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Improving tenure security for the poor in Africa - Namibia
Legal Empowerment of the Poor Working Paper #6
by Ben Fuller
Namibia, the most arid country in sub-Saharan Africa, is one of the most sparsely populated countries on earth, with land area of 824 292 km2 and population of just over 1.8 million. March 1990 saw the end of a century of colonial rule during which indigenous Namibians were dispossessed from rights to both land and resources. First German and then white South African settlers were encouraged to migrate to Namibia and establish commercial farms and related businesses. Finding the large tracts of land needed for this first wave of resettlement required expropriation of that land from blacks. Access to freehold tenure was reserved for white settlers and tenure security for indigenous Namibians largely disappeared. In non-white areas, rights were provided under indigenous tenure systems whose legal status was somewhat murky. Urban tenure was denied as blacks were not allowed ownership of residential land.
The denial of rights to land and resources to the majority of Namibians during the apartheid, colonial period was the primary fuel for Namibia’s liberation movement. While the acquisition and redistribution of freehold farmland has garnered the headlines during the past 16 years, many issues, problems and solutions to the restoration of rights in other areas have emerged. Land and rights reform for Namibia is not the simple task of obtaining from those who have much and redistributing to those who have little. Redistribution, in this classic sense, would apply to only half of the country’s land. The story of the other half is often neglected. Namibia has a web of social, historical, environmental and legal parameters that have required a complex approach to both the recognition and restoration of property rights.
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