Namibia’s Nangolo Mbumba, who took over as interim president of the southern African country on Sunday following the death of Hage Geingob, said he had no plans to run in elections due later this year.
This means that Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah, who replaces Mbumba as vice president and was nominated by the South West African People’s Organization (SWAPO), which governs the country, just over a year ago as its candidate, will remain on the ballot paper. . If she wins, she would be the southern African nation’s first female president.
“I will not be present in the elections, so don’t panic,” Mbumba said, in a rare move among African leaders, who often try to hold on to power when it is in their hands.
“My goal was to become a school principal, which I achieved and now I have to thank the Namibian people for the honor they gave me to be their president for a short period,” Mbumba said during the graduation ceremony. inauguration.
The SWAPO constitution prohibits changes after a candidate has been chosen, two years before the scheduled voting date.
The party has governed Namibia – a mining hotspot with plenty of diamonds, uranium and even lithium, needed for electric car batteries – since independence from South Africa in 1990.
Geingob, in power since 2015, died at the age of 82 in the early hours of Sunday, after a short battle with cancer.
“It is heartwarming and comforting to note that today, even in this time of great loss, our nation remains calm and stable,” Mbumba said. “This is due to the visionary leadership (…) of President Geingob, who was the main architect of the Namibian constitution.”
Geingob leaves behind a middle-income country struggling to spur economic growth above 3% after a pandemic-era slowdown and the former government’s reversal of racial inequalities left by colonialism and annexation South Africa’s white minority.
He led Namibia’s efforts to relaunch itself as a leader in the global green economy, and in 2022 Namibia became the first African country to agree to supply the European Union with green hydrogen and minerals needed for clean energy.
Last year, Namibia began building Africa’s first decarbonized iron plant, powered exclusively by green hydrogen – extracted from water through electrolysis powered by renewable energy – paving the way for steelmaking reform , one of the most polluting sectors in the world.
These developments put Namibia ahead of its economically larger and more industrialized neighbor, South Africa, whose efforts to transition to green energy have been weak.
Source: Terra
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