Editor, RE: “Learning from Namibia” (The New Times, June 15) Namibia has indeed registered commendable progress. However, the major issue remains high inequality. Namibia and South Africa still hold one of the highest levels of inequality in the world precisely because of shared history of land dispossession by European colonialists and apartheid whose descendants – in both countries – still have monopoly over arable land. The German government after taking over Namibia – then called German South-West Africa – killed to near extinction local populations from 1904-1908. In their first genocide, the German Kiezer government ordered the killings in which more than 80 per cent of Herero and 50 per cent of Nama people were decimated through direct killing and in concentration camps. Now consider that, not only the street names in cities are still in German language, but also these Germans are still in Namibia and are part of the major white land holders that they acquired after committing a genocide followed by apartheid! Ndoli Sabi
