Border Crossings in Times of War
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Eloff de Visser, Lieneke [email protected] PhD candidate, Free University of Amsterdam (VU) Border Crossings in Times of War Lieneke Eloff de Visser Abstract The Eastern Caprivi in the north of Namibia forms the easternmost tip of the Caprivi Zipfel. At its widest, the area measures about 200 km east to west, and 80 km north to south. From the capital town Katima Mulilo it is an easy drive to any of four international borders with Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana. These borders were drawn in the early twentieth century as a formal separation between German, British and Portuguese colonial possessions. For the next sixty years, the borders remained permeable and people and goods easily crossed between territories. This changed dramatically with the onset of the Namibian war for liberation. To the South African authorities, the Caprivi Zipfel became a line of defence that was meant to bar SWAPO insurgents from entering Namibia and potential recruits from leaving, and served as a base for cross-border operations. From 1966 onwards the Eastern Caprivi became a militarized region where physical control over the territory’s boundaries was enforced by constant military patrols. Movement on and across the Zambezi and Chobe river borders was banned, while the Namibian - Zambian land border was denuded of all vegetation to allow ease of supervision. Moreover, even the internal Kwando river border between the Eastern and Western Caprivi was closed, so that to all intents and purposes the Eastern Caprivi was under full lockdown. This paper examines how the Eastern Caprivi population responded to these changes. Scholars in the field of borderland studies have convincingly argued against the notion that colonial borders were imposed on hapless Africans. Similarly, conflict studies show that insurgencies are not merely fought out over the heads of a submissive population. Instead, local actors may find it expedient to collaborate with the dominant force, but simultaneously they may find ways to resist through acts of sabotage, subversion or avoidance. Moreover, within the space of the central conflict local actors may actively exploit opportunities to assert their supremacy over rivals, or to gain exclusive access to valuable resources like arable land or hunting and fishing grounds. In the Eastern Caprivi agency indeed resided with the people who sought and managed to circumvent or exploit restrictions on border crossings. They did so for a variety of reasons that rested on livelihood or security needs, or that were ideologically, politically or economically inspired. Thus, instead of being passive victims, local individuals and groups of the Eastern Caprivi creatively contested and escaped the confines of colonial hegemony and military occupation. 1 Introduction The Eastern Caprivi in the north of Namibia forms the easternmost tip of the Caprivi Zipfel. At its widest, the area measures about 200 km east to west, and 80 km north to south. From the capital town Katima Mulilo it is an easy drive to any of four international borders with Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Botswana. The Eastern Caprivi has a long history of foreign occupation. From the 17th century the area has been invaded, ruled or administered by the Lozi, the Makololo, Germany, Britain and South Africa.1 The yoke of foreign rule was in some ways counter-balanced by the benefits of life at the periphery of the empire, allowing a certain freedom in interpreting the decrees emanating from the faraway centre of power. A case in point are the borders that enclose the Eastern Caprivi. Drawn in the early twentieth century as a formal separation between German and British colonial possessions, they remained permeable and people and goods freely crossed the international boundaries. However, the region’s relative autonomy was interrupted during the Namibian war for liberation from 1966 to 1989, when the South African state asserted itself at its periphery by introducing extensive administrative and military control. As part of the counterinsurgency war against the South West African People’s Organization (SWAPO), cross-border movement was prohibited and compliance was enforced by military patrols. To the Eastern Caprivi people, borders became barriers and places of danger. This paper examines how the Eastern Caprivi population were affected by and responded to these changes. When an occupying force successfully introduces security regulations such as the closing of borders, it implies a significant power disparity between the dominant force and the subordinate population. Indeed, in the face of the overwhelming South African military presence, open rebellion was not an option to the Eastern Caprivi people. In addition, the South African forces were well aware of the cardinal rule of counterinsurgency, that is to win the hearts and minds of the population upon whom insurgents rely for recruits, hiding places, food and other resources. The SADF2 therefore put extensive effort into socio- economic development by bringing health and education benefits and food security to a region that had been a neglected backwater during most of South Africa’s rule.3 On the face of it, these measures seemed successful and from a military viewpoint the Eastern Caprivi was a pacified region by 1979.4 Successive military commanders of the region perceived the attitude of the population toward the South African authorities as ranging from neutral to friendly and cooperative.5 However, a lack of overt resistance does not equate a positive 1 Flint, ‘State-Building in Central Southern Africa’, 394. 