Ben Ulenga

Benjamin Ulenga (born Benjamin Uulenga Uulenga on June 22, 1952) is a Namibian politician. In the 1990s, he served under the SWAPO government as a deputy minister and as an ambassador, but he broke with the government in 1998 and founded an opposition party, the Congress of Democrats (CoD), in 1999. He has been a member of the National Assembly of Namibia since 1999.

Life and career

Ulenga, born in Ontanga, Oshana Region, played an influential role in the independence struggle of Namibia against South African apartheid rule. He joined the People's Liberation Army of Namibia in 1974 but was later captured after being wounded in combat and sentenced to 15 years in prison, which he spent on Robben Island. He was released in 1985.

Immediately prior to independence, he was a SWAPO member of the Constituent Assembly, which was in place from November 1989 to March 1990. After independence, he was a SWAPO member of the National Assembly from 1990 to 1996, and he was Deputy Minister of Wildlife, Conservation and Tourism from 1991 to 1995 before becoming Deputy Minister of Regional and Local Government and Housing in 1995. He was later appointed as Namibia's High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, but in August 1998 he resigned from that post to protest plans to amend the constitution so that President Sam Nujoma could run for a third term; in addition, he expressed dissatisfaction with Namibia's military presence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo during that country's civil war. He initially said that he would remain a member of SWAPO, but he subsequently left SWAPO and founded the opposition CoD in March 1999. He was the CoD candidate in the 1999 presidential election, placing second behind Nujoma and receiving 10.5% of the vote. He was also elected to the National Assembly as a CoD candidate in the 1999 parliamentary election.