Police want public assistance in Okahandja 5 investigations

By: Tileni Mongudhi
March 12, 2024

POLICE have invited activist and Namibia Economic Freedom Fighters’ leader Michael Amushelelo and the public to provide statements under oath to assist police investigations into the fatal killing of five suspected robbers at Okahandja, in April last year.

The Issue has also learned that friends and relatives of the five men, Erikki ‘Akawa’ Martin (also known as Al-Quaeda), Abed ‘Koppe’ Andreas, Marius ‘Jackie’ Ipinge, Malakia ‘Brown’ Kotokeni and Flavianus ‘Kalu’ Endjala, are planning a protest march later this month to demand justice for the slain men. 

 

The five were fatally shot at Okahandja on the night of 25 April last year, in what police called an attempted robbery of a gambling house in the town.

Friends and family of the deceased men, over the weekend, held meetings and fundraising activities to ensure that their movement picks up traction before taking to the streets. T-shirts bearing the five men’s faces have also been produced, while organisers are still looking at printing placards and other promotional material to raise awareness. 

Inspector General of the Namibian Police, Joseph Shikongo told The Issue that he was not aware of the planned protest. He, however, said that those with information that can assist police investigations into the killing should provide the police with the evidence and make statements under oath to that effect.

 

“I have written a clear letter to Amushelelo and those making allegations, to come forward and provide statements under oath,” Shikongo said. The police chief said that those with information should provide their statements under oath to commissioner Moritz !Naruseb, who is head of the police conduct and investigations directorate.

 


The Issue has seen Shikongo’s letter to Amushelelo dated 28 February. In the letter, Shikongo acknowledges receipt of Amushelelo’s petition and urges him to assist the police with further evidence and a statement under oath.

Prosecutor General Martha Imalwa told The Issue that the docket has not yet reached her office and that it is still in the hands of the police conduct and investigations directorate, which is responsible for internal investigations. 

The Issue has learned that Shikongo is taking the case so seriously that it is being investigated by three different entities within the police. They are the Namibian Police Forensic Science Institute, the police conduct and investigations directorate and the criminal investigations directorate before it can be submitted to the prosecutor general’s office. 

Unholy trinity 

This case has brought to the fore the failings of the criminal justice system and the intricate relationships between the police, prosecutors and criminal underworld. A significant concern raised is why criminals appear to always be a step ahead of law enforcement and why, in robbery cases, suspects continue to get bail.

In the Okahandja case, questions are being asked as to how the five deceased men might have been allowed to freely roam the streets. Police reported that the five were facing a combined 24 criminal cases on charges considered serious. Police have not answered how the five might have been repeatedly granted bail in all the cases. At least five police officials who don’t want to be named told The Issue that corrupt police and prosecutors facilitated the granting of bail to known ‘criminals’. While two senior officers blamed incompetence saying the corruption allegations were too extreme.

Imalwa also called on those with evidence of corrupt prosecutors to come forward with such information and allow her to take action. “I hate rumours, I want clear information, so I deal with it,” she told The Issue on Monday.

Another example raised is the fact that a list of names of police officers involved in the shooting was leaked to the public just days after the shooting occurred. This was considered a breach because police usually do not release the names of officers involved in shootouts, for their safety as well as to facilitate smooth investigations into the shooting incident.

“Senior officers are being used by criminals to target the boys,” said a detective who did not want to be named due to fear of reprisal. But he explained that the officers involved in the shooting were a thorn in the flesh of the armed robbery gangs operating in Windhoek. The officers are from the serious crime unit. The unit has a reputation for using brute force when handling suspects. 

The Issue has been informed that members of the unit are facing several complaints, especially by suspects claiming to have been assaulted. The detective said these officers were effective in apprehending criminals and recovering money stolen in armed robberies. Now Amushelelo and the ‘Justice for Our 5 Brothers’ movement are demanding that the officers involved be brought to book.

Amushelelo went as far as linking the incident to National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia (Namcor) board chairperson, Jennifer Comalie’s arrest on drug dealing charges last year.

Amushelelo alleged that the slain men were paid to plant the drugs in Comalie’s car while attending a board meeting at Namcor. The five were allegedly then executed by police, after threatening to blow the whistle on the alleged framing, because they were not paid what was promised to them in full. Amushelelo’s allegations pointed to suspended Namcor managing director Immanuel Mulunga as the key figure in this conspiracy theory. Mulunga has denied these allegations and was quoted in the media distancing himself from the allegations.  