2 South African Defence Force. 3 Eloff de Visser, Winning the Hearts and Minds, 18. 4 Geldenhuys, Die wat Gewen het, 90. 5 Interviews held with Gen Minnaar Fourie, Gen AK de Jager, Gen Gert Opperman and Gen Johan Saayman, former SADF commanders of the Eastern Caprivi, during March 2011, South Africa. 2 attitude. Moreover, imposed rules are seldom entirely water-tight. As explained by James Scott, outward compliance may conceal ‘strategies of the weak’, that is the ways in which subordinate people resist a dominant force through acts of sabotage, subversion and avoidance.6 Similarly, Peter Skalnik argues that when people are unable to confront state power directly, they may develop coping strategies that rely on quiet resistance, adaptation, accommodation and, when it proves profitable, collaboration. Furthermore, a subdued population may ‘select’ elements from the foreign development packet, which may gradually be incorporated into their own political and social culture.7 Although colonial history provides ample evidence of ‘strategies of the weak’, many studies have privileged the manipulations of state and colonial rule over the agency of subordinates.8 However, more recently researchers in Borderland Studies have argued against the notion that colonial borders were imposed on hapless Africans. In fact, as Paul Nugent points out, frequently the delineation of international boundaries irreversibly ended old hierarchies and created opportunities for politically aspiring new elites. Moreover, local authorities, rather than opposing colonial rule, attempted to maximize benefits by enlisting colonial institutions as arbitrator in local struggles for dominance over people and land.9 Similarly, in the field of Conflict Studies, Stathys Kalyvas points to a danger of portraying violence in civil wars as being externally imposed on unsuspecting, and therefore innocent civilians. He argues that at the peripheries, or the local level, a conflict may be more about pre-existing local disputes than about issues that concern the central parties in the struggle. Thus, local actors are by no means passive or invisible, but may successfully pursue personal ambitions by manipulating the central actors to promote their attempts to assert supremacy over rivals, or to gain exclusive access to valuable resources like arable land or hunting and fishing grounds.10 This paper aims to elaborate on the theme of African agency. The focus of the first chapter is on the Eastern Caprivi region before its borders were closed during the Namibian war for liberation. The second chapter discusses the strategic function of the Eastern Caprivi in South African security considerations. It outlines the region’s extensive militarisation leading to radically limited cross-border access. The third chapter deals with reasons and ways that people of the Caprivi circumvented or exploited such restrictions. The final chapter discusses the multiplicity of meanings that infused the border concept during the conflict. 6 Scott, Domination and the arts of resistance, 188. 7 Skalník, Outwitting the state, 13. 8 McClendon Thomas, ‘Coercion and Conversation’, 53. 9 Nugent, ‘Arbitrary Lines’, 47-51. 10 Kalyvas, ‘The Ontology of ‘Political Violence’’, 480-482. 3 Early Boundaries The rivers that enclose much of the Eastern Caprivi have functioned as natural boundaries since pre-colonial times, when the region fell under the rule of the Lozi kingdom that had its headquarters in what is now western Zambia. For instance, Sipopa, the Lozi ruler from 1864 to 1878, appointed and sent Mamili Simataa Kabende to take up residence at Linyanti in the Eastern Caprivi, where the like-named river formed the southern perimeter of the Lozi domain. More than a visible boundary marker to the Lozi territory, the river also provided an obstacle to potential invaders, and indeed the Mamili’s responsibility was to guard the kingdom against invasion by the Matabele.11 A story survives of a party of Matabele warriors coming up from the south who, because they could not swim, had to depend on local knowledge and cooperation to safely find their way through the maze of channels and islands. Having negotiated transport to the northern bank, the Matabele were tricked by the local boatman. He rowed them to an island from where he made his escape and left the Matabele to starve to death.12 In a similar manner the Zambezi river functioned as a safety barrier in the north-eastern part of the Eastern Caprivi. Having acquired the Eastern Caprivi as part of her colonial possessions, Germany sent Captain Streitwolf to take control of the region in 1908.