Book tips: The Haiǁom San and their lost home Etosha

For Namibia holidaymakers, Etosha National Park is one of the highlights of their round trip. For some Namibians, however, or more precisely: for the Haiǁom, Etosha is a wound. Because Etosha was once their home. Until 1954, when the then South African administration banished them from Etosha and forcibly resettled them.

Two books can tell you the story of the Haiǁom and their fight for compensation for the expropriation they suffered while there is no game at the waterhole to watch.

"Haiǁom in the Etosha Region" by anthropologist Ute Diekmann was published in 2007, when the Etosha National Park celebrated its 100th anniversary. Diekmann describes the long history of displacement and discrimination against the Haiǁom.

The nature reserve was founded in 1907 by the then German colonial power. However, the Haiǁom, who lived in harmony with nature, continued to be tolerated in the park. It was not until 1954 that South West Africa's administration controlled by South Africa took measures to forcibly relocate them (more background).

One would think that the government of independent Namibia from 1990 onwards would rectify this injustice. But that was not the case. On the contrary. In 1997, it sent a police force to the entrance of Etosha Park south of Okaukuejo. Using tear gas and batons, the force took action against 40 Haiǁom who were demonstrating for the return of their land by blocking the entrance.

Fight for compensation in court

Namibia had guaranteed the right to private property in its constitution. The aim was to resolve the land issue through a legal process of redistribution. A conference on land reform was held in 1991. However, claims for the restitution of expropriated ancestral land were not formulated.

In "Beggars on our own land ...", legal expert Willem Odendaal describes the Haiǁom's fight in court for compensation for their ancestral land. In 2015, the case 'Tsumib v. Government of the Republic of Namibia' was filed with the Supreme Court of Namibia.

His book, published in 2024, analyses the historical and current social and legal background and recounts the course of the court case. It centres on the question of whether and how the Haiǁom people can claim compensation in court.

Odendaal's conclusion: the future of the claims to expropriated ancestral land depends on the political will of the government. Especially as it relies on a majority in the legislative parliament.

On the other hand, Odendaal believes that the courts have a duty to uphold the rights enshrined in the constitution, which he believes form the basis for the ancestral claims of the Haiǁom.

Anyone who reads Diekmann and Odendaal suddenly sees Etosha with different eyes - including the burial sites of Europeans at the Rietfontein waterhole. You may wonder what a Haiǁom feels whose grandparents or even parents were born here?

Sven-Eric Stender