Africa-Press – Namibia. The Nama Youth of Namibia rejected the Genocide Remembrance Day meeting held in Keetmanshoop in the //Kharas region last week.
The meetings, spearheaded by Vice President Lucia Witbooi, form part of her engagement with traditional leaders from the affected communities on the commemoration of the day, in the Omaheke, Otjozondjupa, Hardap, //Kharas, Erongo, Kunene and Khomas regions.
The group in a statement sent to Nampa blamed the government for failing to recognise the structural, emotional and generational destruction endured by the Nama people, who they said continue to suffer as a result of the genocide.
The meeting, held on 22 April, coincided with the day on which the Nama people remember the painful history of colonial oppressors, who ordered that the Nama community be exterminated.
The youth group expressed anger at Witbooi’s decision to proceed with the meeting, despite traditional leaders having written to her to request an alternative date for the engagement.
“This decision showed disrespect for the emotional and spiritual weight the day carries to the Nama people. It is not just another day in the calendar, it is our day of sorrow, a sacred space for honouring those who came before us and suffered for who they are,” said the statement.
The statement further noted that the meeting displayed insensitivity towards the community’s pain, and formed part of a broader pattern of disregard and exclusion that has characterised the government’s approach to the genocide discourse and the so-called Joint Declaration with the German government. Additionally, the youth group also objected to the proposed date of 28 May for the genocide commemoration, arguing that it signifies the bureaucratic closure of death camps rather than the end of suffering. “This is another example of this detachment from our lived truth. It erased our experience and imposes a version of history that does not speak for us,” the statement added.
They called on the government to listen and stand for the truth and to heed the voices of the Nama people, especially on days that hold the greatest significance for them. “Our past cannot be rewritten. We have had enough of elements that show the tendency of rewriting that past. We want our future to be shaped with honesty empathy and justice,” it added.
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