Namibia: Politician named Adolf Hitler sweeps to victory in local election
A local official in Germany's former colony confirms he has 'nothing to do' with Nazi ideology
A Namibian politician named after genocidal Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler confirmed on Thursday he has no plans of fighting for world domination after sweeping to a victory in a local election.
In an interview with German newspaper Bild, Uunona Adolf Hitler, elected as councilor for the Ompundja constituency with 85 percent of the vote, clarified that he had "nothing to do" with Nazi ideology.
He appears on the election nomination list as Adolf H. Uunona.
Germanic names and the German language remain widespread in Namibia, known as German South West Africa during its colonial occupation by the German Empire.
The politician told Bild that his father had named him after the Nazi leader, but said "he probably didn't understand what Adolf Hitler stood for. As a child I saw it as a totally normal name."
"It wasn't until I was growing up that I realized: This man wanted to subjugate the whole world. I have nothing to do with any of these things."
Germany is responsible for the darkest chapter in Namibia's history, which saw soldiers of German Kaiser Wilhelm slaughtered some 65,000 Herero and 10,000 Nama tribespeople in a 1904-08 campaign after a revolt against land seizures by German colonists.
Some historians refer to the massacre as the first genocide of the 20th century or the "forgotten genocide."
Germany has acknowledged “moral responsibility” for the massacres but has stopped short of making an official apology to avoid compensation claims.
In 2018 Germany handed over to Namibia skulls and other remains of massacred tribespeople shipped to Germany following the massacres for experiments in the discredited fields of phrenology and eugenics aimed to prove European racial superiority.