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FORMER member of parliament Geoffrey Mwilima has again filed a High Court case in an attempt to win his release from jail, where he is serving a 15-year term of imprisonment in connection with his involvement in a failed attempt to overthrow the Namibian government in the Zambezi region.

Mwilima (67), who has been in jail for more than 23 years since his arrest in August 1999 is now asking the High Court to issue an urgent interdict in which the minister of home affairs, immigration, safety and security is ordered to authorise his release from prison on account of his medical condition.

Mwilima is also asking the court to review and set aside a decision of the minister of home affairs, immigration, safety and security, Albert Kawana, on 12 December last year not to authorise his release from prison.

According to documents filed at the court, the head of the Namibian Correctional Service’s healthcare services, Dr Tony Lumbidi, on 24 November last year submitted a report to Kawana in which he informed the minister that Mwilima suffers from diabetes and chronic kidney failure, and that both conditions are considered to be dangerous diseases.

Lumbidi added, though, that Mwilima has access to regular dialysis sessions and to his private doctors when needed, and concluded that his continued imprisonment would not be detrimental to his health.

The report on Mwilima’s medical condition was done after High Court judge Esi Schimming-Chase on 14 November last year ordered the medical officer of Windhoek Correctional Facility to determine, in terms of the Correctional Service Act, whether Mwilima is suffering from a dangerous disease or whether his continued incarceration is detrimental to his health.

She also ordered that if the medical officer determined he was afflicted by a dangerous disease or that his continued incarceration would be detrimental to his health, the officer should make a recommendation to the minister in terms of a section of the Correctional Service Act that says the minister may authorise the release of a prison inmate on medical grounds on a recommendation of the medical officer.

Mwilima says in an affidavit filed at the court, that once a medical officer has determined that a prison inmate is suffering from a dangerous disease, it is the minister’s duty to consult the commissioner general of the Namibian Correctional Service and to authorise the release of the inmate.

The only discretion the minister has in such a situation is about whether to set conditions for an inmate’s release, he says as well in his affidavit.

After receiving the report on Mwilima’s medical condition, Kawana responded on 12 December by informing Dr Lumbidi in a letter that he noted the medical officer’s decision and hoped Dr Lumbidi would inform Mwilima accordingly.

Mwilima is arguing that Kawana unlawfully failed or refused to authorise his release on medical grounds, and that his continued imprisonment is a threat to his life.

He states in his affidavit: “The failure to release me is tantamount to cruel and degrading treatment and unlawful infringement of my inalienable right to dignity.”

According to Kawana, though, he has not received a recommendation for Mwilima’s release on medical grounds and cannot authorise Mwilima’s release until he has received such a recommendation.

In the absence of a recommendation from the medical officer, Mwilima remains imprisoned on the basis of a court order sentencing him to serve a particular prison sentence, Kawana says: “He cannot be released.”

Judge Marlene Tommasi reserved her judgement on Mwilima’s application for an urgent interdict for his release after hearing arguments from lawyers Profysen Muluti, representing Mwilima, and Sisa Namandje, representing the minister and the prison authorities on Friday.

Tommasi postponed the delivery of her judgement to 3 March.

Mwilima was sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment in December 2015, at the end of a marathon high treason trial. The Supreme Court reduced his sentence to 15 years in an appeal judgement delivered in December 2021.