High-speed chase, guns, cops and robbers

It was a dark Tuesday evening of 25 April 2023, three detectives, from the police serious crime unit, were in pursuit of a group of suspected armed robbers in Okahandja. The officers followed a tip that something big was about to go down. There was talk of a farm in the Okahandja-Windhoek area but the information was not specific nor was it clear what the actual robbery target was. 

The detectives only knew that at least three vehicles and at least eight suspected robbers were involved. 

Police sources said that investigations later revealed that the gang was informed by their inside contact that the gambling house’s cash is collected at night by a security company and not during the day as the norm. The plan was to hit while the cash was being collected. 

Police suspected Two Volkswagen Golfs and a third vehicle were involved.  

The detectives kept their sights on the third car. 

The suspects driving the third car were unaware of the fact that the vehicle belonged to the Windhoek City Police and was booked as part of an intelligence-gathering exercise. 

Upon arrival in the Okahandja central business district, police were greeted by commotion. There appears to have been a confrontation and the suspects fled before the robbery took place. 

Some of the suspects allegedly fled on foot in different directions, while six of them managed to drive off in the city police owned vehicle. 

The unmarked police vehicle was now in hot pursuit and the suspects allegedly opened fire. What happened next is not clear and police reports of the incident remain hotly contested, especially by activist Amushelelo.

One bullet hit the police car at the left rear end of the boot trunk panel. 

Police also opened fire, while in pursuit of the vehicle towards the Nau-Aib suburb. The car then left the road and landed in a ditch, near the town’s vehicle testing and licensing (Natis) centre. The bullet-riddled car came to a standstill and the five lifeless bodies remained in the car.

The sequence of events has not yet been independently verified. The police statement said that officers on the scene saw a suspect leaving the vehicle and disappearing into a river bed under the cover of darkness, leaving their five travelling companions dead and their bodies bullet-riddled. 

A leaked autopsy report indicated that Kotokeni, known as Brown on the streets, had eight gunshot wounds from the back and three exit wounds in front around his chest area. 

Police reported that they recovered housebreaking equipment, knives and two airguns in the vehicle. 

The officers survived unscathed.

Police sources further said that the officers involved in the shootout had to wait for a forensics team to remove the dead bodies from the vehicle, while also taking the guns used by the responding officers into their custody for testing.

It was at this point when removing the bodies from the vehicle that the detectives instantly identified one of the slain men as Martin, who also went by Al-Quaeda on the streets. The discovery shocked detectives at the scene. Police sources said that Martin was a known police informant, who was at the time also a crucial State witness in a criminal case before the courts. 

The officers were allegedly shocked because Martin started collaborating with the police because he had left the life of crime behind and started what appeared to be a legitimate business of buying and selling cars. He allegedly told his handlers that the birth of his daughter was behind his change of heart. 

Police were now struggling to explain what he was doing in the vehicle and why he did not inform his handlers of the planned hit on the gambling house.

Martyrs 

Police deputy inspector general responsible for the operation, Major General Elias Mutota, had in his statement the following day highlighted that the slain men had a history of crime. They were all previously arrested and had been granted bail in a combined total of 24 criminal cases, on charges related to armed robbery, housebreaking, theft, attempted murder, possession of firearms and ammunition without a licence, illegal dealing in firearms, displaying fake vehicle number plates and escaping from lawful custody.

These cases were committed and subsequently registered in Windhoek, Nkurenkuru, Walvis Bay, Tsumeb, Omuthiya, Opuwo, Ongwediva and Sesfontein.

There were small pockets of voices supporting the police’s action because crime had gotten out of hand. 

However, the weeks following the killing saw police come under heavy scrutiny and criticism. Lawyers, politicians, activists and even police officers condemned the killing. Some labelled it a well-planned execution.

Social media platforms like Instagram, X (formerly Twitter) and WhatsApp saw an avalanche of tributes being posted in honour of the slain men. They were loved and received what appeared to be celebrity funerals. 

MP and president of the NEFF Epafras Mukwiilongo spoke at Martin’s funeral and said that he was going to talk to Inspector General Shikongo about the conduct of particular officers who had been harassing the slain men before being killed by the same officer.

The police had lost the public relations battle. 

Theories also started emerging that the slain men were victims of a deal with corrupt officers gone wrong, and that corrupt police officers were trying to extort money from the gang. The gang, weeks before their killing, allegedly scored millions from a heist where they allegedly robbed a transport company owner at Ongwediva. In this case, N$6 million was allegedly stolen from a vehicle parked at the company owner’s house in Ongwediva around 31 March 2023. A case was only opened days later on 2 April. Police subsequently arrested five suspects who appeared in the Oshakati Magistrate’s Court in December 2023 and are expected to appear in April again. It now appears as though the two robberies are unrelated.

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