Swapo president Hage Geingob believes only a mature political party in which the rank and file are united in conscience, spirit and action can lead Namibia.
An animated Geingob while opening the party’s seventh elective congress in Windhoek said only Swapo can lead Namibia to prosperity, as it can transform the country.
“The Namibia of today is not the same Namibia of 32 years ago, which was characterised by poverty and oppression of the majority of our people. The Namibia in which we live today is worlds apart from apartheid Namibia under colonialism,” he said during the seventh party congress.
He admitted they have the unfinished business of housing delivery, employment creation for young people and poverty eradication.
“Only Swapo can complete these tasks and achieve the overall mission of prosperity for all Namibians – because Swapo believes in the dignity of the Namibian people,” added Geingob, who has been a member of the party for 60 years.
He said: “Our longevity is attributable to the fact that we have always adapted to change and we were able to reinvent and modernise Swapo to remain the vanguard, the sole and authentic representative of the Namibian people, during the liberation struggle and after independence”.
Geingob said during the past five years of the current leadership of the party, they have not witnessed senior leaders leaving to form their political parties.
The party’s president, who did not endorse any candidate, said whoever emerges victorious has his support and he will work with the team to usher the party into a new era.
“When comrades experience defeat at a congress because the delegates have chosen others instead of them and they find themselves outside the structures of the Swapo party, it should not be interpreted as division and disunity. On the contrary, it is part of the democratic process, which we, as members and sympathisers, have agreed to entrench in the constitution of the Swapo party,” h said.
Geingob added they were successful in averting major crises because there are processes, systems and institutions that serve as the bulwark of the effective governance architecture.
“We were successful because we are a disciplined political party that marshals Namibians to hold hands and to pull together in the same direction,” he said.
The congress came to an end yesterday, with Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah and Sophia Shaningwa being re-elected as deputy president and secretary general.