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As the rays of the rising sun transform the sand dunes to a glorious deep red, flocks of flamingoes take to the sky in a blur of pink and the myriad calls of wild animals break the quiet of an African morning, Namibia wakes up to a new day. Drills buzz their way into the belly of the earth in search of rich booty, traffic hurtles along the nation’s highways and planes take off as people go about the daily business of life in the fast lane but time stands still in the countryside where nature reigns supreme in all her majesty.

Despite its transition into the modern world of cell phones, satellites and skyscrapers, Namibia has retained its ancient character and traditions and its multi-ethnic tribal culture. A young nation that has made all the right moves to preserve and protect its environment, Namibia has vast open spaces with spectacular natural wonders like the unusual coastal Namib Desert, the deep bowl of Etosha, abundant wildlife and the stunning grandeur of the Fish River Canyon, idyllic Bavarian style villages in an African ambience and the mysteriously eerie Skeleton Coast where hot African and cold Arctic temperatures marry to lure ships to an untimely end.

Namibia's contrasting landscapes hide awesome phenomena such as the world’s largest underground lake aptly named Dragon’s Breath; the Hoba Meteorite, the largest chunk of extraterrestrial rock to be found on earth; the tallest dunes of red sand at Sossusvlei where wind patterns seem to be frozen for eternity and the hospitable Namib Desert that strangely sustains elephants, lions, giraffes and rhinos, as well as the oldest living fossil tree on earth, the Welwitschia Mirablis. Such unusual enchantments coupled with abundant sunshine, political and economic stability and a well-developed tourism infrastructure attracts tourists from across the globe.

Namibia, Gem of Africa, has something to offer to every soul- World’s biggest deserts, national parks, tropical forests and savannahs and many more natural wonders and amazing places. There is simply no limit!

Historically Speaking

Namibia has had a colourful and turbulent history beginning from the earliest records of human habitation going back 25,000 years. The first people in the region were the San, nomadic hunters and foragers who lived in small groups of 25-30 members, evidence of whose presence can be seen in the cave and rock paintings found in Namibia. Pastoral tribes who made a living from breeding and tending cattle joined these early inhabitants and before long, the practise of agriculture developed. The Bantu tribes from the east brought with them the use of implements and Iron Age tools when they moved in alongside the original Khoisan tribes. By the 16th century, the Herero people had traveled down from the lake districts of East Africa. Thus the tribes dwelling in the region grew in numbers with the most prominent being the San, Khoi-khoi, Ovambo and the Herero. This was a time of increasing instability with the tribes in conflict with each other as cultures, lifestyles and demands for land clashed. This set a trend that was to occur frequently - it is believed that the Nama people of modern Namibia descended from Khoi-Khoi tribal group and were responsible for the violent clashes in the 1870s and 1880s.

The Europeans began to arrive in southern Africa by the 15th century, when new sea routes were discovered as trade between European countries and the East increased. The sea routes most commonly sailed by merchant ships were the ones along the Namibian coast and around the Cape of Good Hope. Bartholomeu Diaz, the Portuguese navigator was the first European to reach what is now Walvis Bay before making landfall in Luderitz in December 1487. The coast did not give the newcomers any sense of the wealth and riches awaiting them inland, and they sailed away. Apart from sporadic contacts with Europeans, there was no real interaction between natives and Europeans till the Germans annexed a whole lot of territory in 1884 and created a new region called South-West Africa.

By this time, the Dutch began to move inwards, picking fights with the local chiefs and generally digging in deeper and deeper in what was obviously land worth fighting for. In 1840, a truce was declared and an agreement made, but peace was short-lived as skirmishes and battles within the various tribes and with the Whites became commonplace.

The latter years of the 19th century saw an increase in colonization by European powers and the Portuguese, the British, the French and Leopold II of Belgium was launched on what became the infamous ‘Scramble for Africa’. As German missionaries made rapid inroads into the interiors of the Dark Continent, they opened up the region for traders and in 1884 Germany annexed the country proclaiming it a German protectorate. The years that followed were to be very difficult ones for the ethnic Namibians as their economic and political power bases eroded with all the natural resources and wealth thereby generated concentrated in the hands of a minority White elite. For the next 30 years, Namibia was to remain a German colony, part of the larger territory of German South West Africa. Germany’s defeat in the World War I passed the administration of Namibia to South Africa under a 1920 League of Nations mandate. When the South African mandate expired, the South Africans chose to stay on in defiance of the League of Nations and international opinion. The Boer government of South Africa implemented the apartheid regime in Namibia with segregation and marginalisation of the Black majority. Most of the most fertile land, the mines and the wealth passed into the hands of the new Afrikaaner settlers with the ethnic Namibians used as cheap labour.

After the World War II, South Africa formally announced its intention to annex Namibia in the UN General Assembly in 1947. The next 20 years were spent in futile attempts to annul the annexation by international organizations like the UN and other pressure groups but the economic might of South Africa prevailed and Namibia remained a vassal state. Namibia was too profitable a territory to be granted independence and the status quo remained as South Africa continued to reap rich dividends from its illegitimate occupation.

