Elections in Namibia
Elections in Namibia
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Elections in Namibia

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Elections in Namibia

Elections in Namibia determine who holds public political offices in the country. Namibia is a semi-presidential representative democratic republic. It runs direct elections every five years for the position of the president and seats in the National Assembly, and every six years for the Regional Councils and the distribution of seats in local authorities. The National Council is elected indirectly by the constituency councillors of Namibia's 14 regions.

The current direct elections determining political positions are the 2019 Namibian general election for president and National Assembly, and the 2020 Namibian local and regional elections for Regional Councils and local authorities.

Namibia elects on national level a head of state - the president - and a legislature. The president is elected for a five-year term by the people. The Parliament is bicameral in nature. Until 2014 the National Assembly had 78 members of which 72 were elected by direct popular vote using the proportional representation and a maximum of 6 non-voting members are appointed by the president. The members are elected for a five-year term. Since then the number of elected seats to the National Assembly was increased to 96 to allow for wider representation of the population, although the real reason behind it was the newly introduced gender equality system of the ruling party SWAPO. This system would have pushed several male members out of parliament. The National Council of Namibia has 42 members, indirectly elected for a five-year term in triple-seat constituencies (regions). Namibia is a democratic but one party dominant state with the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO) in power.

Opposition parties are allowed, but are widely considered to have no real chance of gaining power. Upon independence of Namibia the territory inherited a populace divided along ethnic groups, and political parties representing these ethnicities. While this is also true for SWAPO which was founded to represent the Ovambo people, the ruling party has garnered national support due to its role in the fight for independence. Opposition parties have had little success in national elections, and their representation in the lower house has been dwindling steadily.

The 2014 Namibian general election was the first in Africa to use electronic voting. The electronic system was also used in the 2015 Namibian local and regional elections and in the 2019 general election. However, the electronic voting machines (EVMs) that Namibia purchased do not implement the Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT). The Supreme Court of Namibia ruled in 2020 that without a paper trail, usage of the EVMs in elections is unconstitutional. Starting with the 2020 Namibian local and regional elections the voting process thus uses paper ballots again.

There are 121 constituency councillors to be elected. In the 2015 Namibian local and regional elections the party affiliations of the elected councillors were:

Local elections determine the population of the village, town, and city councils and have a direct influence on who will become mayor, as this position is elected among all councillors. Contrary to the regional elections, local elections in Namibia are determined by party, not by individual. There were 57 local authorities to be elected.

Before Namibian independence the territory was known as South West Africa. All elections until 1978 were only for Whites, but even thereafter several parties representing the indigenous population, among them SWAPO, were excluded.

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