuously refers to as handpicked by Nujoma was vehemently opposed by some SWAPO Party members whom she always spins and propagates on their behalf. It is an open secret that Gwen Lister is one of the staunch supporters of one of those leaders who wanted to succeed former President Sam Nujoma. What is going on which Lister is doing is part of their positioning strategy for the next SWAPO Party. The conspiracy and strategy are designed to break the longstanding comradeship and friendships between Pohamba and Nujoma, and alienate or split into two their support base within the party. When you split Nujoma and Pohamba’s support base in the party, then you will weaken or undermine their standing in the party with the great possibility of defeating each of them individually or collectively, as they will no longer constitute a strong solid force to be reckoned with. The strategy is to alienate any of Nujoma’s supporters from Pohamba and Pohamba’s supporters from Nujoma, or cause confusion and commotion amongst the group, and with that create a loophole to defeat and humiliate both of them. Other than serving the purpose of positioning for next year’s congress, Lister’s perspective under consideration fits well into the usual destabilizing strategy which has destroyed many African nations. This destabilization is done by fueling disunity within stable and strong ruling political parties like the SWAPO Party. First you create tension and hatred amongst the popular leaders like it is being fueled between Pohamba and Nujoma. By creating such division at the helm of the party you are assured of that tension trickling down or permeating throughout the party and causing confusion and hatred within the party, therefore weakening the party. By weakening a popular political party, you also undermine the stability of the political system of a country. Other destabilizing strategies are to spread rumours and gossip which create an atmosphere of uncertainty and utter confusion among the citizens. Mistrust and tension are manifested with rumours such as of reshuffling, leakages of confidential state documents, cabinet documents, leakages from the Central Committee and other top party organs’ documents to the press such as we are seeing classified information continuously being leaked to The Namibian newspaper. Other destabilizing factors done to undermine a country’s government, is to spread stories such as insecurity and such assassination stories, etc. All of the above we have seen, is done since President Pohamba came to power and the leading newspaper, The Namibian, is spreading all the above stories with the potential to destabilize Namibia. Countries such as Ghana under Kwame Nkrumah, Zaire or Katanga under Patrice Lumumba, and others are all witness to the abovementioned destabilizing factors. Before Kwame Nkrumah’s government was undermined and overthrown in Ghana, rumours and unwarranted stories counter-productive to the stability of the political and economic system were spread all around. And before the assassination of President Lumumba all kinds of rumours of insecurity and so on were spread all over the show to cause uncertainty, mistrust and hatred among the citizens. Surely Lister’s perspectives’ undertones are identical with the above-mentioned situations. Let us hope that they are not deliberately designed to undermine President Pohamba’s government with an intention to eventually remove his government from power. Lister’s perspective smells a rat. Let us be awake and alert. Please let us not allow ourselves to become another African victim. Let us be aware of divide and rule tactics. The very same The Namibian newspaper was complaining that Nujoma is overshadowing Pohamba by not letting the president do his things alone, but ironically the very same newspaper is complaining again when President Sam Nujoma attends to other equally important events where President Pohamba is not present? What can you do to satisfy the need and demands of a person who hates you or who has a hidden political agenda against you. The answer is there is nothing you can do rather than to watch your back. Pauls Shanyengana Khomasdal