Namibian People’s party counts on citizens’ trust
by Toivo Asheeke
November 2009 is election year in Namibia and contrary to the typical trend in Africa, I am of the opinion that it will be a peaceful and successful one.
The South West Africa People’s Organization (SWAPO) has the unquestioned support of the majority of the Namibian people and offers the best plan for progress. Most Namibians are still loyal to SWAPO and confident in the party’s ability and determination to improve Namibia.
Five years ago (2004), a historic election took place in Namibia. The founding president of the country, Comrade President Sam Nujoma, finished his second term as president. In the SWAPO national convention held earlier that year, Comrade Minister Hifikepunye Pohamba was elected to stand as the party’s candidate at the upcoming election.
According to statistics of the election, 85.2 percent of 977,742 registered voters turned out. Namibia selects its leaders by popular vote and Comrade Minister Hifikepunye Pohamba won 76.44 percent of the total, with his nearest challenger Ben Ulenga of the Congress of Democrats (COD) winning only 7.28 percent. In the elections for the National Assembly (Parliament) SWAPO party won 75.83 percent of the available seats with the COD winning 7.27 percent.
SWAPO comfortably won a peaceful and successful election in which all political parties were able to campaign and voters to vote freely. It was an unprecedented moment in African history, as the transition of power from the founding president to his successor was seamless and peaceful.
With this as a backdrop, the reality of a SWAPO victory can be attributed to many factors, a few of which will be highlighted here.
To begin, SWAPO is the party that fought for and brought independence to Namibia and is still deeply respected and trusted by Namibians. From its foundation in 1960 until the present, SWAPO has been present in the minds of the people as the fighter for their rights and it is in turn valued highly.
Furthermore, the SWAPO party has a comprehensive and clear plan on how to develop the country through projects such as Vision 2030 and the National Development Plan Three to name a few key ones. There are indeed problems facing the implementations of these development plans and how to best achieve them but they are at least goals SWAPO is trying to achieve.
In addition to this, SWAPO is truly a national movement. Namibia has 13 different ethnic groups and although the Ovambo tribe is slightly less than two thirds of the population, SWAPO has support from elements in all the tribes. Most of the other political parties, such as Rally for Democracy and Progress, Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), National Unity Democratic Organization (NUDO) and the COD were formed primarily on tribal foundations and have yet to create a message that the Namibian people as a whole can rally around.
Finally, the weakness, ineffectiveness and incompetence of the opposition parties make any of their elections to power a dream only they entertain. As mentioned before, COD, RDP, DTA and all the others formed primarily on tribal lines rather than national lines and thus don’t appeal to the Namibian people as a whole. These parties also don’t have any plan for what they will do for the country when they get to power; all their campaign rhetoric consists of critiquing SWAPO party but yet offering no alternative to supposed “ineffective policies.”
Moreover, many of these opposition groups were founded by unhappy SWAPO members who broke from the party because when independence came, they believed they should have been given higher positions of power in government or government-run businesses. They didn’t form these groups to serve the Namibian people, but to satisfy their own desires for power and thus they will not gain any meaningful votes in the upcoming election.
With this as the case, coupled with SWAPO’s determination to run a strong and effective campaign, expect SWAPO to win the upcoming election.
Comrade President Pohamba, who is standing for re-election, spoke about what SWAPO had to do to ensure victory at the upcoming election. He said, “We must also work harder and always consistently so that the voters can turn out in large numbers to exercise their democratic right and vote … While the track record of our Party speaks for itself, we must work to convince the populace that we can do better.”
So, as was stated earlier, expect SWAPO to easily win the November elections not because of corruption, voter intimidation or opposition intimidation, but because they are the party that the Namibian people wish to follow.
Toivo Asheeke is a junior politics major and can be reached at twashee07@earlham.edu.
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