Landless People’s Movement (LPM) legislator Utaara Mootu says the current N.dollars 18 billion genocide offer by Germany must be rejected with the contempt it deserves by every Namibian.

Mootu stressed this in the National Assembly (NA) on Wednesday when she made her contribution to the agreement signed by the German and Namibian governments as reparation for the killing of over 100 000 Nama and Ovaherero people between 1904 and 1908.

As a descendant of the genocide communities, Mootu expressed disappointment that other descendants whose ancestors suffered at the hands of colonial Germany in the National Assembly want to push through a declaration that resolves nothing, “just to protect their political interests.”

“They are here pushing a motion that will absolve Germany of its terror and depths of savagery with a laughable settlement, conscious of the hardships faced by the Ovaherero/Ovambanderu, Nama, San and Damara communities as a consequence of genocide,” she said fiercely.

Mootu also argued that without a peace treaty in place, the Nama, Ovaherero/Ovambanderu, Damara and San communities are still at war with Germany to this day, albeit not physically.

“A peace treaty separates from the joint declaration, and that prescribes the long term conditions for peace, which outlines conditions for permanent resolutions of hostilities between the two warring parties is essential,” she lectured the House.

The LPM firebrand lamented the generational wealth lost by victim communities as a direct consequence of the genocide.

“We have lost our land, we want our land, our heritage, our wealth back. Young people are faced with intergenerational poverty, which is a relentless cycle in which poverty is passed down from one generation to the next,” she said.

While driving the point home, she took aim at land reform minister Calle Schlettwein, who is of German descent, as a classic example.

“Today there is a clear economic inequality between myself and other young black youth and a child of Honourable Calle Schlettwein and German descendants. Who has generational wealth today? It is the German offspring. Who has intergenerational poverty today? It is the offspring of the victim communities,” she said.

The hotly disputed and widely rejected joint declaration on genocide is currently before the assembly for scrutiny. It will either be ratified or rejected.

Source: The Namibian Press Agency