Sam Nujoma, the revolutionary leader who guided Namibia to independence from apartheid South Africa in 1990 has died at 95.
Hailed as Namibia’s “Founding Father”, Nujoma passed away on Saturday night following a three-week hospitalisation in the capital, Windhoek, according to the Namibian presidency.
Nujoma led the long fight for independence from South Africa in 1990 after helping found Namibia’s liberation movement known as the South West Peoples’ Organisation (Swapo) in the 1960s.
After independence, Nujoma became president in 1990 and led the country until 2005.
Nujoma had been hospitalised over the past three weeks with an illness from which he “could not recover”, Namibian President Nangolo Mbumba said in a statement announcing the death with “utmost sorrow and sadness”.
He “inspired us to rise to our feet and to become masters of this vast land of our ancestors,” President Mbumba said.
He added: “Our Founding Father lived a long and consequential life during which he exceptionally served the people of his beloved country.”
Nujoma retired as head of state in 2005, but continued to lead the party before stepping down in 2007 as president of the ruling Swapo party after 47 years at the helm.
Nujoma was revered in his homeland as a charismatic father figure who steered his country to democracy and stability after long colonial rule by Germany and a bitter war of independence from South Africa.
He was the last of a generation of African leaders who led their countries out of colonial or white minority rule that included South Africa’s Nelson Mandela, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda and Mozambique’s Samora Machel.
Nujoma headed the South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO) that led the liberation struggle since its inception in 1960.
While SWAPO has remained in power since independence, Nujoma finally quit in 2007 at the age of 78, two years after standing down from the presidency.
Many Namibians credited Nujoma’s leadership for the process of national healing and reconciliation after the deep divisions caused by the independence war and South Africa’s policies of dividing the country into ethnically based regional governments.
Even his political opponents praised Nujoma for establishing a democratic constitution and involving white businessmen and politicians in government after independence. He was also known for his fierce anti-Western ideology and railing against homosexuality, which he called a “foreign and corrupt ideology” and AIDS disease “a man-made biological weapon”.