35 years ago, anti-Apartheid activist advocate Anton Lubowski was assassinated outside his home in Windhoek. His killers have still not been brought to book, but his widow Gabriele is still fighting for justice. In this interview with BizNews, she describes a walk Anton took with Hage Geingop, the now late President of Namibia, on the morning of his death. “…And he must have told Hage Geingop what burdened him. And a couple of hours later, he was dead. What is significant to me is that whenever somebody asked Hage Geingop about that, he immediately threatened them with lawyers.” She said the family had to leave Windhoek in ’92 because “I was just warned: Leave your fingers from this case. It is dangerous for you and the children.” Although a High Court inquest did find that Anton was killed by a hitman hired by the South African National Defense Force’s Civil Cooperation Bureau (CCB), Gabriele believes “they were only used as a decoy” and that the alleged hitman was “just a patsy” who “couldn’t even hold an AK-47”. She describes visiting the CCB’s Ferdi Barnard in prison and believes he “really didn’t know” who had killed Anton. Gabrielle also addresses suspicions that Anton was a South African Military Intelligence (MI) spy, and says: “So whatever information Anton had, that he shared with Hage Geingob on the Tuesday morning of his death…was stronger…then the decision was taken, this guy needs to go.”
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Edited transcript of the interview
Chris Steyn (00:02.19)
35 years ago, anti-Apartheid activist advocate Anton Lubowski was assassinated outside his home in Windhoek. His killers have still not been brought to book, but his widow Gabriele is still fighting for justice. And she is with us today. Welcome, Gabriele.
Gabriele Lubowski (00:23.79)
Thank you, Chris, for having me on your show.
Chris Steyn (00:26.808)
You’re welcome. You’ve been haunted for decades by this, particularly by events in the days leading up to Anton’s killing and to events on that day. Please take us through those events.
Gabriele Lubowski (00:49.86)
Yes, it’s not so easy to know where to start. So…
Yes, I think I must just give a little bit of an introduction. Why did we actually get involved in the liberation struggle? So when we returned from our studies to Namibia, Anton was doing his apprenticeship at a law firm and he came across young black men who were in prison, not because they were criminals, but because they didn’t have the correct papers. So they had studied overseas. They were doctors, lawyers, accountants – and they were sitting in prison. So he said to himself, something is off here. And he started investigating and he stumbled upon many atrocities that were happening in the country and that South Africa was actually illegal in Namibia and a resolution had been passed that Namibia would be led to independence, Resolution 435. And as a lawyer, he took a decision that he was going to make a difference and contribute to Namibia’s independence. He was given an opportunity to meet with the exiled SWAPO president on one of our December overseas holidays and he absolutely fell in love with the man. He said he loved his vision for a new Namibia and in 1984 he decided to join SWAPO publicly and said they are the only ones that can bring us freedom.
Gabriele Lubowski (02:44.1)
So that is our background, that’s why Anton got, but we had no idea what it would unleash. And from ’84 to ’80, beginning of ’89, we went through absolute hell. We were ostracised, were cut off from the community, we lost our jobs, we didn’t have enough income. We were abused, media attacks, constant police surveillance, Anton’s detention. So it was terrible.
Now what Anton’s role…The very important role that he played is, first of all, he was the link between the inside and the outside SWAPO, because he was travelling all the time to tell the international community about the atrocities that were committed against Namibian citizens. So that was his first, his very important role. Then the atrocities that were committed up to that point, they were wrapped in secrecy. So he uncovered them and he spoke about them. It was the first time that these atrocities inside the countries were actually exposed.
And then the third thing that he did is that he took upon himself the organisation to have the exiled leaders and other members come back into the country by organising the offices, the houses, the furnishing for the houses, so that these people wouldn’t be stranded on the street.
So he did those three very important things. Yet, after his murder, it was as if he never existed.
Gabriele Lubowski (04:53.112)
There was just a silence around his death. He was not on it. We as a family were not supported. We were not taking into the fold of the SWAPO family. And again, we were isolated. We were cut off. So how do you continue with your life if before independence you were cut off and isolated and after independence the same? So I just did not know how to now continue with my life and the life of my children.
And the project he was busy with at the time…He was working together with a professor in Germany… So they were looking at all the apartheid laws and to change them and transform them before independence so that those laws could not be used against other people.
The second thing, sorry, I just made some notes. And so the second thing that he was busy with is he was working on an economic plan because Namibia is so rich in minerals, but local business people and entrepreneurs did not get opportunities to access that wealth. So he was working on an economic plan and he was investigating the case of missing people. There were many Namibians that did not return from exile.
