Swapo poised to lose nearly 10 seats

Projections late yesterday pointed to Swapo losing about 10 seats in this year’s National Assembly election, down from the 63 the party won in 2019. On the other hand, party presidential candidate Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah is expected to perform better than former president Hage Geingob’s 56% share from that year.With 92 constituencies – out of 121 – counted by yesterday afternoon, Swapo had secured 54 seats, nine fewer than the 63 seats it won in 2019. That year, the party fell short of achieving a two-thirds majority by one seat – shedding 14 seats in total from the 77 it won in 2014.By late yesterday, the ruling party was pinning its hopes on the Oshana Region, a traditional stronghold, where some constituency results were still pending. Also pending were results from the coveted Windhoek West constituency and parts of the Erongo and Omaheke regions.Political scientist Rui Tyitende yesterday commented: “The preliminary results are similar – not in quantitative terms – to what Geingob garnered in 2014. He was more popular than the party, but the fortunes were reversed when the party became more popular than him in 2019.“The reasons for that were multiple – but key was structural poverty, unemployment and corruption that decimated the livelihoods of fishermen and their families," he explained. On Nandi-Ndaitwah doing better than the party this year, Tyitende said: “People have lost trust in Swapo but deem Nandi-Ndaitwah as ‘clean’ in a party that has a serious image and credibility problem.”‘Breathing through the wounds’Licking their wounds late yesterday was the now outgoing official opposition, the Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), which was set to lose 11 of the 16 seats it won in 2019. For much of yesterday the party held onto four seats, but late results from its stronghold in the Kunene Region saw it increase its parliamentary share to five seats, which the party hoped would not be a flash in the pan as more results – which could drag its share down – continued to trickle in.PDM officials, desperately hoping for a late miracle, yesterday banked their fading hopes on the pending results from the Omaheke Region, where the party enjoys pockets of strong support.Irrespective of what the late results will show, it is now a foregone conclusion that PDM will be knocked off its official opposition perch by the Independent Patriots for Change (IPC), which by late yesterday had secured 18 seats in the National Assembly after 814 654 votes had been counted.Although 1.4 million voters were registered for this election, it is projected that only around 1 million of them have voted.AR clinging onNew kid on the block Affirmative Repositioning (AR) was still holding onto its projected six seats by late yesterday. Without a specific stronghold anywhere in the country, the leftist outfit hoped to maintain its generic rise from the remnants of votes still pending.Windhoek West in particular was expected to give the youth-centric party a shot in the arm.Breathing down AR’s neck yesterday was the Landless People’s Movement (LPM), which looked poised to increase its parliamentary presence with an additional seat from the four it currently occupies in the August House. The party stood at five seats late yesterday – aligning with earlier projections that it will win between four and five seats.Other opposition partiesThe United Democratic Front (UDF), which has strong roots in the Erongo and Kunene regions, held onto two seats by its fingernails late yesterday, with hopes that the pending results in the two regions would help it cling onto its pair of seats. The party is not expected to gain more.Former official opposition parties Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP) and Congress of Democrats (CoD) were among the parties with zero seats as counting limped towards a close.South West Africa National Union (Swanu), Namibia Economic Freedom Fighters (NEFF), Republican Party (RP), All People’s Party (APP), National Unity Democratic Organisation (Nudo), National Democratic Party (NDP) and the Body of Christ Party (BCP) were all holding onto one seat each by late yesterday.#NamibiaDecides2024

Swapo poised to lose nearly 10 seats

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Namibian Sun 2024-12-05

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Swapo poised to lose nearly 10 seats

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Namibian Sun 2024-12-05

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