As nationalist sentiments grew, mass demonstrations became the order of the day and were ruthlessly suppressed by the regime and all political parties were strictly banned. By the 1960s, most of the political parties merged to form South West African People’s Organization (SWAPO), which took the issue of South Africa occupation to the International Court of Justice, under the leadership of Dr Sam Nujoma. SWAPO started a guerilla campaign against South Africa; this plus the UN Resolution of 1989 and mounting public opinion both within South Africa and across the world resulted in an end to the official policy of apartheid forced South Africa to the negotiating table. A constitution was adopted in February 1990, and the first free and fair elections were held in Namibia. SWAPO came to power after the elections with Dr Sam Nujoma as the first president of the independent Republic of Namibia on 21st March 1990. Nujoma was succeeded as President of Namibia by Hifikepunye Pohamba in 2005.

Habitat

Namibia is situated in Southern Africa and shares international frontiers with South Africa, Botswana, Angola and Zimbabwe. The country can be divided into four distinct topographical regions – the 2,000m central plateau that traverses from the north to south, from Keetmanshoop to Otjiwarongo is basically hilly and primarily used for ranching. The plateau slopes westwards down to the coast to the long, narrow, arid belt of the Namib Desert. The Namib Desert is full of escarpments and canyons formed by years of wind and water action into the most spectacularly scenic area of natural beauty in all of Namibia. Further below the Namib Desert is the flat coastal plain – an area of shifting sand dunes. East of the plateau, the land slopes gently down to the great sandy stretch of the Kalahari Desert. The eastern lowlands encompass the high rainfall areas of the Okavango and Caprivi regions.

Mt. Brandberg is the highest mountain in Namibia at 2579m. Other important peaks are the Moltkeblick (2480m), Bismarckfelsen (2419m), Gamsberg (2347m) and the Spitzkoppe (1730m). There are five perennial rivers in Namibia forming natural frontiers with the neighbouring countries. These river systems are the Kunene, Okavango, Zambezi, Kwando/Linyanti/Chobe and the Orange River.

Flora & Fauna: Namibia can proudly claim fame to being the very first country in the world to include provisions for the protection, conservation and sustainable utilization of the environment in its Constitution. As a result, 15.5% of the country has been devoted to National Parks where rare and endangered species of animals, birds and plant life are preserved and protected. Namibia has 14 vegetation zones - desert, semi-desert, forest savannahs woodlands, mopane and thorn bush woodlands, dwarf shrub, camel thorn, mixed trees and shrub savannahs. Savannah or grasslands extend over 64% of the country covering parts of the highland plateau and the Kalahari Desert sandveld. Dry woodlands and forests grow in 20% of the land area while approximately 16% comes under desert type arid/semi-arid vegetation.

The Namib Desert is mostly barren except for hardy species of grass and woody scrub and small shrubs. The surprise element in the Namib is the profusion of lichens that grow prolifically in the central coast and in the succulent and fleshy grass varieties commonly found in the more temperate savannah. Namibia has more than 120 tree species and more than 200 endemic plant species including the highly unusual African giants baobabs that grow in the grassy steppes and woodlands in northern Namibia, from the Kunene River to the Zambezi River. The vegetation around the rivers changes from woodland to riverine forests. The riverbanks may have as diverse specimens as thorn trees, red or wild seringa, large false mopane, kiaat, Rhodesian teak, sausage tree and clusters of wild date palms, reed and papyrus banks along the channels. Endemic to the Namib and one of the rarest plants in the world is the Welwitschia, a dwarf tree which lives for 2000 years or longer and in its lifetime produces a single pair of leaves. Another tree unusual in appearance is the 7m high African moringa which looks more like an upside down tree with its gnarled, tangled bare branches closely resembling a root system sticking up into the tree. A really rare stand of moringas is famous as the Haunted Forest – it can be seen in the Etosha National Park.

Namibia has a rich and varied wildlife with over 140 mammal species and 620 bird species native to the country. The eland is the biggest and the Damara dik- dik, the smallest of over 20 species of antelopes alone that are found here. Namibia has amongst the largest numbers of elephants, giraffe, oryx, hyena, ostrich and antelopes apart from the endangered species of black rhinos, cheetahs, Hartmann's mountain zebra, blackfaced impala, wild dog, lion, kudu, waterbuck and oribi. More than 887 bird species are on record as endemic to the region of Southern Africa – out of these, 620 are found in Namibia. The Walvis Bay and Sandwich Harbour lagoons are two very significant wetland areas in Africa. The wetlands have a steady and rich food supply that attracts nearly 180,000 migratory birds. Namibia has other water bodies such as the bays around Luderitz, the salt pans in Swakopmund and Etosha, the delta of the Orange River and the Cape Cross lagoons.