A politician in Namibia hit headlines after he won the regional election for councillor because his name is Adolf Hitler Uunona.
The name is the same as that of the German dictator Adolf Hitler who is infamous for the Holocaust that happened under the German Nazi regime between 1933 to 1945 that killed over 6 million jews.
Reacting to the controversy surrounding his name, Adolf said that he did not choose to be named after the German dictator.
Adolf said, “Hitler was a controversial person who captured and killed people across the globe. I am not like him,” reported The Namibian.
Speaking about his name, Adolf said that there is nothing he can do to change the name and he does not know why his father gave him this name.
The newly-elected leader of the Ompundja constituency of the Oshana region of Namibia also lashed out at international media for ‘sensationalising’ the issue and publishing his photo next to the Nazi party leader Hitler.
The 54-year-old leader who as per the report, has been the councillor of Ompundja constituency since 2004 asked, “Are they only hearing my name for the first time now?”
He also feels that it is unfair of the media to write about him for his name which was given to him by his father when Adolf was a baby.
Adolf said that having the name Adolf Hitler does not mean that he has Adolf Hitler’s character or that he resembles “Adolf Hitler of Germany”.
The councillor also said that if he had a choice in naming himself, he would have agreed to be named Adolf Hitler because of the atrocities he committed.
He insisted that just like anyone else, he too is a good person.
Reacting to the news report published by a German newspaper, Phil ya Nangoloh, executive director of NamRights said that it was designed to defame councillor Adolf.
Phil named the author of the news report and said that he maliciously and sensationally referred to Uunona as “Adolf Hitler of Africa”.
Phil said that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the attack is intended to serve these two malicious purposes.
As per him, the objectives behind this news story are to victimise Adolf and to discredit the ruling Swapo Party. Phil named the opposition party Independent Patriots for Change (IPC) and said that the party enjoys support among white right-wingers.
He said that these Namibians who are of German extraction are “against Germany paying reparations for the 1904-1908 genocide against the ethnic Nama and Herero peoples.”
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