Chris Jacobie-Flipside
THE election and endorsement of Me. Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah as the Swapo-party candidate for the 2024 Presidential Elections is much more than the choice of a ruling political party.
It rather demonstrates the strength of the democratic steel of Namibians that is tempered in the crucible of adversity and challenge over the years. Namibians and their diversity are what the Namibian House is made of.
The facts are that Me. Nandi-Ndaitwah is not only supported as the historic first woman presidential candidate but is reinforced by her own merit, which includes a very scarce commodity nowadays: her motherly firmness, her basic values, and respectfulness. Her values far overshadow her popularity, and President Dr. Hage Geingob, as an astute leader, recognized that she does not need an endorsement because she has enough intrinsic merit. She represents hope that is enough motivation for the Namibian nation to meet any challenge that might come their way.
Credit for this must go to Swapo’s first Director of Elections, Chairman of the Constitutional Committee, Founding Prime Minister, and Namibia’s Third President, Dr. Hage Geingob, who effectively put an end to engineered democracy. He displayed the same foresight when he engineered the Nujoma-third term and limited all other terms, including his own.
The biggest favor Dr. Geingob did for Swapo, Me. Nandi-Ndaitwah, and Namibia was not endorsing her or any other candidate and allowing her to become the people’s choice. She has no debt to pay because Nandi-Ndaitwah is without any political luggage.
The Swapo nominee again confirmed that dignity is an important quality because she herself is dignified, and only a fool will attack her character. No political party, Swapo included, has an alternative to Nandi-Ndaitwah, whose gravitas is impossible to ignore, even by her fiercest enemies. To pretend something else is political dishonesty and expected from political scavengers who stroll from carcass to carcass and never find a home.
Namibia is the biggest winner of its democracy, and it is only possible by democrats in spite of camouflaged political dictators wanting voters to believe otherwise. Because Namibians endured the past and elected how to live their future.
