Namibia
Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...
is a
one party dominant state
A dominant-party system, or one-party dominant system, is a political occurrence in which a single political party continuously dominates election results over running opposition groups or parties. Any ruling party staying in power for more th ...
with the
South-West Africa People's Organisation
The South West Africa People's Organisation (, SWAPO; af, Suidwes-Afrikaanse Volks Organisasie, SWAVO; german: Südwestafrikanische Volksorganisation, SWAVO), officially known as the SWAPO Party of Namibia, is a political party and former ind ...
in power. Opposition parties are allowed, but are widely considered to have no real chance of gaining power. In Namibian politics, ethnicity plays a significant role in
party
A party is a gathering of people who have been invited by a host for the purposes of socializing, conversation, recreation, or as part of a festival or other commemoration or celebration of a special occasion. A party will often featur ...
affiliation and voting behaviour. Some parties are dominated by single ethnic groups; SWAPO itself, its government, and administration, is pre-dominantly Ovambo.
Parties with parliamentary seats
Parties with seats in the
National Assembly of Namibia
The National Assembly is the lower chamber of Namibia's bicameral Parliament. Its laws must be approved by the National Council, the upper house. Since 2014, it has a total of 104 members. 96 members are directly elected through a system of clos ...
after the
2019 elections
The following elections were scheduled to occur in 2019. The International Foundation for Electoral Systems has a calendar of upcoming elections around the world, and the National Democratic Institute also maintains a calendar of elections in coun ...
Hage Geingob
Hage Gottfried Geingob (born 3 August 1941) is a Namibian politician, serving as the third president of Namibia since 21 March 2015. Geingob was the first Prime Minister of Namibia from 1990 to 2002, and served as prime minister again from 201 ...
,
Left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
,
Socialism
Socialism is a left-wing Economic ideology, economic philosophy and Political movement, movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to Private prop ...
Social democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote s ...
,
,
, -
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,
Popular Democratic Movement
The Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), formerly the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), is an amalgamation of political parties in Namibia, registered as one singular party for representation purposes. In coalition with the United Democratic ...
af, Populêre Demokratiese Beweging
, PDM
,
McHenry Venaani
McHenry Venaani (born 8 September 1977) is a Namibian politician and the president of the Popular Democratic Movement, a party with sixteen seats in the National Assembly of Namibia and one seat in the National Council of Namibia. Venaani has be ...
,
Centre-right
Centre-right politics lean to the right of the political spectrum, but are closer to the centre. From the 1780s to the 1880s, there was a shift in the Western world of social class structure and the economy, moving away from the nobility and ...
,
Conservatism
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilizati ...
Economic liberalism
Economic liberalism is a political and economic ideology that supports a market economy based on individualism and private property in the means of production. Adam Smith is considered one of the primary initial writers on economic liberali ...
Bernadus Swartbooi
Bernadus Clinton Swartbooi (born 11 October 1977) is a Namibian politician.
Swartbooi was a Governor of the ǁKaras Region before being appointed as Namibia's deputy minister of lands and resettlement in 2015 by President Hage Geingob, a posit ...
,
Centre-left
Centre-left politics lean to the left on the left–right political spectrum but are closer to the centre than other left-wing politics. Those on the centre-left believe in working within the established systems to improve social justice. The ...
to
left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
,
Social democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote s ...
Progressivism
Progressivism holds that it is possible to improve human societies through political action. As a political movement, progressivism seeks to advance the human condition through social reform based on purported advancements in science, tec ...
Land reform
Land reform is a form of agrarian reform involving the changing of laws, regulations, or customs regarding land ownership. Land reform may consist of a government-initiated or government-backed property redistribution, generally of agricultural ...
Environmentalism
Environmentalism or environmental rights is a broad philosophy, ideology, and social movement regarding concerns for environmental protection and improvement of the health of the environment, particularly as the measure for this health seeks ...
Apius Auchab
Apius Auchab (born 3 October 1959) is a Namibian politician who has served as the president of the United Democratic Front (Namibia), United Democratic Front since 2013. He has been a Member of the National Assembly (Namibia), National Assembly si ...
National Unity Democratic Organisation
The National Unity Democratic Organisation (NUDO) is a political party in Namibia. It has been represented in the National Assembly of Namibia and in the National Council of Namibia since it split from the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (now PDM ...
, NUDO
,
Esther Muinjangue
Esther Utjiua Muinjangue (born 17 August 1962) is a Namibian politician and the president of the National Unity Democratic Organisation (NUDO), a party which occupies two seats in the National Assembly of Namibia and one seat in the National Coun ...
,
Centre-right
Centre-right politics lean to the right of the political spectrum, but are closer to the centre. From the 1780s to the 1880s, there was a shift in the Western world of social class structure and the economy, moving away from the nobility and ...
Independent Patriots for Change
The Independent Patriots for Change (IPC) is a political party in Namibia. It was founded by Panduleni Itula in August 2020. As an independent presidential candidate in the November 2019 election, Itula won the best result of a losing candidat ...
, IPC
,
Panduleni Itula
Panduleni Filemon Bango Itula (born 2 August 1957) is a Namibian politician, dentist, lawyer, and former Chief Dentist at the Katutura State Hospital, as well as a former SWAPO party school lecturer. He was an independent presidential candidate ...
,
,
Grassroots democracy
Grassroots democracy is a tendency towards designing political processes that shift as much decision-making authority as practical to the organization's lowest geographic or social level of organization.
Grassroots organizations can have a va ...
Ignatius Shixwameni
Ignatius Nkotongo Shixwameni (4 September 1966 – 10 November 2021) was a Namibian politician. He was the leader of Namibia's All People's Party.
