President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah’s address to the 26th Annual Meeting of the Council of Traditional Leaders should send shivers down the spine of anyone who cares about Namibia’s unity. On the surface, her speech was respectful and conciliatory, an olive branch to chiefs, hompas, and traditional authorities across the land. But between the lines lay a sobering warning: our country risks sliding back into a Bantustan mentality, the very disease our liberation struggle sought to cure.
The illusion of tradition
Let us be brutally honest. Traditional authorities play a role in our cultural identity. They preside over rituals, settle minor disputes, and provide a sense of belonging. But when tradition becomes a substitute for governance, the line blurs dangerously. The President was right to caution that new applications for recognition keep pouring in “unabated”. Every new chiefdom demands salaries, cars, and resources from the state purse. At this rate, Namibia risks becoming a federation of fiefdoms, each carved along tribal lines.
Is this what independence was fought for? Did the founding fathers envision a Namibia where the head of state must beg traditional leaders to stop selling communal land to the highest bidder? Or where the central government plays referee in endless succession battles that split villages in two?
We must stop romanticising traditional authorities as if they are infallible saints. They are human, fallible, and just as susceptible to corruption and greed as any cabinet minister. The sale of communal land is not just corruption; it is betrayal, a betrayal of the poorest citizens who depend on land to live and farm.
Succession fights: a national embarrassment
The President’s frustration with succession disputes was palpable. More than ten authorities remain leaderless because of infighting. That is not just a community issue; it is a national disgrace. Each dispute drags the courts into what should be internal matters, consumes resources that could fight poverty, and leaves ordinary citizens stranded without leadership.
How can chiefs demand to be seen as custodians of unity when their houses are burning from within? If you cannot unite your own people, what moral authority do you have to lecture the state about governance? These endless quarrels expose the rot at the heart of our traditional systems: a hunger for titles, resources, and influence dressed up as culture.
Central government under siege
The bigger danger is structural. Namibia is a unitary state, not a federation of monarchies. Yet increasingly, central government is forced to tiptoe around chiefs who act as parallel centres of power. The President herself acknowledged this contradiction when she declared, “When the government needs communal land for development, there should be no negotiations.”
She is absolutely correct. National development cannot be held hostage by gatekeepers of communal land. If land is needed for a green scheme, an agro-processing plant, or a school, it should be allocated in the name of national interest, not as a bargaining chip for traditional elites. To suggest otherwise is to undermine the very essence of sovereignty.
Here lies the slippery slope: when chiefs begin to view themselves as landlords and the government as just another tenant, Namibia’s nationhood is in jeopardy. This is Bantustan thinking: a patchwork of tribal fiefdoms where the central state has to negotiate access to its own territory.
The Bantustan mentality revisited
The late President Hage Geingob warned about this creeping tribalism when he coined the phrase “Bantustan mentality”. Under apartheid, Bantustans fragmented Namibians along ethnic lines, making it easier to dominate us. Today, we risk doing the same thing voluntarily, under the guise of tradition.
Every new traditional authority entrenches ethnic identity over national identity. Every land dispute settled in the name of tribe chips away at the idea of a Namibian house. Every chief who prioritises clan loyalty over national unity reopens wounds we thought we had healed in 1990.
Let us call it what it is: tribalism with a cultural mask. And unless confronted head-on, it will hollow out our republic from within.
Complicity of central government
The central government is not innocent either. For decades, it has thrown money, cars, and titles at traditional authorities in exchange for political support. This patronage has created dependency and inflated the importance of chiefs beyond their cultural mandate. The result is a bloated system where the state funds dozens of authorities, many of which exist only to serve narrow tribal interests.
This cannot continue. A poor country cannot afford to bankroll every would-be chief who demands recognition. Nor can it allow communal land, the most sensitive resource in our history, to be managed by those who view it as private property.
A clear line must be drawn
The President is right to demand accountability. If chiefs sell communal land, they must face the law. If succession battles paralyse communities, government should refuse to bankroll them until order is restored. And if applications for new authorities continue to flood in, they must be frozen until Namibia decides whether it wants to be a modern state or a patchwork of tribal enclaves.
Culture matters. Heritage matters. But culture cannot be weaponised against the state. Traditional authorities must be cultural custodians, not parallel governments. They must preserve values, not peddle corruption. They must complement the republic, not compete with it.
The way forward
Namibia stands at a crossroads. One path leads forward, to a modern, united state where culture enriches national identity without undermining it. The other path leads backward, to Bantustan politics, where tribe trumps nation, and chiefs wield power beyond their mandate.
The President’s speech was both a warning and a challenge. She has thrown down the gauntlet: unity over division, accountability over corruption, and central authority over fragmentation. But words alone will not suffice. The state must act decisively to reclaim its authority before it is eroded by tribal fiefdoms.
Namibia cannot afford to regress into the very structures our liberation struggle dismantled. To do so would be to betray the sacrifices of those who fought for freedom and to condemn future generations to live in a fractured, tribalised republic.
The ghosts of Bantustans are stirring. The question is: will we exorcise them or invite them back into the Namibian house?
