Expropriation threats 'like a poison'
White Namibians of German heritage say expropriation threats are creating a rift between them and the Ovaherero.
Ovaherero paramount chief Vekuii Rukoro and others have come under fire from German-speaking Namibians over threats that their farms will be expropriated.
During a panel discussion on Tuesday, organised by the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights as part of a symposium aimed at interrogating the 1904-08 genocide, an emotional Erica von Wietersheim said most German-speaking Namibians love their motherland, Namibia, adding the graves of their ancestors are here.
“Unfortunately threatening remarks by your Chief Rukoro and others, threatening German-speaking farmers that they will take our farms, worked like a poison. They deepen the rift between the Herero and Germans instead of bringing us together,” she said. According to the former head of the National Archives, Werner Hillebrecht, some German-speaking Namibians are walking around with “blinkers”.
He added there is also a sense of entitlement among the Nama and Ovaherero communities, adding the colonial war was not limited to 1904 and 1908, and that they only concentrate on the text of the extermination order by Lothar von Trotha and not the wider context of colonial rule.
“It actually started with the attack on Hornkranz by Curt von Francois in 1893 and it ended with the battle of Sam !Khubis near Rehoboth in 1915, and it would not have ended if the colonial masters would have been South Africa, which continued the wars in other ways,” he said.
He, however, added these facts do not take away from the trauma inflicted on those directly affected by the genocide, but it is important to look at what happened afterwards.
He also drew attention to the fact that the expropriated land was initially the livelihood of the Damara and San, while emphasising that German rule affected all indigenous groups the same way.
He added the Cold War and apartheid made researching colonial history difficult for long periods, and as a result, much is still unknown.
As an example, he noted the reports of women being subjected to forced labour in concentration camps such as Shark Island.
Former Allgemeine Zeitung news editor Eberhard Hofmann said Namibians are selective with history and are not considering the writings of local Germans, in German, which document the fact that the Von Trotha extermination order was revoked.
“In the end we will have to discuss and get back to the real facts and we cannot just be selective, as it happens. In all these discussions, not once so far has it been mentioned that when the shooting order (extermination order) became known in Berlin two months later, it was revoked by the Kaiser.
“So it is unfinished business; we still have a long way to go to communicate,” he said. Freelance journalist Sven-Eric Stender said it is important that more information is made available, because significant doubt still exists regarding the genocide.
“We need to address these myths; at least to my knowledge there were plans by Mr Von Trotha to erect a prisoner of war camp at Okahandja and there was this myth of a Kesselschlacht (German for when you surround the enemy and slowly terminate them from the outside moving inward) to prevent the Ovaherero from escaping. So there are doubts,” he said.
Some Germans regard the rumours of a Kesselschlacht as a myth, claiming the soldiers were not sufficient to perform the manoeuvre.
During a panel discussion on Tuesday, organised by the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights as part of a symposium aimed at interrogating the 1904-08 genocide, an emotional Erica von Wietersheim said most German-speaking Namibians love their motherland, Namibia, adding the graves of their ancestors are here.
“Unfortunately threatening remarks by your Chief Rukoro and others, threatening German-speaking farmers that they will take our farms, worked like a poison. They deepen the rift between the Herero and Germans instead of bringing us together,” she said. According to the former head of the National Archives, Werner Hillebrecht, some German-speaking Namibians are walking around with “blinkers”.
He added there is also a sense of entitlement among the Nama and Ovaherero communities, adding the colonial war was not limited to 1904 and 1908, and that they only concentrate on the text of the extermination order by Lothar von Trotha and not the wider context of colonial rule.
“It actually started with the attack on Hornkranz by Curt von Francois in 1893 and it ended with the battle of Sam !Khubis near Rehoboth in 1915, and it would not have ended if the colonial masters would have been South Africa, which continued the wars in other ways,” he said.
He, however, added these facts do not take away from the trauma inflicted on those directly affected by the genocide, but it is important to look at what happened afterwards.
He also drew attention to the fact that the expropriated land was initially the livelihood of the Damara and San, while emphasising that German rule affected all indigenous groups the same way.
He added the Cold War and apartheid made researching colonial history difficult for long periods, and as a result, much is still unknown.
As an example, he noted the reports of women being subjected to forced labour in concentration camps such as Shark Island.
Former Allgemeine Zeitung news editor Eberhard Hofmann said Namibians are selective with history and are not considering the writings of local Germans, in German, which document the fact that the Von Trotha extermination order was revoked.
“In the end we will have to discuss and get back to the real facts and we cannot just be selective, as it happens. In all these discussions, not once so far has it been mentioned that when the shooting order (extermination order) became known in Berlin two months later, it was revoked by the Kaiser.
“So it is unfinished business; we still have a long way to go to communicate,” he said. Freelance journalist Sven-Eric Stender said it is important that more information is made available, because significant doubt still exists regarding the genocide.
“We need to address these myths; at least to my knowledge there were plans by Mr Von Trotha to erect a prisoner of war camp at Okahandja and there was this myth of a Kesselschlacht (German for when you surround the enemy and slowly terminate them from the outside moving inward) to prevent the Ovaherero from escaping. So there are doubts,” he said.
Some Germans regard the rumours of a Kesselschlacht as a myth, claiming the soldiers were not sufficient to perform the manoeuvre.
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