Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah has officially assumed office as Namibia’s first female president, achieving the nation’s highest leadership position nearly six decades after joining the liberation struggle against apartheid South Africa.
The 72-year-old veteran politician, who secured electoral victory in November, joins a select group of female African heads of state following predecessors such as Liberia’s Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Malawi’s Joyce Banda, and Tanzania’s Samia Suluhu Hassan—all of whom attended Friday’s historic inauguration ceremony.
She succeeds Nangolo Mbumba, who served as interim president following President Hage Geingob’s death in February 2024. As Namibia’s fifth president since independence, she inherits leadership of a nation that endured German colonization until World War I and subsequently waged a decades-long independence struggle against South African rule.
“My responsibility is preserving our independence achievements while vigorously advancing economic and social development to create shared prosperity for all citizens,” Nandi-Ndaitwah declared in her inaugural address.
Her extraordinary biography mirrors Namibia’s sovereignty journey. She joined the South West Africa People’s Organization as a teenager, experienced exile across multiple countries during the liberation struggle, and has served continuously as a lawmaker since 1990. Her husband, a retired military commander, received the formal designation “first gentleman” during the ceremony.
Nandi-Ndaitwah took her constitutional oath before visiting dignitaries from South Africa, Zambia, Congo, Botswana, Angola, and Kenya.