Berlin did not want the term "reparations for war crimes" to be used, as this could open the door to a chain of individual claims.
Berlin did not want the term "reparations for war crimes" to be used, as this could open the door to a chain of individual claims.
Here are some interesting facts:
This agreement involves 1.4 billion USD in payments over 30 years, the genocide estimates on the higher end are at about 140,00 people (source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/28/world/europe/germany-namibia-genocide.html ). Last year the chemical company Bayer agreed to an 11 Billion USD settlement related to a lawsuit involving one of their pesticides - the estimated number of plaintiffs are 90,000 currently and 30,000 estimated potential future ones. (Source: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2021/05/federal-judge-nixes-proposed-monsanto-glysophate-settlement-deepening-black-hole-for-bayer.html). Looks like US lawsuits are more powerful than an African state with many natural resources.
Foreign direct investment in mining in Namibia has been about 50 billion dollars ANNUALLY. Germany is one of the main investors.
Source: https://www.npc.gov.na/download/Researches_by_NPC/mining-research-paper-18-11-2020.pdf
China and South Africa are the two biggest investors in Namibia by far. 80% of all foreign direct investment in Namibia goes into mining. Foreign Direct Investment apparently accounts for 6.6% of the employment in Namibia. Source: https://www.bon.com.na/CMSTemplates/Bon/Files/bon.com.na/ea/eaaee5ca-4e72-4bd3-9df8-55f15a36c4d9.pdf I would recommend reading this in full- here is another fun thing to notice here - apparently the mining sector doesn't produce stable profits for Foreign investment (yet it keeps coming). Incidentally, manufacturing is a good source of profits due to mineral processing companies (I wonder what the connection is 🙂 )
The unemployment rate is about 20% Source: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/NAM/namibia/unemployment-rate
Namibia is apparently a great place for investment! Because it has a stable democracy and a well established road infrastructure. One of the cons is alas that the government has a "willingness to raise state ownership of mining assets in the industry". Source: https://santandertrade.com/en/portal/establish-overseas/namibia/investing
Anyway I don't know much about internal politics in Namibia but I am somewhat inclined to believe given the current setup this is the most they can get. Maybe the info I shared has a completely benign outlook to it. I am not an expert on Development economics so I would be happy to hear other insights.