Namibia had a peaceful and reasonably credible elections last week, at least as far as the preliminary observer reports showed. President Hage Geingob and South West Africa People’s Organisation (Swapo) won another five-year mandate.
That is a positive development. However, it also made quite a poignant statement about the stewardship of Geingob and Swapo. From a high of 87 per cent in 2014, this time he got 56.3 per cent of the vote, just enough to avoid a rerun. His party, too, though victorious in the legislative vote to choose 96 MPs, got 63 seats, down from 77, losing its two-third majority in parliament.
The message in the poll outcome is quite clear: The popularity of Namibia’s third president and that of the party that has ruled the country since independence from apartheid South Africa in 1990 is waning. Most probably, the voters gave them another chance because there was no better alternative. Their work is well cut out and they better get down to making amends quickly.
Africa is replete with independence parties that lost favour with the electorate. President Geingob and Swapo must deliver on their campaign promise to bring tangible improvement to Namibians’ lives. From corruption, a malady that invariably afflicts all African states, a struggling economy and the Southern African nation’s worst ever droughts, there can be no room for complacency. The Bank of Namibia has forecast a third year of recession with the economy shrinking by 1.7 per cent this year.
This being his final constitutional term, President Geingob should not be encumbered by vested interests that all too often cloud the vision of a typical African leader. He owes it to his party in particular and Namibians in general to bequeath a legacy of prosperity to the sparsely populated and largely desert country.
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