Tobias Hainyeko

Tobias Hainyeko (1932 -1967) was Namibian guerrilla fighter who served as the first commander of the People's Liberation Army of Namibia (PLAN) during the Namibian War of Independence. He was born in northern Namibia in 1932.

In the early 1950s, Hainyeko arrived in Cape Town, South Africa just after the Ovamboland People's Organization (OPO) was formed. He immediately integrated with the group and became one of its prominent members. Hainyeko spent valuable years working in Cape Town, sharing political experiences with the likes of Andimba Toivo ya Toivo and Andreas Shipanga. In 1959, just before the Old Location Massacre, he returned to Namibia, but left the country again in 1960 following Sam Nujoma to Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania. After meeting Nujoma in Tazania, he learned that SWAPO was preparing for arm struggle and became one of the first SWAPO members to volunteer for military training. He then went for military training, first in Algeria, then in the Soviet Union. He returned to Tanzania and helped set up a military training centre in Kongwa for new recruits. It was from there that Hainyeko brought all trained cadres together and moved to establish the first guerrilla force for the struggle for the total liberation of Namibia. In 1962, Hainyeko was appointed First Deputy Army Commander of the South West Africa Liberation Army (SWALA), the predecessor of PLAN. SWALA was renamed to PLAN in 1966 and Hainyeko became the first PLAN commander.

In 1965 Hainyeko, together with Peter Nanyemba and Johan yaOtto Nankudhu, led the first group of PLAN combatants from their military camp in Kongwa, Tanzania via Nakonde, Zambia to the Namibian border at Sesheke to commence the armed liberation struggle in Namibia. Through careful planning under his leadership, SWAPO established a military training base at Omugulugwombashe in northern Namibia. It was from the Omugulugwombashe base that SWAPO guerrillas launched its armed struggle against the South African occupation regime on 26 August 1966, this would mark the beginning of the Namibian War of Independence which lasted until 1989.