Staff Reporter
A court battle is looming over the planned installation of Ovaherero paramount chief-designate and academic Mutjinde Katjiua.
One faction of the Ovaherero Traditional Authority (OTA) recently announced its plans to install Katjiua as the community’s substantive chief.
The installation, according to a leaflet circulating on social media this week, will take place this coming weekend in Aminius in the Omaheke region.
The OTA has been in turmoil since the death of paramount chief Vekuii Rukoro last year as two factions emerged, fighting to replace him.
The factions consist of supporters of former secretary general Katjiua, and former acting paramount chief Vipuira Kapuuo.
New Era is reliably informed that the faction of Kapuuo will in the coming days seek for a court interdict to halt Katjiua’s installation.
A large number of Kapuuo supporters were seen at the High Court on Monday, where they allegedly consulted lawyers. Katjiua was endorsed at a disputed ‘chiefs council’ meeting late last year at Onderombapa in the Aminius constituency as the next paramount chief-designate.
His designation was heavily disputed by the Kapuuo faction, who argued that the meeting was illegally constituted. “We, the majority of the chiefs’ council, do not recognise the alleged appointment of professor Mutjinde Katjiua as paramount chief-designate,” said Kapuuo in a statement late last year. Kapuuo was yesterday not available for comment as his phone went unanswered.
At the time, Kapuuo had said it is only at a properly constituted meeting of the Ovaherero senate that candidates’ names can be put forward for debate among the approximately 470 members to designate a new chief.
Kapuuo’s sentiments were supported by patron of the Ovaherero Red Flag Association, Ben Zaaruka, who then described the meeting which saw Katjiua being designated as paramount chief-designate as illegal, null and void, while warning those who convened the gathering not to “pee on our tradition”.
“Where in our history have you seen a secretary setting up a transitional committee? Where have you seen a deputy chairperson calling a chiefs’ council meeting while the chairperson himself is alive and well? This is a mockery of our tradition; let us not pee on our tradition,” stressed Zaaruka at the time.