14 Sep 2015

Paramount chief of Baherero in Namibia, Advocate Vekuii Rukoro has appreciated what Kgosi Tshekedi Khama and other traditional leaders did for Baherero. Baherero fled into Botswana to escape the officially sanctioned extermination order of General von Trotha.

Speaking at an event to honour Kgosi Tshekedi Khama in Pilikwe village recently, Advocate Rukoro said the extermination order was meant to wipe out Hereros for refusing to be colonised by the Germans.

Incidentally, he said, a similar order of 22 April 1905 was issued against their Nama colleagues and many of their descendants are in the areas of Tsabong and Omaweneno. He said Botswana did not look down upon them with a condescending attitude that they were not of their tribe but welcomed them as fellow human beings.

Thus, he expressed hope that the bond of the common history of the border between the Otjozondjupa and Omaheke regions or Namibia as a whole and Botswana would remain forever between the two nations.

That, he said should serve to cement a permanent friendly relationship between their two peoples because a relationship based on ties of consanguinity would never be broken by geo-political borders.

Furthermore, he said a lot of Hereros and Namas of Botswana, especially in the Tsabong and Omaweneno areas, had lost their language and culture and were looking up to them in Namibia to help them revive the two languages and their culture. He said a language was first natural identification of any human being and it was through the language that all learned about their culture. Ends