Namibia’s Herero people have filed a lawsuit in the US against Germany over a genocide in the early 20th century. The case, to be heard on Tuesday, shows how Germany is still struggling with its colonial past.
“We Germans acknowledge our historical, political, moral and ethical responsibility and the guilt that Germans brought upon themselves,” said Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul during a visit to Namibia back in 2004. Speaking at the Waterberg, where Emperor Wilhelm II’s troops had mercilessly put down a rebellion against German colonial rule a hundred years earlier, the then German minister for development aid was close to tears.
Tens of thousands of Herero and Nama people were killed by the so-called “protective troops” or died in concentration camps in the years after the 1904 battle. It was the first genocide of the 20th century, historians say.
Namibia had waited a long time for such words, but the German government of the time backed off, saying Wieczorek-Zeul had spoken as a private person. The backpedaling fitted a decades-old pattern: No matter what government happened to be in power, the country won international respect for coming to terms with the Holocaust, while at the same time its colonial past was ignored.
Government pledges to deal with colonial past
Finally, however, a cautious change of heart seems to be on the horizon.
A look at the current government’s coalition agreement shows “a willingness that has not previously been publicly declared in this form” by the government to devote itself to the colonial issues, says colonialism expert Henning Melber, a senior adviser at the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation.
For the first time, the German government has pledged a willingness to deal with its colonial past. “We want to build a bridge from the past via the present to the future,” German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas promised in May on a visit to Tanzania.
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