Brigitte Weidlich
21 November 2008
FORMER Director of Elections Philemon Kanime, who resigned from the ruling Swapo Party last month, has joined the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP) opposition party.
"I sent a letter to Swapo on October 9 and informed them I would resign after over 40 years of being a member," Kanime told reporters yesterday.
"I became a Swapo member in 1961.
I am a democrat and always kept an independent mind, which was not liked there [in Swapo].
RDP stands for the values we once fought for to have in an independent Namibia."
Last month Kanime cited witch-hunts inside Swapo, a "command-and-obey culture" in that party, unruly behaviour from the party's youth league and a lack of open debate as his main reasons for leaving the party.
According to him, Swapo has reached a stage where it lacks inspiring political ideals.
Swapo members participating in NBC phone-in programmes last year accused Kanime of "illegally registering" the RDP when he headed the Electoral Commission of Namibia.
In November last year the Swapo Party Youth League (SPYL) called on Kanime to resign as Elections Director because of what they called his "dubious conduct" in registering the RDP as a political party.
The Youth League claimed he was a sympathiser of the new party.
They said Kanime should have informed President Hifikepunye Pohamba about the party's application, as the President had appointed him, and urged the Government to launch an investigation into the RDP's registration.
Kanime refused to resign and said he had done nothing wrong.
In April this year he was put on "special leave" after controversy erupted around the postponed Omuthiya local authority election, which eventually took place in September.
Kanime was suspended shortly after the Swapo Party claimed he had smuggled an RDP candidate, Magnus Nangombe, onto the voters' roll for the election of the first Town Council of Omuthiya.
Kanime hit back by claiming that he did not know how Swapo had got hold of the list but he was sure that Nangombe had registered in time.
Kanime and two others were suspended for an unspecified time.
No disciplinary hearing took place but Kanime was replaced with Moses Ndjarakana after his term expired at the end of July.
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