The Bwabwata National Park (sometimes referred to as West Caprivi or the Caprivi Strip) falls within both Kavango and Caprivi Regions (see map on page 369), and is bounded in the north by the border with Angola, in the south by the border with Botswana, in the east by the Okavango River and in the west by the Kwando River. First proclaimed in 1937 as a "Nature Reserve" (Fisch 2008: 30), in 1963 the park was re-proclaimed as the "West Caprivi Nature Park" (Boden 2009: 44), although there had been plans to declare the area a "Bushman Reserve" in terms of the recommendations of the Odendaal Commission in 1962 (Nuulimba 2012: 3). In 1968 the park was re-proclaimed as the "Caprivi Game Park", with a higher degree of conservation protection (Brown and Jones 1994: 3). Soon thereaft er, however, the South African Defence Force (SADF) declared the park a military zone and established military bases there, e.g. at Alpha (later renamed Omega), Pika Pau (later renamed Buff alo) near the Okavango River and Fort Doppies on the Kwando River (Boden 2009: 57). The SADF withdrew from the area in 1989 – shortly before Namibia's Independence in March 1990.