Life
Shixwameni was born in Shambyu, the traditional kingdom in the Kavango Region, and he ear ...
,
Centre-left
Centre-left politics lean to the left on the left–right political spectrum but are closer to the centre than other left-wing politics. Those on the centre-left believe in working within the established systems to improve social justice. The ...
,
Social democracy
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote s ...
Conservatism
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilizati ...
Epafras Mukwiilongo
Hon. Jan Epafras M. Mukwilongo is a Namibian politician and a businessman. Founding leader and self-styled "Commander-in-Chief" of the Namibian Economic Freedom Fighters in 24 June 2014. He was elected to the List of Members of the 7th National A ...
Marxism–Leninism
Marxism–Leninism is a communist ideology which was the main communist movement throughout the 20th century. Developed by the Bolsheviks, it was the state ideology of the Soviet Union, its satellite states in the Eastern Bloc, and various c ...
Pan-Africanism
Pan-Africanism is a worldwide movement that aims to encourage and strengthen bonds of solidarity between all Indigenous and diaspora peoples of African ancestry. Based on a common goal dating back to the Atlantic slave trade, the movement exte ...
Centre-left
Centre-left politics lean to the left on the left–right political spectrum but are closer to the centre than other left-wing politics. Those on the centre-left believe in working within the established systems to improve social justice. The ...
,
Liberalism
Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law."political rationalism, hostility to autocracy, cultural distaste for c ...
South West Africa National Union
The South West Africa National Union (SWANU) is a Namibian political party founded in 1959. Most of its members came from the Herero people, while fellow independence movement SWAPO was mostly an Ovambo party. The party's president is Charl ...
Left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
Nationalism
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: The ...
,
,
Unrepresented parties
The following parties contested the 2019 parliamentary elections but did not gain a seat, in the order of votes obtained:
*
Congress of Democrats
The Congress of Democrats (CoD) is a Namibian opposition party without representation in the National Assembly and led by Ben Ulenga. It was established in 1999, prior to that year's general elections, and started off with a number of notabl ...
Katima Mulilo
Katima Mulilo or simply Katima is the capital of the Zambezi Region in Namibia. It is located in the Caprivi Strip. It had 28,362 inhabitants in 2010, and comprises two electoral constituencies, Katima Mulilo Rural and Katima Mulilo Urban. I ...
The following parties were established after the last parliamentary elections in 2019:
*
Independent Patriots for Change
The Independent Patriots for Change (IPC) is a political party in Namibia. It was founded by Panduleni Itula in August 2020. As an independent presidential candidate in the November 2019 election, Itula won the best result of a losing candidat ...
(IPC). In 2020 it won the
municipal elections
In many parts of the world, local elections take place to select office-holders in local government, such as mayors and councillors. Elections to positions within a city or town are often known as "municipal elections". Their form and conduct vary ...
in the commercial hubs
Walvis Bay
Walvis Bay ( en, lit. Whale Bay; af, Walvisbaai; ger, Walfischbucht or Walfischbai) is a city in Namibia and the name of the bay on which it lies. It is the second largest city in Namibia and the largest coastal city in the country. The ci ...
and
Swakopmund
Swakopmund (german: Mouth of the Swakop) is a city on the coast of western Namibia, west of the Namibian capital Windhoek via the B2 main road. It is the capital of the Erongo administrative district. The town has 44,725 inhabitants and covers ...
Outjo
Outjo (Otjiherero: ''small hills'') is a city of 6,000 inhabitants in the Kunene Region of Namibia. It is the district capital of Outjo Constituency. It is best known as a main gateway to Etosha National Park.
Overview
The town was founded by ...
Okahandja
Okahandja is a city of 24,100 inhabitants in Otjozondjupa Region, central Namibia, and the district capital of the Okahandja electoral constituency. It is known as the ''Garden Town of Namibia''. It is located 70 km north of Windhoek on the ...
Rundu
Rundu is the capital and largest city of the Kavango-East Region in northern Namibia. It lies on the border with Angola on the banks of the Kavango River about above sea level. Rundu's population is growing rapidly. The 2001 census counted 36,9 ...
Swakopmund
Swakopmund (german: Mouth of the Swakop) is a city on the coast of western Namibia, west of the Namibian capital Windhoek via the B2 main road. It is the capital of the Erongo administrative district. The town has 44,725 inhabitants and covers ...
Walvis Bay
Walvis Bay ( en, lit. Whale Bay; af, Walvisbaai; ger, Walfischbucht or Walfischbai) is a city in Namibia and the name of the bay on which it lies. It is the second largest city in Namibia and the largest coastal city in the country. The ci ...
* The
Affirmative Repositioning
Affirmative Repositioning (AR) is a leftist political movement in Namibia mainly focused on land reform, youth empowerment and social reform. Founded in 2014 by Job Amupanda, Dimbulukeni Nauyoma and George Kambala, the AR uses social media platf ...
(AR) movement was registered for the 2020 local elections as an association in the urban centres of
Windhoek
Windhoek (, , ) is the capital and largest city of Namibia. It is located in central Namibia in the Khomas Highland plateau area, at around above sea level, almost exactly at the country's geographical centre. The population of Windhoek in 202 ...
, Walvis Bay and Swakopmund. It gained two seats in the Windhoek municipality and won the 2020 mayoral election with Job Amupanda.
Democratic Party of Namibia
The Democratic Party of Namibia is a political party in Namibia, launched in July 2008 at Keetmanshoop.
Although it constitutes an initiative of the Nama people, the party plans to focus on all ethnic minorities in Namibia. It positions itself i ...
Namibia
Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...
Namibia
Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...