Now the fascinating thing is that in all of these three things, the president, the exiled president, and I don’t know who of the other leadership were involved in all three. First of all, at that time they were collaborating with the enemy. So there was not really an interest to transform the apartheid laws. Secondly, the SWAPO-exiled people brought all the, sorry to use that word, all these vultures into Namibia who were only there for their self-interest…
Gabriele Lubowski (07:15.948)
All these guys were brought in by the exiled SWAPO leaders and Anton knew how to fight the South Africans. They were, they were, they were brutal, they were, but they were straightforward. That is what they were doing. But this force was different. It was subtle. You know, you couldn’t. And he did not know who these people were. SWAPO introduced them to him and he thought it’s OK to work with people. He didn’t know they were arms dealers, that they were mining magnates and you know what their background was.
And then he investigated. Somebody gave him a list of missing people. And now we know what happened in the Lubango camps. That SWAPO because the South Africans had beaten them in 1985 and they were busy with a witch hunt killing their most valuable and important people. So that’s what he was busy with.
And like I said, the SWAPO leadership was involved in some other way in all three of them. All this I uncovered in the 30 years, more than 30 years that I’ve been seeking.
Chris Steyn (08:48.44)
Okay, let’s go to the day of his death, please, Gabriele.
Gabriele Lubowski (08:53.956)
Yes, like I said, I at the end of 1988, I succumbed to a severe depression and decided that I was going to have to get out of the situation just for a while, just to reflect, just to gain, you know, who I am, also for the sake of our children.
So the…pieces that were put together was that Anton, so a friend told me a story, an old school friend of his and a colleague of his…that Anton had contacted them and said he desperately, he urgently has to talk to them. But somehow it didn’t work out. His school friend, they were at a braai and the opportunity did not arise that they could chat. But his friend told me, Anton, there was something that really worried him because he was not his usual optimistic self. And jokes that were made, which no matter how bad a situation was, he would always join in the jokes, but that evening not. Then he called his colleague Monday night, 12 o’clock, he said, I urgently have to talk to you. And his colleague said to him, I’m so sorry, I have to leave for the North tomorrow morning five o’clock. Let’s shift it to Wednesday. I’ll be back in Windhoek.
And then he had that walk with Hage Geingop on Tuesday morning. It seems he couldn’t hold it any longer, whatever burdened him….
Gabriele Lubowski (11:20.846)
…And he must have told Hage Geingop what burdened him. And a couple of hours later, he was dead. What is significant to me is that whenever somebody asked Hage Geingop about that, he immediately threatened them with lawyers. Now, that is a very strange reaction because why would somebody not tell? That is what Anton was burdened with, what he told him.
From that moment on, Hage Geingop has never granted me a meeting. So when he became prime minister and we were still in Windhoek, we were still in Windhoek until 1992, he never granted me a meeting doesn’t matter how many times I asked him. And then finally someone said to me, why don’t you write an open letter in the newspapers? And all that happened is he threatened me with legal action.
Now, I mean, there were many things I said once I realised what possibly could have going on. But what shocked me and hurt me the most that he didn’t even wanted to see my children. Now when my children were small and they visited Anton in Windhoek, Anton always took them to the SWAPO offices. They were sitting on his lap. He was like an uncle to them. And now when they wanted to see him about their own future, possibly making a difference in Namibia and talking about their dad….
Gabriele Lubowski (13:20.44)
….he refused to see them. So that I will never grasp and never understand.
Chris Steyn (13:30.21)
Have you tried to get answers from other people in SWAPO and the Namibian government?
Gabriele Lubowski (13:38.244)
Well, like I said, we then left Namibia in ’92. It was actually friends of mine whose one friend of mine told me she had a dream. And my sister-in-law in Pretoria, she and her husband prayed about it. And they said, because I was determined to find out what had happened here because my personality is like that. If you hide something, if I sense there’s something that is off here, then because I’m just wired to want the truth, because I think the truth actually liberates. Yes, it is tough. There are consequences sometimes to truth, but it is the only way to go. If you want a healthy society. That’s the only way to go. Why hide something? Because eventually it does come out in whatever way. It’s been proven again and again. So, yeah, I’m sorry, I lost my thread a little bit here. What was the question again?
Chris Steyn (15:00.17)
I just wondered whether anybody else in SWAPO or in the Namibian government has tried…
Gabriele Lubowski (15:02.728)
…I did whenever I went to Windhoek; we left in ’92 because I was just warned. Leave your fingers from this case. It is dangerous for you and the children. So I decided then to listen.
It was also that in ’92, it was actually the first time I was totally in denial. I still expected Anton to one day walk in the door again. So it took me so long to actually realise he is actually gone. He’s never going to come back.
