Dialogue / Media Reports

Opposition parties absent from Namibia’s first official genocide day – Namibian 01-06-2025

“Opposition parties absent from Namibia’s first official genocide day

By Eliaser Ndeyanale

1 June 2025

Several opposition parties were noticeably absent from the official commemoration of Genocide Remembrance Day held on Wednesday to honour the victims of the 1904-908 Ovaherero and Nama genocide.

Political parties such as the Independent Patriots for Change (IPC), the Landless People’s Movement (LPM) and the United Democratic Front (UDF) did not send representatives to the event.

IPC national chairperson Brian Black says the party was not present at the event because the descendants of the victims of the genocide were excluded.

[…]

LPM spokesperson Lifalaza Simataa says the party could not attend because the party president, Bernadus Swartbooi, and other party leaders were doing a public lecture on genocide at Gibeon.

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One Africa on Wednesday reported that Swartbooi accused the government of pushing a one-sided narrative and refusing to unify the commemoration days observed by the Nama on 12 April and Ovaherero on 2 October.

“This 28 May date was meant to bring all of us together but that’s not the language being used,” Swartbooi was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile, UDF spokesperson Mabasen Narib says the party’s no-show at the event should not be interpreted as a boycott, adding that the party is busy with by-elections at Sesfontein, Grootfontein and the Kanjamab constituencies scheduled for 17 June.

[…]

Those from opposition parties who were present at the event were Popular Democratic Movement leader McHenry Venaani, George Kambala of the Affirmative Repositioning and former Swanu of Namibia parliamentarian Usutuaije Maamberua.

Namibia on Wednesday commemorated its first-ever Genocide Remembrance Day to honour more than 100 000 Ovaherero and Nama people who were killed by German colonial forces between 1904 and 1908.

Speaking at the commemoration event in Windhoek, president Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah recounted the atrocities committed by the German colonial government under its policy of extermination and genocide.

“We should also find a degree of comfort in the fact that the German government has agreed to offer an apology to the affected communities and the Namibian people in general.

We may not agree on the final quantum, but that is part of the complex negotiations we have been engaged in with the German government since 2013,” she said.”

Full report “Opposition parties absent from Namibia’s first official genocide day” on the website of the Namibian (last checked in June 2025)

See also the statement by President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah on the occasion of the Genocide Remembrance Day, Parliament Gardens, Windhoek, 28 May 2025, in the ‘Primary Sources’ section of this website