botswana/namibia - Cour international de Justice

of line and direction of the northern channel with the flow of the main river. Paragraph 71 of
the Namibian Memorial usefully points out that the shape of the island and the two channels
was copied, though onto a barely recognisable scale, on the 1889 Map, Serial 4. The depiction
of these two channels on the 1889 Map provides a much more probable explanation for the
choice of alignment and the wording of Article III of the 1890 Agreement than the whimsical
fantasy relating to a sand ridge advanced in paragraph 116 of the Namibian Memorial.
Navigability of the main channel was in the minds of the treaty-makers, not the avoidance of
swampy ground.8 Bradshaw's map seems the likely source of the 1889 map, and was used on
German maps for 30 years and on British maps for 40 years (Namibian Memorial,p.25,
para.71). The accuracy of these later maps should therefore constantly be qualified by
reference back to Bradshaw's Map.
(ii) The British maps 1890 to 1909
566. The Namibian Memorial makes no mention of the early British maps which indicate the
boundary. For example, the War Office map of 1903 and the GOC-in-Chief (South Africa)
Map of 1906 which, though they may not add 'much to the mapping of the Chobe'
(Rushworth, Namibian Memorial, Vol.V, Annex 102, p.33 at p.38), both show the boundary
on the north bank of the Chobe. It was the 1909 version of the GOC-in-Chief (South Africa)
Map which the British Foreign Office used as the basis of their negotiations with Germany, as
to a possible arbitration relating to the southern boundary of the Caprivi Strip. Two sketch
maps authorised by F W Panzera show the boundary in the river but the scale is too small to
indicate the relevant channel. District Commissioner Panzera provided the instructions to
Captain Eason to survey the Chobe following the request of the Secretary of State, Lord
Harcourt to the High Commissioner in 1911 for "all available information from local sources
in support of the view that the northern channel is the main channel"(Botswana Memorial,
Annex 16).
The Eason Map of 1912: Map No.2, 1:100,000. (Botswana Memorial, Annex 15).
567. These instructions were carried out in the survey of the Linyanti River by Captain
Eason9, coupled with his Report, which concluded that the northern channel was the main
channel in accordance with the terms of the Anglo-German Agreement (Botswana Memorial,
Chapter V, para. 146. page 64). Two maps, No. 2 'Linyanti River from Kazungula to Ngoma'
and number 9,' 1:200,000, Tracing of a map of The Linyanti River from Kazungula to
Liambesi by Hauptmann Streitwolf, 1909' trace the course of the lower stretch of the Chobe;
both show the Island. Map No.2 labels the Island 'Kassikiri' and clearly shows the meander
loop in the southern channel, supporting Captain Eason's comment 'that the southern channel
is merely a backwater'. The shape of the island in No. 9 is poor, lacking accuracy. Map No.2
stands out as the best depiction up to that date of the geographical configuration and
qualification of the northern channel as the main channel. Rushworth confirms this view:
"Eason in fact produced the best depiction of the Chobe available until 1928 and much
superior to that appearing on British maps before 1933, but it was never incorporated in to a
published map." (Rushworth Report, Namibian Memorial, Annex 102, p.41)
(iii) The German Maps up to 1914
[8 The 1889 Map is discussed above at paragraph 548. All versions of the map are of too small a scale and the
boundary line, when shown, is superimposed over the Chobe River and extends some half mile beyond both
north and south bank.]