With Sam Nujoma, every time I went to Windhoek, I contacted the office. I had lunch with him. I don’t know how to describe it. I don’t know exactly the words to use, but I could actually never have a proper conversation with him. It was very strange, almost like almost like a little boy. It was a strange way he would say things and so I couldn’t have a real conversation with him.
And that’s when when Pohamba became president. I also tried to see him. He also did not respond to me. He did not want to see me.
And then when I had finished my first book On Solid Ground, I can’t actually remember how I got to the State House, which was this huge, I cannot explain to you how huge it was, a little bit outside Windhoek. I went there and I walked along passages and big halls and rooms and there was nobody. It was just that silent…
Gabriele Lubowski (17:16.268)
…and I dropped off my book for Pohamba. But like I said, I never heard from them or whatever attempts I made were basically ignored.
And so in the end, all I did is when I went to Namibia, it was just to visit my mother who was still in an old age home in Swakop.
Chris Steyn (17:46.37)
Now, a High Court inquest did find back then that Anton was killed by a hitman hired by the South African National Defense Force’s Civil Cooperation Bureau. They denied that, but they did admit that they had Anton under surveillance. If they were not the ones who killed Anton, do you think they know who did?
Gabriele Lubowski (18:12.932)
To be quite honest with you, look, I visited Ferdi Barnard in Pretoria, in what is that place called where the real criminals that cannot, yeah, that’s right, that’s right. I visited him there. And I don’t believe there was any, he was already in prison. Everything that he did was exposed. There was no reason for him…
Chris Steyn (18:27.256)
Maximum Security.
Gabriele Lubowski (18:42.904)
…not to tell but he actually didn’t know. His only task was to observe Anton’s house. He had met Acheson…at one point there were two men I can’t remember their name who contacted us and they said that Donald Acheson was just a patsy. He was really, he couldn’t even hold an AK-47. You know, he was really a lost soul, which they just picked up.
And Ferdi Barnard said when he heard that Anton had been shot, he just got into his car and he drove down to South Africa. They didn’t know. So for me, I’ve always somehow known that they were only used as a decoy. Because it was so easy just to say it was the South Africans. It was the CCB.
Of course, we are still leaving that door open that we’re saying it could have been some guy who just on his own took an initiative because they were filled with such hate against Anton. But I can’t see why this person wouldn’t have come forward by now. So yes, let’s say that possibility does exist, but the order definitely to kill Anton did not…
Gabriele Lubowski (20:29.092)
That seems quite clear.
Chris Steyn (20:30.744)
Yes, sorry. Did you find a Barnard sympathetic in any way towards your quest for justice?
Gabriele Lubowski (20:47.693)
Well, like I said, I will…
I was obviously a bit weary of him because I knew that people like that can’t actually tell the truth. Because I also read the book that was written about him. And when you can see the trauma he had to endure as a child. So when I went, I just hoped that he would be in a position to say, to give me closure. But he wasn’t. Yeah, he was not in a position because he actually really didn’t know. I don’t think, I don’t have, had a sense that he was…
Gabriele Lubowski (21:37.732)
…you know, that he was holding anything back.
Chris Steyn (21:41.006)
So he fled the Namibia because he thought he would be a suspect.
Gabriele Lubowski (21:45.987)
Yes, yeah.
Chris Steyn (21:49.592)
Now, former Defense Minister Magnus Malan came out at the time, also obviously denying that the military had been involved, but then said they had no reason to kill Anton because he was a paid Military Intelligence agent. What did you make of that statement?
Gabriele Lubowski (22:08.036)
Yes, you see when Magnus Malan made that statement and that was another obstacle and hurdle we had to overcome in our life. Because for me it was not only that he made that statement but that Hage Geingop in the media he was interviewed and he says and he said it just proves that we have and had spies in SWAPO.
So he was, yes, they believed. So they sided with Magnus Malan. And that absolutely killed everything for me and my children. Because you know how most people would react? Where there is smoke, there is a fire. You see? And then they thought, that’s why the guy was so…
Chris Steyn (22:37.678)
So they believed him.
Gabriele Lubowski (23:03.562)
…active in this whole thing because he got paid for it. Understand? They couldn’t fathom that he was a man that was actually just out of his heart because he couldn’t see other people having to live under such injustice. And yeah, so that closed all doors for us.
You know, why we should have been given some appreciation and some acknowledgement, it was exactly the opposite.
And so what we now know, they were definitely trying to get Anton out of the way. Because, well, everybody, when you think about it.
Chris Steyn (23:52.43)
SWAPO?
Gabriele Lubowski (23:56.61)
So it was SWAPO. It was the money power. It was the, it was the South Africans because those through those three were in under one blanket. They were negotiating with each other. OK, so none of them could handle Anton. When they couldn’t corrupt him and they tried in various ways. The second they could do is to make as if he is a spy.
