Ngurare faces toughest challenge

THE troubled Swapo Party Youth League secretary Elijah Ngurare is perhaps facing his sternest battle in the ruling party, despite having survived about nine attempts in the past five years to end his political career.

The ruling party’s Central Committee is scheduled to meet today to decide whether to endorse the Politburo’s decision to expel the youth league leader or not.

Theories about what will transpire vary. Some think he is likely to weather the storm and others think his demise is nigh.

Sources said President Hage Geingob’s re-emergence on the political scene was Ngurare’s undoing, although the irony is that Ngurare was at the forefront of campaigning for Geingob to become Swapo vice president at the 2007 elective congress.

It was at that time that a faction supporting Hidipo Hamutenya was being edged out, something that resulted in the formation of the Rally for Democracy and Progress political party.

It was also at the time that the Ngurare-led SPYL successfully advocated the ‘guided democracy’ doctrine, which eventually worked in Geingob’s favour when he was bidding for the country’s presidency.

At the time, the only enemies were those who were linked to RDP, while Ngurare and Geingob enjoyed cordial relations.

It was only in 2010 that the relationship between the two started crumbling. The reasons for this are still unknown and remain a matter of speculation.

Some say the fallout was caused by something as trivial as Ngurare’s refusal to work as Geingob’s personal assistant.

Another theory put across was that Ngurare allegedly refused to support Geingob’s bid for the country’s presidency. This theory appears plausible since the majority of youth leaders and senior party leaders who are eager to boot Ngurare out are in Geingob’s camp.

Before the fallout, Ngurare appeared to be Swapo’s blue-eyed boy who was destined for greater heights. Back then, Cabinet ministers would consult the youth leader on pertinent state and party matters. It was after the fallout that Ngurare found himself at the receiving end of attempts to oust him as SPYL secretary and later from the party.

In 2011, three attempts to suspend Ngurare at SPYL national executive (NEC) and Central Committee meetings, failed.

It then became public knowledge that Ngurare’s relationship with youth leaders like Armas Amukwiyu, Sacky Shanghala and Mandela Kapere had hit rock bottom and never recovered.

This is despite Ngurare having recommended Kapere to take over the National Youth Council from now deputy health minister Juliet Kavetuna, at the expense of Veikko Nekundi, who was largely seen as Ngurare’s right-hand man.

In 2007, Ngurare hand-picked and appointed Kapere into the SPYL national executive alongside Charles Siyauya and Clinton Swartbooi. In those days Ngurare also supported Amukwiyu in his bid to get Nico Kaiyamo expelled from the ruling party for allegedly being the brains behind the Tsumeb Rate Payers’ Association which was supposed to rival Swapo.

During 2011, disciplinary procedures were instituted but amounted to nothing.

At the time Ngurare’s detractors accused him of ignoring the youth league constitution when making decisions and appointments and for allegedly forcing members to support only his ideas. One of his foes labelled him a dictator, because he allegedly did not tolerate different views.

Attempts to unseat him at the SPYL congress in 2012 failed. A year later, a more organised campaign to remove Ngurare from running the SPYL surfaced. It started with a Politburo debate where those in the Geingob camp allegedly presented copies of social media discussions between Ngurare and his SPYL NEC colleagues where they apparently insulted the party and its senior leadership.

The issue was sent to the Central Committee where the SPYL leadership was instructed to apologise.

They apologised but the party leadership did not deem the apology appropriate. This led to a decision by the party’s top four to bar the SPYL leadership from attending and participating in the party’s extraordinary congress in June that year. The youth leadership, with the exception of Ngurare and his deputy Veikko Nekundi, defied the orders and attended the congress held in Swakopmund.

When the congress ended, President Pohamba called for an urgent CC meeting, which was described as watershed. At the CC meeting Pohamba came to Ngurare’s rescue and decided that the youth leader issued an unequivocal apology.

In 2014 another attempt to oust Ngurare surfaced. The Namibian reported that Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah had tabled the motion and compared Ngurare to the president of the South African Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) Julius Malema. Nandi-Ndaitwah denied the allegations at the time.

The new allegations against Ngurare, The Namibian understands, are that he and Job Amupanda, Dimbulukeni Nauyoma and George Kambala, have been planning to form a party to rival Swapo. They have also allegedly been involved in activities that could compromise the country’s security, or so the Swapo Politburo members believe.

Ngurare has also been linked to a ‘third force’ that is instigating him and the three land activists to undermine the Geingob administration and the Swapo leadership. Depending on who is talking, the ‘third force’ is an alleged euphemism for the founding president Sam Nujoma and some of the other Swapo leaders.

Geingob also blamed the ‘third force’ for instigating ‘exile kids’ to embarrass government. Talk of the ‘third force’ being behind the youth when they clash with government is not new. Between 2008 and 2010, the SPYL had been at loggerheads with the Pohamba administration.

Things between Pohamba and the SPYL were so tense that Pohamba allegedly had stern talks with Ngurare and at the meeting he allegedly also instructed Ngurare to call Nekundi to order. The youth leaders, at the time, wanted a speedy implementation of youth empowerment programmes and rural development.

Ngurare, Nekundi and Swartbooi were some of the youth leaders taking on the party and government elders publicly. They even described some of the elders as being ‘allergic to the youth’.

Ngurare became a household name in Namibian politics after he took over from former firebrand SPYL leader Paulus Kapia, who stepped down as secretary after becoming deputy works minister in 2005.

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