Dirk Frederik Mudge (16 January 1928 – 26 August 2020) was a Namibian politician. He served in several high-ranking positions in the South African administration of South West Africa, was the chairman of the 1975–1977 Turnhalle Constitutional Conference, and co-founded the Republican Party (RP) of Namibia as well as the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), now known as the Popular Democratic Movement (PDM).

At Namibian independence, Mudge was a member of the Constituent Assembly and 1st National Assembly until he retired in 1993. Mudge was the founder of Namibia's Afrikaans daily Die Republikein and its publisher Namibia Media Holdings. He served on the board of directors until 2008.

Dirk Mudge, a White Namibian of Afrikaner descent with mixed Dutch and German roots, was born on the farm Rusthof near Otjiwarongo. He was a farmer by profession. In 1947, he graduated from Stellenbosch University with a Bachelor of Commerce, whereupon he worked as an accountant in Windhoek. Between 1952 and 1960, he farmed with cattle.

In 1955, Mudge became a member of the pro-apartheid National Party (NP), which governed South Africa between 1948 and 1994. He was elected to the whites-only Legislative Assembly in 1961 to represent Otjiwarongo. In 1965, Mudge became a member of the executive committee for South West Africa and thus a high-ranking administrator of the territory, holding this position until 1977.

When AH du Plessis, the leader of the South West African branch of the National Party, was appointed Minister in 1969, Mudge acted in his position as leader of the NP. At that time he began to disagree with NP's views on the future of South West Africa. He forged a friendship with Herero Chief Clemens Kapuuo, discussed plans for a self-governed South West Africa with then-Prime Minister of South Africa John Vorster, and became one of the driving forces behind the 1975–77 Turnhalle Constitutional Conference.

The Turnhalle Conference was an attempt to win over a broad spectrum of the indigenous population by means of small reforms and compromises, and thus make them cease their support for the armed resistance waged by SWAPO at that time. Its aim was also to cement the separation of the South West African ethnicities by making the future state of Namibia, a constitution of which was drafted at the Turnhalle conference, a confederation of bantustans. Mudge served as chairman. As a result of the conference, many of the participating delegates agreed to aggregate their small, ethnically defined parties into one bigger body that was able to form a counterbalance to SWAPO. Mudge founded the Republican Party (RP) shortly before the Turnhalle proceedings finished. The RP joined when on 5 November 1977 the Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA) was founded with Clemens Kapuuo as first president and Dirk Mudge as chairman.

At that time Mudge founded Die Republikein, until today the only Afrikaans daily, as a mouthpiece of the RP. He also established Democratic Media Holdings (today Namibia Media Holdings), the publishing agency of the newspaper.

The subsequent 1978 South West African legislative election was won by the DTA by a landslide, which claimed 41 of the 50 seats. Although these elections were the first multi-racial elections in the territory of South West Africa there were allegations of widespread intimidation, not least by the presence of South African troops in the north of the territory. The United Nations Security Council declared these elections "null and void". On 1 July 1980, Mudge became the chairman of the Council of Ministers of the resulting government.