Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah from Namibia’s ruling political party, SWAPO, won the country’s presidential election on December 3 to become the first female president and the first in Southern Africa.
“The Namibian nation has voted for peace and stability,” Nandi-Ndaitwah said after she was declared president-elect.
Read also:Nandi-Ndaitwah wins election to become Namibias first female president
Born in 1952, the ninth child to a clergyman, Petrus Nandi at Onamutai in northern Namibia. Nandi-Ndaitwah had always been keen on politics having witnessed SWAPO political activities while growing up
“Growing up, political activities were also not very far from me,” she told the Swapo Today newsletter last year.
“I could see Swapo activities being organised by the likes of Kaxumba Kandola. They would come near our house to hold meetings because there were big trees for shade,” she said.
She attended a course at the Lenin Higher Komsomol School in the Soviet Union from 1975 until 1976. She graduated in management from the Glasgow College of Technology, in the United Kingdom, and in 1988 a further post-graduate diploma, in international relations, from Keele University, also in the UK. In 1989 Nandi-Ndaitwah obtained a master’s degree in diplomatic studies, also from Keele University.
Nandi-Ndaitwah went into exile in 1974 and joined SWAPO members in Zambia. She worked at the SWAPO headquarters in Lusaka from 1974 to 1975, and served in numerous senior roles.
She became the SWAPO deputy representative in Zambia from 1976 until 1978 and the chief representative in Zambia from 1978 to 1980. From 1980 until 1986, she was the SWAPO chief representative in East Africa, based at Dar es Salaam. She was a member of the SWAPO central committee from 1976 to 1986 and the Namibian National Women’s Organisation (NANAWO) president from 1991 to 1994.
She was a member of the Namibian National Assembly from 1990. And has held several ministerial position including foreign affairs and women and children affairs.
Under President Hage Geingob, Nandi-Ndaitwah was appointed as Deputy- prime Minster of Namibia in March 2015, while serving in parallel as Minister of International Relations and Cooperation. she was the party’s secretary for information and mobilisation and as such, is one of SWAPO’s main spokespeople.
In March 2023, President Geingob named Nandi-Ndaitwah as SWAPO’s presidential candidate in the 2024 Namibian general election. Following Geingob’s death in February 2024, Nandi-Ndaitwah was appointed vice president. She is the first woman serving in that role She was elected president in the general election held in November, making her the first woman to hold the position.
On December 3 2024, she was officially declared the President-elect of the Republic of Namibia Nandi-Ndaitwah received 683,560 votes (58.7%), making her the first woman to win a Namibian Presidential election. She will be inaugurated on 21 March 2025 and will become the first female President in Namibian history.
Nandi-Ndaitwah is married to Epaphras Denga Ndaitwah, former Chief of the Namibian Defence Force.
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