Chapter 6: I’ve Seen the Rain in Africa — but Not in Namibia

We were greeted by the flight attendant in the lobby of the private aviation terminal and she accompanied us out to the jet, where we were swiftly seated and our jet departed.

I had been on the jet before and knew the members of the three women crew. They were all very professional and all business when they were in the air. We were served lunch, and after they cleaned up our plates, we were left alone.

Johan, you might have guessed, was not normally my ‘driver’. He was, in fact, the head of The Trust’s security for its African holdings. In practice, that meant that he had a small mercenary army of mostly former South African soldiers who worked for us. Some white, mostly black, but highly trained and disciplined.

I reviewed his plan for dealing with the problem at our mine, and then he and I both kicked back and slept. It was a long flight from Germany to South Africa.

Although The Trust had holdings in South Africa, that was not our ultimate destination. The mining operation in question was in Namibia, across the border from South Africa in the Hardap province. But we were going to keep a low profile for this trip.

The jet landed at the airport in Jo’berg, deplaned, and we almost immediately got onto a smaller turbo prop plane for the rest of our trip.

We were taking a circuitous route that would add time, but more or less keep the South African authorities from knowing that we had left the country, and the Namibian authorities from knowing that we were in their in country.

Our flight plan that was filed indicated that we were heading down to Kimberly, where the famous diamond mines are. We were partial owners of one of the smaller mines in that area (still very profitable) and one of the few holdings The Trust had that it didn’t own outright. We had other minority investors, to my amusement, when I discovered it that included the Queen of England! I had been down in the mine during my teenage years; thousands of feet down! I doubt that the Queen had ever set foot in the mine.

But not long after we got out beyond the air traffic control zone, we deviated from our flight plan and flew over the Kalahari desert to Mamuno, a city on the Botswana/Namibia border. We used the railway from South Africa that went through the town of Mariental to resupply the mine with needed supplies, but we frequently used the little village of Mamuno as a way station for taking out gem stones, something that we kept very quiet. We kept several aircraft there, along with a private fuel supply and a long dirt runway.

When we arrived in Mamuno, we switched over to a helicopter and flew the rest of the way to our 300,000-acre mining concession. We kept low and avoided customs inspectors or military patrols. Namibia has one of the smallest, least capable militaries in Africa. After all, the entire country is mostly desert, and they expect the mining operations to protect themselves.

While I had been making my way into the country through the back door, Johan had flown directly to Windhoek, the capital and largest city in the country. While I had been flying slowly, he had a separate operation moving forward. We had been in contact, and it had been successful thus far.

I was waiting in the house that Jack had built for himself, looking out at the mine. It was an open pit mine, unlike the diamond mines that typically followed ‘pipes’ the descended for thousands of feet. The Kimberly mine was one of this ‘pipe’ sort of mine.

Ours was more like the copper mines in Arizona and Chile, or the Homestake gold mine in South Dakota, only on a far smaller scale. From the house I could see the workers in the distance. They were almost entirely members of the Ovambo tribe, the largest tribe in Namibia — one of the offshoots of the great Bantu southward migrations. They were operating the heavy equipment that broke up the soil, put it into huge haulers that brought it up to the processing facility at the top of the mine.

The general manager of the mine was a member of the Shona tribe of Zimbabwe, who had attended a formal University mining school, and since he was not Ovambo, he was less likely to be corrupt or assist in the theft of product. My uncle was not opposed to using long established tribal rivalries to prevent collusion.

Kembo Chitando looked down on the Ovambo workers and was strict and unforgiving with shirkers or thieves. He got a cut of the profits, so he regarded thieves as if they were stealing directly from him. Which, in a way, they were.

There were also a variety of other technical specialists working at the mine who were Afrikaans, and German — descendants of earlier settlers in Namibia.

Johan finally appeared in a vehicle convoy with our guest — the Minister for Mining and Energy, the Hon. Netumbo Kawana. Netumbo was an old SWAPO (South-West African Peoples Organization) hand who had been in the government since its inception in 1990.

The Minister, as he liked to be called, was a man of small stature — around 5’ 3”. There was talk that he was half Ovambo and half San or Nama, the San being the original bushmen inhabitants, or Nama, a Bantu tribe, but smaller with light bones, and taller than the San. Who knows, and did it matter?

Alas, he was an unhappy guest, since he had been more or less kidnapped from his lover’s bed in Windhoek.

“Mr. Walker!” he shouted at me, “What are you doing KIDNAPPING me and bringing me here to this desolate and god forsaken place! If you wanted to see me, you could have just called my assistant and she would have made you an appointment!”

“Ah, mister Minister! Sometimes there are things to be discussed that cannot go thru official channels, or over phone lines, and today is one of those times.”

The Minister was still sputtering, until we brought out some of his favorite single-malt Scotch. After he tossed down the first glass and started on the second, his temper had diminished.

“So what is so secret and important that you have your men frighten me half to death?”

“Minister, we have been hearing rumors that you were unhappy with our current arrangement and were considering actions against the mine.”

I continued,

“I know that you have your agents working here in the mine, and they are telling you that we seem to be coming close to the end of the time that this mine will be profitable. Within a year or two. Right?”

He nodded his head in agreement without changing his expression.

“But you know that we will continue to put your consideration money into your Swiss account at least until that time, yes? And a big bonus when and if we do close the mine down.”

He nodded his head once again.

“So, just exactly what is the problem that has you so upset that you are threatening my operation here?”

Minister Kawana pondered for close to a full minute before he answered.