Buy back the land, genocide descendants tell Germany

JEMIMA BEUKES WINDHOEKSima Luipert, activist and descendent of the Nama and Ovaherero genocide, told a press conference in Berlin last week that affected communities do not want Germany’s generosity, but want what is owed to them.According to her, Germany can start with buying back the land that its colonial forces took from now disposed people and which now belongs to descendants of German settlers while Nama and Ovaherero people are squeezed into reserves.“Since the German Reich settled its citizens on our land, we might as well settle Nama and Ovaherero people on German land here in Germany, because at that time it was fine to do it then. If Germany doesn’t want to buy our land and return it to us, they can set up a Great Namaqualand and Ovahereroland in Germany and settle our people,” Luipert said.She also demanded that Germany must rewrite its own history taught in German schools if indeed it is genuine about reflecting on its colonial history and to acknowledge what it has done to the Nama and Ovaherero people.“At the moment, German history of atrocities and crimes starts with the Jewish Holocaust and, in the same vein, Namibian history starts with the liberation history and that is what our children have been taught since independence,” she said.Same WhatsApp groupLuipert said the joint declaration by the Namibian and German governments, in which Germany undertook to pay N$18.4 billion for the genocide, was drafted in the same spirit as the Berlin conference which cut up Africa for European benefit.Luipert told journalists that the declaration is mere financial support to the Namibian government and not towards genocide and is not enough to compensate for the land affected communities lost.“That land covers two-thirds of present-day Namibia and I do not know how this money can buy the current two-thirds of the entire Namibian land surface. I also don’t know how this money can make up for the livestock that was taken in 1907 by the German Reich when they decided that not a single livestock or property should belong to the Nama or Ovaherero people. “And all that livestock was given to the German settlers whose descendants are still sitting on our land and I don’t know how this money can make up for human dignity, rape, forced labour, sterilisation, abduction, loss of culture and religion and political and social organisation,” she said.The declaration is still under discussion in Parliament.Restore the soulDr Ngondi Kamatuka, president of the Association of the Ovaherero Genocide in the United States, said the German people must understand that they have an obligation to restore the soul of the Nama and Ovaherero people and this can be done by getting rid of the joint declaration.“If we were at the negotiating table, this kind of nonsensical agreement would not have seen the [light of] day, because we would not have been bullied into something that does not even begin to address our pain.“We understand where the Namibian government was coming from because they do not feel the pain of the Ovaherero and Nama people, that is why could agree to something so disingenuous,” he said. jemima@namibiansun.com

Buy back the land, genocide descendants tell Germany

Comments

Namibian Sun 2025-06-18

Please login to leave a comment

Buy back the land, genocide descendants tell Germany

Comments

Namibian Sun 2025-06-18

Please login to leave a comment

Login