A look at Namibia

2009-11-25 14:13

Windhoek - The Republic of Namibia, which holds presidential and parliamentary elections on Friday, is a large sparsely-populated country which for much of the 20th century lived in the shadow of white-ruled South Africa.

Basic facts about Namibia, which in pre-independence days was known as South West Africa:

GEOGRAPHY: At 824 292 square kilometres, Namibia is almost twice as big as the US state of California and two-thirds the size of South Africa, which borders it to the south.

In addition to a 1 500-kilometre Atlantic coastline, the country also has borders with Angola to the north, Zambia in the far north-east and Botswana to the east.

Much of the country, notably along the coast, is desert.

POPULATION: 2.1 million in 2008 (World Bank), of whom around half are from the Ovambo ethnic group, three percent are Bushmen, or San, and six percent whites, including descendants of German settlers.

MAIN CITIES: Windhoek, the capital, and Walvis Bay, the only deep-water port.

HISTORY: The oldest residents of the region are the San, or Bushmen, group, who were traditional hunter-gatherers. In early modern times other groups moved in, including the Herero people in the 17th century, and British and German missionaries and settlers in the 19th.

The region became a German colony from 1884, when the major European powers engaged in their "scramble for Africa." The discovery of diamonds in the early 20th century heightened its attractiveness.

The Germans put down rebellions with brutality and introduced racial segregation, which was later pursued by the South Africans, who imposed their control after Germany's defeat in World War I.

After World War II, South Africa continued to administer the territory in defiance of the United Nations. The collapse of the white minority apartheid system in the late 1980s brought independence for Namibia in 1990.

The nationalist South West Africa People's Organisation (Swaspo) has consistently won elections since then, and it is expected to again win on Friday.

INSTITUTIONS AND GOVERNMENT: The president is elected for a five-year term, as are 72 of the 78 members of the National Assembly, or lower house of parliament. The other six members are appointed by the president while the 26 members of the upper house, the National Council, are indirectly elected by regional bodies.

In the last elections, in 2004, Hifikepunye Pohamba won over 76 percent of votes to become president, and SWAPO took 75% of votes in the parliamentary vote.

ECONOMY: 30% of Namibia's export earnings are from diamonds, of which it is the world's sixth largest producer. The country is also a major uranium producer, and possesses other minerals including silver, tin and zinc as well as a large fishing industry.

Average per capita income was 2004 dollars in 2008 (World Bank). In 2007 Namibia figured 128th out of 182 countries in the United Nations' Human Development Index, which attempts to measure overall well-being.

- SAPA