Nandi-Ndaitwah sworn in as Namibia’s first female President

The Republic of Namibia last Friday swore in its first female President, Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah (NNN), a long-standing member of Namibia’s ruling South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO) party, reaching the highest office nearly 60 years after she joined the liberation movement fighting for independence from apartheid South Africa.

The new president, who is the fifth in line of presidents in Namibia, is the second African woman to be directly elected as President, after Liberia's Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

The continent's only other female president at the moment is Tanzania's Samia Suluhu Hassan, who took up the role after her predecessor died in office in 2021 and the former president of Malawi Banda who also took over after the death of the president.

The three all attended the inauguration at the capital Windhoek to lend her their support.

In her inaugural address, President Nandi-Ndaitwah pledged to defend, uphold and support the constitution of the country in the presence of other visiting leaders from several African countries including South Africa, Zambia, Congo, Botswana, Angola, Tanzania and Kenya, international dignitaries and representatives of regional institutions.

The 72-year-old Nandi-Ndaitwah won the election held in November last year with a 58 per cent share of the votes cast to become one of a handful of female leaders in Africa after the likes of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, Joyce Banda of Malawi and Samia Suluhu Hassan of Tanzania. 

Ghana’s Vice-President

Ghana’s first female Vice-President, Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, also led a high-powered Ghanaian delegation to the inauguration in Namibia and described it as a powerful reflection of the resilience and determination of African women.

In a message shared on her official Facebook page last Saturday, March 22, 2025, the Vice President said she was honoured to witness what she called a historic moment for the continent.

“Her leadership is a testament to the strength, resilience, and determination of African women,” she wrote.

“May she continue to inspire men and women across the continent and prove that with courage and commitment, no dream is beyond reach.”

The swearing-in of Nandi-Ndaitwah coincided with the 35th anniversary of Namibia's independence, but the ceremony was moved from a soccer stadium where thousands were due to attend to the official presidential office because of a heavy rain.

The new President succeeds Nangolo Mbumba, who stood in as Namibia's President following the death in office of President Hage Geingob. Nandi-Ndaitwah was made vice president following Geingob's death.

German colony

Namibia, a sparsely populated nation in southwestern Africa was a German colony until the end of World War I and then they won independence from South Africa in 1990 after decades of struggle and a guerilla war against South African forces that lasted more than 20 years.

Addressing the nation after her historic swearing-in she said, “The task facing me as the fifth President of the Republic of Namibia is to preserve the gains of our independence on all fronts and to ensure that the unfinished agenda of economic and social advancement of our people is carried forward with vigour and determination to bring about shared, balanced prosperity for all”.

Nandi-Ndaitwah is a veteran of the South West Africa People's Organisation, or SWAPO, which led Namibia's fight for independence and has been its ruling party ever since. She has been a long-term loyalist of the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO), which has been in power since the country gained independence in 1990 after a long struggle against apartheid South Africa.

Brief Background

She joined SWAPO, then a liberation movement resisting South Africa's white-minority rule, when she was only 14.

While the party has made changes and improved the lives of the black majority, the legacy of apartheid can still be seen in patterns of wealth and land ownership.

She is the ninth of 13 children. Her father was an Anglican clergyman, and she attended a mission school that she also later taught in. She joined SWAPO as a teenager in the 1960s and spent time in exile in Zambia, Tanzania, the former Soviet Union and the United Kingdom in the 1970s and 1980s. She had been a lawmaker in Namibia since 1990 and was the foreign minister before being appointed vice president after the death of the president.

President Nandi-Ndaitwah said she would insist on good governance and high ethical standards in public institutions and would promote closer regional cooperation.

She pledged to continue calling for the rights of Palestinians and the people of Western Sahara to self-determination and demand the lifting of sanctions against Cuba, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.

Three million people

She also said Namibia would continue to contribute to efforts to fight climate change, a persistent threat for an arid country of just three million people that regularly experiences droughts. Nandi-Ndaitwah's husband is a retired general who once commanded Namibia's armed forces and was formally given the title “first gentleman.”

Nandi-Ndaitwah's inauguration came a day after Namibia's Parliament elected its first female speaker.

Namibia is a geographically large country with a small population of three million. Government statistics show that white farmers own about 70 per cent of the country's farmlands.

A total of 53,773 Namibians identified as white in the 2023 census, representing 1.8 per cent of the country's population.

Namibia is one of the world's most unequal countries, with a Gini coefficient of 59.1 in 2015, according to the World Bank, which projects poverty is expected to remain high at 17.2 per cent in 2024.

The unemployment rate rose to 36.9 per cent in 2023 from 33.4 per cent in 2018, according to the country's statistics agency.

The SWAPO Party

SWAPO Party of Namibia, is a political party that began as a liberation movement in Namibia (formerly South West Africa) that advocated immediate Namibian independence from South Africa and became the country’s leading party following independence in 1990.

It was founded in 1960, and after South Africa refused a United Nations order to withdraw from the trust territory in 1966, SWAPO turned to armed struggle. SWAPO’s greatest political strength lay among the Ovambo people in the northern part of the territory.

Led by Sam Nujoma who died recently and backed by the Angolan ruling party, Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, and the Soviet Union, SWAPO used Angola as a base for guerrilla warfare on Namibian soil; operations were carried out by SWAPO’s guerrilla force, the People’s Liberation Army of Namibia (PLAN).

Beginning in 1978, South Africa made periodic retaliatory land and air strikes into Angola. Herman Toivo ja Toivo, a co-founder of SWAPO, was imprisoned in South Africa for a 20-year term in 1968 but was released in 1984.