Namibia after President Hage Geingob (1941-2024)

Abstract

On 4 February 2024, Namibia’s President Hage Geingob lost his short battle with cancer. His second five-year term in office would have ended on 21 March 2024. Following Sam Nujoma (1990–2005) and Hifikepunye Pohamba (2005–2015) as third Head of State, he was the first of the veterans to depart from this world. A member of the first ‘struggle generation’, he nevertheless was an ‘outlier’. He represented the liberation movement SWAPO (South West African People’s Organisation) from the mid-1960s at the United Nations while also studying Political Sciences, obtaining a BA at Fordham University and an MA at The New School. In 2004, he added a PhD at the University of Leeds to his academic credentials with a thesis on state formation in Namibia. From 1975 onwards, he was the only Director of the United Nations Institute for Namibia in Lusaka. In mid-1989, he returned from exile during the transition to independence under UN supervision, overseeing SWAPO’s election campaign. He chaired the elected Constituent Assembly and was largely responsible for the adoption of the normative framework in February 1990 as the last step to Independence (21 March 1990).