President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda has mourned the death of his Namibian counterpart Hage Geingob.
Museveni described Hage as a great leader.
President Geingob died yesterday after he was diagnosed with cancer.
Geingob had been in charge of the thinly populated and mostly arid southern African country since 2015, the year he announced he had survived prostate cancer.
“I first heard of Geingob in the 1970s, when he became the head of the Namibian Institute in Lusaka. Indeed, some Ugandans, such as Joan Kategaya, worked there; during that time, many of them were exiles, running away from the terror of Idi Amin. The Namibian Institute, I think, was training Namibians in exile so that they would be able to run their country after independence,” Museveni said.
He said when the NRM came to power in 1986, Mzee Sam Nujoma came here, and we were ready to support SWAPO as we, indeed, supported the ANC and PAC. However, events were moving fast, and Namibia got freedom in 1990. I attended the independence celebrations on behalf of Uganda. Namibia has been stable. I thank our brothers at SWAPO for that.
“On behalf of the government and people of Uganda, I salute the contribution of the late Geingob to the cause of freedom in Namibia and Africa in general. I extend our condolences to his family and the people of Namibia,” Museveni said in a statement.
