Namibia Embassy Berlin -
Regierungsmitteilungen
Namibian President Returns Home to Fordham
By Tom Stoelker on September 23, 2015 Rose Hill, University News
"Hage G. Geingob, PhD, FCRH '70, president of the Republic of Namibia, returned home to Fordham to receive an honorary doctorate of humane letters at the Rose Hill campus on Sept. 22."We welcome you back as a son of Fordham, but at the same time we hail you as the Father of Namibia," said Joseph M. McShane, SJ, president of Fordham.
President Geingob arrived at Keating Hall with an entourage that included his wife, Monica Kalondo. Father McShane showed the president the granite step engraved with his name commemorating the occasion.
Namiba President Hage Geingob. (Photos by Bruce Gilbert)
The presentation ceremony took place at Tognino Hall. The ceremony's faculty sponsor Booi Themeli, PhD, an associate professor of economics and director of the Ubuntu Program between Fordham and the University of Pretoria in South Africa, explained the intertwined histories of the two countries, which border one another."Namibia also went though apartheid and fought the liberation struggle," he said. "Their independence was an inspiration to the struggle that we [in South Africa] were going through."
It was his nation's discriminatory policies in education under apartheid that spurred Geingob to seek schooling in 
the United States in the mid-1960s.
At the time Fordham had a burgeoning African and African-American studies program, born out of the United States' own civil rights struggle. Geingob began studies at two colleges before a position at the U.N. brought him to New York, and finally to Fordham, where he finished his bachelor's.
Please click here for more photos and the President's full speech....and on the historic photo above for a current video interview with the President.
Read more...H.E. Dr Hage Geingob makes his first Heroes Day Speech as President of the Republic of Namibia:
HEROES ACRE NATIONAL MONUMENT, WINDHOEK, AUGUST 26, 2015
Director of Ceremonies;
Your Excellency, Edgar Chagwa Lungu, President of the Republic of Zambia and our Guest of Honour;
Comrade Sam Shafiishuna Nujoma, Founding President and Father of the Nation; (...)
I am honoured and humbled to be standing here today, to deliver my first Heroes Day Speech as President of the Republic of Namibia.
We mark this solemn occasion by remembering and paying tribute to the valiant sons and daughters of our soil, whose blood waters our freedom.
There is an African proverb which says, "Tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today."
Several decades ago, brave Namibians made the choice to take a leap of faith and join the struggle for the liberation of our beloved country.
These are the heroes and heroines who prepared us for the peace and tranquility we enjoy today. There is a time in human suffering, when one is forced to make a choice whether to submit or to fight, even if it means paying the ultimate price.
In 1966, when the International Court of Justice failed to assist our cause for self-determination in farcical circumstances, a turning point came to SWAPO. This prompted one of our stalwarts and heroes Peter Ndilimani Nanyemba to say, "We will cross many rivers of blood before we can achieve our freedom."
Following this clarion call, the SWAPO Central Committee, under the leadership of Comrade Sam Nujoma, resolved that we must fight in order to become our own liberators. To this end, the first bullets which marked the beginning of the armed struggle were fired at Ongulumbashe on 26 August 1966.
Today, the three heroes we are honouring as well as all our other heroes and heroines, are a testament to that statement made by Comrade Nanyemba and the resolve of Comrade Nujoma, for indeed they crossed many rivers of blood so that we can be a free and independent people rather than an oppressed people.
• Your Excellency, Comrade Robert G. Mugabe, President of the Republic of Zimbabwe and Chairperson of SADC;
I am honoured to join this august gathering in Gaborone, where my delegation and I have received excellent hospitality since our arrival. I thank my brother, Lt. Gen. Seretse Khama Ian Khama, President of the Republic of Botswana, for making us feel at home.
Your Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
As a pan Africanist, and coming from a country that suffered the brunt of colonial rule, it is with great joy and pride that I present my maiden statement to this august gathering. For us to deepen regional integration, we need to revisit the road, which we have traversed. The origin of our regional integration forms part of the broader pan Africanist agenda, which is rooted in the struggles of Africa against the scourge of slavery, racism and colonialism. Read more...
August 17th, 2015 | by New Era
"I would like to state unequivocally that as President I have heard the cry of the poor. I have dedicated my Presidency to the complete eradication of poverty in this beautiful country of ours," said Geingob, who started his speech by quoting a verse from the Bible that says: 'Whoever closes his ear to the cry of the poor, will himself call out and not be answered.'
He said the essence of the all-out-war on poverty is that poverty eradication is only achievable if collective efforts are made by all Namibians towards that goal.
"This why on the eve of 31 July, I met leaders of the Affirmative Repositioning group. I called on them to hold hands with government in the spirit of harambee [Swahili term for pulling or working together] and be part of the war on poverty," the President said.
The dialogue is an initiative of the Ministry of Poverty Eradication and Social Welfare.
Among those who attended the launch were Vice-President Nicky Iyambo, Prime Minister Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila, the First Lady Monica Geingos, UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative, Anita Gbeho, various government ministers, diplomats and members of the private sector.
Click here for the Keynote Address delivered by the President at the Launch of the National Dialogue on Wealth Distribution and Poverty Eradication