Swanu wants ancestral land rights restored

Namibia’s oldest political party, Swanu, has called on the government to prioritise the debate on ancestral land claim during the second land conference slated for November this year.
Swanu president Usutuaije Maamberua in a statement emphasised that access to land is a human rights issue and is demanding that the land is returned to its “rightful owners”.
According to Maamberua, the second land conference should put measures in place that would ensure that all land property, dignity and rights lost during the colonial rule are restored.
He also criticised the government for re-allocating land to people who did not lose land during the colonial government, and said that land must be given back to people who lost it.
“People should be resettled on their ancestral land. The 20/50 hectare allocation of the land policy should be reviewed as it has failed in some parts of the country and caused serious disagreements between families and traditional leaders,” he urged.
The new Amendment Act for Communal Land allows traditional authorities to allocate up to 50 hectares of land without the consent of the minister, but a ministerial consent is required for land above 50 hectares.
Calls to revisit ancestral land rights come at a time when government feels the debate would threaten national security.
In 2014, the then lands minister Alfeus !Naruseb reminded Namibians that a land conference held just after independence resolved that there would be no “entertainment of ancestral land claims in Namibia”.
The former minister had during his tenure also urged Namibians to “leave behind the past and stop demanding for ancestral land because it will disturb peace.”
Sacred sites
In addition, Maamberua proposed that government take ownership of massacre sites in Namibia to allow descendants of the Nama and OvaHerero genocide victims to have easy access to the graves. Guestfarm Hamakari situated close to the Waterberg is one of such place, Maamberua noted.
“Of course I do not mean the whole farm must be given to government, only the portions where the graves are, must be in the possession of government so that families do not have to go through private individuals who may refuse families access to the place,” he said.
Swanu’s statement comes in the wake of a plea for government to revisit the ancestral land claims debate by the working group on land reform of the Namibian Non-Governmental Organisations Forum (Nangof).
According to the group convener Uhuru Dempers, when Namibians agreed to close the debate they had hoped that they would regain their ancestral land through legal expropriation but this he noted, never happened.
JEMIMA BEUKES