Namibia: Skulls of my People
Tribal leaders in Namibia fight the German government for the return of hundreds of skulls taken for racial experiments.
Editor’s note: This film is no longer available to view online.
Tribal people of Namibia claim that between 1904 and 1908 Germany perpetrated the first genocide of the 20th century in their country, the former Imperial German colony of South West Africa.
After colonists confiscated their land, the cattle-rearing Herero and Nama people rebelled and as a result were massacred by German troops. They were shot, hanged from trees, or forced into the desert where they starved to death.
Survivors were taken to work in concentration camps where many died. Women and girls were raped. An estimated 100,000 people were killed, leaving just 15,000 survivors.
Hundreds of skulls of Herero and Nama people who died were taken to Germany for scientific racial experiments by the colonists. This film is a testimonial account of the descendants of the Herero victims and their ongoing struggle to reclaim their land, get compensation and the return of their ancestors’ skulls from Germany.
![Advocate Vekuii Rukoro (front, dressed in red), the paramount chief of the Herero people, at a heroes' commemoration service in Okeseta, west of Windhoek [Screengrab/Al Jazeera]](/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/88dbd54e22a34631bad25349702a225d_18.jpeg "Advocate Vekuii Rukoro (front, dressed in red), the paramount chief of the Herero people, at a heroes' commemoration service in Okeseta, west of Windhoek [Screengrab/Al Jazeera]")