Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro
Can any political party and/or formation ever put Namibia on the right trajectory – a progressive trajectory – if it does not have, in the least, an ideological foundation for what this trajectory, however progressive it may be, is?
Yours Truly Ideologically is prompted to pose this question, given his circumspection that unless the country knows where it is coming from, where it currently is, and where it is headed, then whatever it is currently doing and may be doing in the future, if not rooted in a deep-seated analysis, especially as to the nature and genesis of the problematic it is confronting, whatever endeavour it is embarking upon may in the final analysis only be a matter of assumptions.
In terms of governance, then, can any country, including Namibia, be trusted to be governed properly if what is being done and for what purpose?
To answer this question, it is only right and proper that we retrace our steps to from where we emerged as a new and independent country, to become a sovereign country equal among any other sovereign countries in the world.
We emerged from colonialism. In this instance, and in the last stages of colonialism, we emerged in 1990 from apartheid South Africa’s occupation, and hence apartheid colonialism.
That is before Imperial Germany’s colonialism up until the Second World War, when the then South West African territory was entrusted as a mandate to Britain, which in turn delegated such to the Cape Colony that was then under its colonial influence.
Speaking of colonialism, colonialism was not an end in itself but a means towards an end – or a manifestation of something else, which is capitalism.
Many writers on imperialism and colonialism have written extensively on these subjects, which was more than just academic expiation of the respective writers.
Notably, among them Lenin, Kwame Nkrumah, Frantz Fanon, and Walter Rodney, known for their works like Lenin’s Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism; Nkrumah’s Neo-Colonialism, the Last Stage of Imperialism; Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth; and Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.
All of these and many others were theses on colonialism, putting in context the system operative masterminding the colonisation of Africa, or any other colonised countries then in Africa, Latin America, Asia, the Caribbean, and the Pacific – not excepting Namibia.
This goes without saying that the Namibian struggle was not solely and only about colonialism. It could not have been, as colonialism was and could not have been the only problem the indigenes had, because colonialism was only a manifestation, if not precursor, of and to something else and bigger – which is capitalism.
Thus, with her attainment of independence in 1990, Namibia did not come to the end of the road. This is as far as the indigenes are concerned and/or may have been concerned.
May have been concerned because it has been unclear and never was it clear if the Namibian who clamoured for freedom and independence then did so to just see the end to colonialism, while colonialism was not an end in itself but a means towards capitalism.
Namibia thus embarked, and/or must have embarked, on the long haul – which in today’s political parlance is defined variously as either sovereignty, independence, liberty, justice – you name them. In a nutshell, the end of colonialism.
But what about neo-colonialism? Not to mention capitalism. Is and has Namibia ever been aspiring towards the end of neo-colonialism and capitalism?
A big no, because just like any and/or many, if not all, anti-colonial revolutions in Africa, likewise the anti-colonial revolution in the then South West Africa, today’s Namibia, has failed to conceptualise what was and needed to follow the demise of colonialism – not to mention capitalism.
Because despite colonialism being a tool of capitalism, Namibia and/or anti-colonial Namibian revolutionaries, in their anti-colonial agitations and endeavours, also failed to conceptualise the new society they purported to want to create after colonialism.
Or are and have been saying that capitalism has not and never been our problem? Our problem has been colonialism, and if you like neo-colonialism as it pertains currently with the supposed demise of colonialism, as indeed capitalism.
If colonialism was but only another stage of capitalism, can we really maintain and conclude that with the presumed and believed end of colonialism, as it is generally assumed, there is no capitalism in our country?
Can we say today because capitalism, which in colonial times was not good and could not have been for the country and its majority indigenes, has now eventually turned today to be good?
Or is it a matter that capitalism inherently was not bad but was only made to be bad by colonialism – meaning once colonialism, that was once perceived and believed an anathema to indigenous progress and prosperity, has been done away with, then capitalism is good for us and/or the country? As much as colonialism was a function and factor of capitalism?
As long as Namibia’s development trajectory is not informed, and/or juxtaposed, to colonialism, and by extension to capitalism, the independence, freedom, and justice, as you would have it currently in Namibia, cannot but be like the chasing of a mirage.
For essentially it means we and/or the country does not know what development is and why. Because it is a contradiction in terms to speak of and about development within capitalism, the very system that engineered colonialism.
It is thus strange and a mockery of the Namibian revolution that today, with the demise of colonialism, capitalism, the harbinger of colonialism, is not an issue.
While, historically, it is and has been the very embodiment of separate development, inequality, exploitation, poverty – you name them. Everything its prodigy, colonialism, was designed for and to be.
At no point has Namibia paused to rethink where she is coming from, dating back to the forerunners of the anti-colonial revolution to this day.
What do we have in place and how would those currently running the administrations, from the executive, parliamentarians, and members of the judiciary, perceive themselves currently and visualise the country?
Between changing the administration, which has happened, and changing society, which is far from attainment, there is a gulf. As changing society requires a fundamental change based on ideology. Does the current corps in charge subscribe to any ideology? Which?