So what happened when Anton was given or took on the task for the exiled SWAPO to come back, he was approached… Anton didn’t know he was a French arms dealer. He was given the okay by SWAPO. So he approached Anton and he said, I’ve got a furniture factory in South Africa. If you buy from me, I give you a discount and a commission. And remember, Anton had no more work. He was now fully helping Swapo to return to Namibia and they didn’t pay him a cent. So he was happy because now he was earning he had a family to look after, you know, in Cape Town.
And yeah, so…what they did is they bugged that furniture. So so when that furniture was put, somebody must have sent…and remember Sam Nujoma was suffering from that paranoia because that’s a human thing if you do something. He was collaborating with the enemy….
Gabriele Lubowski (26:07.516)
…So because Nujoma was collaborating with the enemy. He thought everybody…when something goes wrong everybody else is collaborating with the enemy.
So they must have said…like I said nobody wanted to talk to me I have to put the puzzle pieces together as I see them and when they told Nujoma do you actually know that this guy is possibly a spy because this is what happened with the furniture. I’m just assuming. I’m not saying it is like that, but Nujoma had many people killed. The strongest, the best in Swapo he had killed…
Gabriele Lubowski (27:20.804)
So they were definitely trying to make Anton look like a South African spy because that was the strategy. But they then decided…so I knew that it was a lie because I had lived with Anton. That’s why I wrote that book On Solid Ground. I thought it was my duty. I wanted to tell the world living side by side with Anton. That’s what I experienced. Okay, so a guy like that cannot be a spy and Anton was a person who would point out that what was wrong immediately when he walked into a room, when he walked, you know, he would be one of those people where everybody was hiding and whoosh, whoosh and not, he would open it up.
So his nature just wasn’t the nature of the spy. So whatever information Anton had, that he shared with Hage Geingob on the Tuesday morning of his death…was stronger than…So, they couldn’t, they couldn’t…because he was aware of that spy story and he took steps, you know, because he wouldn’t just succumb to that. That then the decision was taken, this guy needs to go.
Chris Steyn (28:49.592)
Gabrielle, what do you hope to achieve by speaking out now?
Gabriele Lubowski (28:56.556)
What I’m hoping to achieve is that to share with the people of South Africa and Namibia, it is we have to let go of racism. In Anton’s case, it shows clearly it is not the race that determines it is the human being and his or her heart.
So, whether you’re white, whether you are black, whether you are pink, whether you are green, whatever colour, the actions you are going to take are what your heart and your mind determines you to do. So that’s what we have to look for.
Now, the way I’m going to contribute, I discovered two things. that what I believe was shown to me. So the first one is our childhood years. Parents make the mistake to treat a child like a little adult. A child is not a little adult. It is a totally separate phase that leads into adulthood. So if a parent wounds the psyche, the soul of a child, which 80% of parents do, because statistics say only 20% are naturally talented to be parents. The rest has to learn it. And parents are not trained. Do you know that I’ve been since 2002, been going to schools and they absolutely resist this? Don’t ask me why. So the most important thing is only when…
Gabriele Lubowski (31:01.952)
A parent has the power to shape the pathways in the brain. And it’s only when those pathways are shaped through certain methods and techniques can we develop the higher capacities of compassion, of concern, of accepting difference.
We cannot accept, we cannot get to these ways of being if we have been abused or treated incorrectly as children. So the first thing is at every school, there must be a parent training department where parents are supported in how to raise a child, a healthy child.
The second thing is that I was actually it was a lady that came to our house that had a letter for Sam Nujoma, a message from God. So that God I’m talking about is Yahweh, the God that revealed himself to the Hebrews, the Israelites. And Yeshua, the Christ, the anointed one, came to earth to show how to live a life of compassion, of fairness, of love, of mercy. And if we are willing to open ourselves and live, begin to live like that, which is a challenge, because it goes directly against human nature….Then, because when you decide to follow Yahweh and Yeshua, the Christ, you are shown who you are. So Yahweh or Yeshua is like a mirror to you and you are shown who you are. The reason why I’m saying that it happened to me and it was tough…
Gabriele Lubowski (33:23.448)
because I saw things about myself that I didn’t know. And that’s when you then can become the person that makes life on this earth, live this life in peace and being just to each other and really learning to love one another.
So that is the message I want to give. If as South Africans, those two things will happen. There is no reason why we cannot have that country that we all dream about and the vision we all hold in our hearts.
Chris Steyn (34:05.838)
Thank you. That was Gabriele Lubowski, the widow of a slain anti-apartheid activist, advocate Anton Lubowski, speaking to BizNews 35 years after his assassination in Windhoek. Thank you, Gabriele, and I’m Chris Steyn.
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