Staff Reporter
THE political claim that 71% of young people will be eligible to vote in the upcoming Presidential and National Assembly elections in November has been dispelled by the recent release of the final 2023 Census Main Report by the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA).
Opposition parties – mainly the Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), Independent Patriots for Change (IPC), and Landless People’s Movement (LPM) – have shaped their election campaigns around this supposed 71% youth bloc, asserting that it has the potential to change Namibia’s destiny.
According to the NSA, 34.1% of the Namibian population, which stood at 3,022,401 as of 24 September 2023, are classified as youth (ages 15–34). This 34.1%, equating to 1.03 million people, includes individuals aged 15 to 17 who are not yet eligible to vote.
Of this 1.03 million young people, 25.4% are between the ages of 20 and 24, 24.5% are between the ages of 25 and 29, and 23.1% are between the ages of 30 and 34. NSA data further show that 22% of the population are aged 35–59, while 6.8% are aged 60 and above.
The final 2023 Population and Housing Census Main Report was released on Wednesday, 30 October 2024. This is Namibia’s first fully digital census, utilising available technologies to improve operational efficiency, enhance data quality, and enable prompt release of results.
The census revealed that the population grew from 2,113,077 in 2011 to 3,022,401 in 2023. In 2011, 36.9% of the population were between the ages of 15 and 34, 19.5% were between the ages of 35 and 59, and 7.1% were aged 60 and above. Additionally, while 42.8% of the population lived in urban areas and 57.2% in rural areas in 2011, the urban-rural population split reached 50–50 in 2023.
