Namibia’s genocide “from today’s perspective”: opposition demands new deal with Germany

The Namibian opposition has asked Germany for the renegotiation of a controversial genocide deal reached between the two governments last year — this latest move is said to have been prompted by Berlin’s reticence that has led to even more resentment in its former colony.
The leader of People’s Democratic Movement (PDM), Namibia’s largest opposition party, McHenry Venaani, said Tuesday (13 September) he had written to German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock last week but has yet to get a response. In Namibia, Germany was responsible for massacres of the indigenous Herero and Nama peoples, which many historians consider the first genocide of the 20th century. In total, at least 60,000 Hereros and about 10,000 Namas were killed between 1904 and 1908. Now descendants of the victims’ peoples want recognition and compensation. “For a long time, we thought the Greens were our friends,” says Nandiuasora Mazeingo, chairperson of the Ovaherero Genocide Foundation (OGF), shrugging his shoulders at news that German government sees no need to renegotiate the Joint Declaration with Namibia.
After more than five years of bitter negotiations, Berlin announced last year that it recognized that it had committed “genocide” in this southern African territory during its colonial occupation between 1884 and 1915, and promised development aid of 1.1 billion over 30 years to benefit the descendants of the two tribes. Germany also stressed that the aid would be paid on a “voluntary basis” and that the agreement was not tantamount to „reparations”. However, the agreement led to heated debates in the Namibian parliament in September 2021. “We are not going to sign a sham agreement that makes Germany look good on the international stage,” Mazeingo told the media. The biggest stumbling block seems to lie within the wording of the Joint Declaration, which describes the atrocities committed by Germany by being a genocide “from today’s perspective.”