Defence minister Peter Hafeni Vilho has accused Landless People’s Movement parliamentarians of passing information on Namibia’s defence on to foreign countries.
During a heated debate in the National Assembly on Wednesday, Vilho said he has discovered documentary evidence that LPM members of parliament Bernadus Swartbooi and Henny Seibeb have been briefing foreign countries on Namibian defence-related matters.
Vilho was responding to allegations from LPM leader Swartbooi that he was capable of “overthrowing the government through a military coup”.
Swartbooi also accused the minister of being capable of eliminating “a huge section of Namibians”.
“This man will be killing many Namibians. God forbids. […] I see red flags coming,” Swartbooi said.
Swartbooi also alleged there was ethnic discrimination with regard to promotions in the Namibian Defence Force.
In response to Swartbooi, Vilho said if there was any threat to the Namibian public, it would come from the two LPM parliamentarians – Swartbooi and Seibeb.
“It appears the two honourable members of the LPM are serving two constituencies. One constituency is Namibia and the other constituency is foreign. I have two documentary proofs here, [to show] that every communication that we ever had with LPM, they always pass this information to foreign governments,” Vilho said while holding up two documents.
The LPM members did not deny passing information they received from the defence ministry on to foreign countries.
Instead, Seibeb said “LPM is a registered political party with the ECN and as far as [political] ideologies differ, we can write to anyone we want”.
Vilho also denied that there were more than 3 500 Chinese military troops stationed in Namibia.
He said the issue had already been dealt with in August in a press statement and in a letter addressed to the LPM.
The questions asked by Seibeb on this matter last week, Vilho said, were meant to score political points because he had already responded to them previously.
Popular Democratic Movement leader McHenry Venaani also charged that Vilho has for the past days been trying “to become the most dangerous defence minister in a democratic state”.
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