Explorer was in apartheid-era unit accused of assassination
MIKE HORN, the explorer and adventurer, has caused a political row after claims that he was part of a notorious South African battalion under apartheid accused of assassinating a pro-independence leader.
South Africa-born Mr Horn, 56, and Børge Ousland made the first full crossing of the Arctic Ocean via the North Pole in 2019. He is a motivational speaker on personal development and fronted a French survival TV show.
While Horn has remained hazy about his earlier life in South Africa, an inves- tigative programme on Swiss Radio Television (RTS) reported he had served in the apartheid-era Battalion 101, an antiinsurrection force that operated on the border with Angola and Namibia, a South African protectorate that gained independence in 1990. Members of the unit were implicated in the fatal stabbing of Immanuel Shifidi, a pro-independence figure, in Windhoek, the Namibian capital, on Nov 30 1986.
Former colleagues in the unit confirmed, with photographic proof, that Horn was part of the battalion. RTS claimed he “volunteered” to join. Asked if he was there during the Windhoek attack, Horn said: “I’m not sure I was present.” Asked if he had regrets about being in the unit, he said: “People thought we hunted and killed. I hunted people who wanted to kill other people, like a policeman.”
When the story snowballed in Swiss and French media, Horn issued a written response saying he was in the unit for “compulsory military service”.
“I had no particular love for the apartheid regime. I was only fulfilling my civic duty,” he said, adding that he was “not present” at the Windhoek attack, a statement backed up by Brendan Seery, deputy editor of South African newspaper The Citizen, who was at the attack and reported on the aftermath.
Despite the clarification, Jessica Jaccoud, MP in the Swiss canton of Vaud, called for Horn to lose his status as an “honorary member” of Vaud Promotion, a state-funded body promoting the area. She said: “It’s a bit like asking someone who is part of the Wagner group today to be an ambassador for a Swiss canton 30 years from now.”