NYASHA NYAUNGWA DIRK Mudge, a white Namibian who began his political life with the pro-Apartheid National Party but later lobbied for Namibia's independence from South African white-minority rule, has died after contracting COVID-19, aged 92. He died in a hospital in the capital Windhoek late on Tuesday. A polarising figure, Mudge's opponents accused him of delaying Namibia's independence from neighbour South Africa by setting up a 1975–77 national conference. It aimed to make small reforms that would appease Namibia's indigenous population and prevent a full-scale independence war with rebels. Namibia, a former German colony, had been run by South Africa…