It is in this delicate and paradoxical orbit of politics that the 21st March 2005 is an important rendezvous in the political life of Lucas Hifikepunye Pohamba.

Apart from the usual pomp, the family photos and the camaraderie which epitomises such fetes, Pohamba's entry into the presidency provides a moment for pause and deep reflection.

First, our pause is informed by an interrogation of the kind of political leadership Lucas will bring to that irreducible core of government after fifteen years of freedom.

Pierre Mendes France, a Prime Minister extraordinaire under the fourth French republic, argued that it is essential to integrate history in our reflection.

Hence, in this case reflection is rooted in a search for an understanding of the type of contract or commitments a Pohamba Presidency ought to deliver to the Namibian people given our historical particularities.

Evidently, the factors that will shape Pohamba's adoption of a particular leadership strategy during his Presidency are numerous.

Amongst the most obvious are his goals as a leader, his personality, the institutional framework within which he will operate, the political mechanisms by which his power was won and could be retained and the means of mass communication at his disposal.

It is therefore important to posit a thesis in favour of a leadership style that would be hybrid transactional and laissez-faire.

Accordingly, this would provide a possible answer as to whether a Pohamba Presidency would be one of continuity from the three governments of the first republic or in a worse case scenario, fragmentation.

Stating the obvious, a Pohamba Presidency would cohabitate in its initial years with the Party presidency under the emblematic figure of Sam Nujoma.

Equally so, the fact that Pohamba's ascension to the Presidency was conceived politically by President Nujoma would define the finer contours of his presidency.

Obviously Pohamba defined his Presidency on the platform of continuity.

Yet, it should be stated that a Pohamba Presidency would not be in its ontology neo-Nujoma-ist.

As a consequence, it would inadvertently have to put emphasis on the substantive outputs of our democracy.

Nevertheless, it remains, Nujoma-ist in its casting.

One could accentuate the view that Nujoma's leadership style was largely transformational for he was not so much a coordinator or manager, but rather an inspirer and visionary.

Such personas are difficult to pollute.

These are the hallmarks of Teflon presidents.

Such leaders are not only motivated by strong ideological convictions, but have the political will to put them into practice.

The leader creates the story, embodies the story and ensures that it resonates with the broader public.

On the contrary, Pohamba's leadership would not be transformational, thus not so much initiating a vision, but could assume a double movement.

Firstly, it could take a laissez-faire approach in relation to the Party presidency in view of the fact that it is an office outside his personal responsibility as head of state.

It needs mention that political systems can operate without constitutions, assemblies, judiciaries and even political parties.

However they cannot survive without an executive branch to formulate government policy and ensure that it is implemented.

Borrowing from economic jargon, the presidency of a country is a hub and everything else becomes a spoke, and this includes the party headquarters.

Be that as it may, a laissez -faire approach is not irreconcilable with party militancy on the part of Pohamba.

After all, he is number two at party level.

Accordingly, there is the distinct possibility of a Pohamba Presidency having a ménage a deux or a trois at party level given the presence of many senior party leaders who are not in government, but who could interact with a Pohamba executive outside the Nujoma galaxy, in this case the Party Politburo or Central Committee.

This would not necessarily constrain the Pohamba executive because the point deserving elaboration here is the fact that the Party and the government are distinct entities, with roadmaps which are both different and complementary.

The credo of a ruling party is to assist government in the elaboration of government action.

It is a platform for thinking, building ideas and debates without taboos.

Therefore, a Pohamba Presidency could play the role of government cohesion and brokering.

He would have to be a consensus builder.

The second approach of this letter is that of societal reflection.

It is not wrong to argue that over the past 15 years our politics were rooted to certain extent in the discourse of the glorious history of liberation politics, heroic labels and nostalgia.

Executive thinking and elite formation was largely based on an exile doctrine anchored around the elephants who attended the congresses of Tanga and Napundwe.

A priori, there is nothing wrong with nostalgia, rewarding loyalty and the celebration of a glorious past or even the use of imagery and symbols in the consolidation of power.

Even in the process of doing so, the key ministries and difficult assignments must be occupied by those with political stature and (or) accompanying technical competence.

The frontier which separates ability, merit and popularity ought not to be mysterious, but real.

Thus, it should be borne in mind that a country is not a museum; it is not a souvenir which becomes a victim of its own immobility.

Nonetheless, the heritage of the Nujoma government is positive and we could not negate these noteworthy successes.

With regard to democracy and liberty, there are zones of progress and the institutions destined to protect and guarantee these have been developed.

Grosso modo, the three Nujoma governments fared well in terms of the articulation of the various aspects of political inputs such as popular activity, pluralist interests groups, media attention, parties, elections and formal legislation.

Yet, the theory of the ubermensch being fallacious, the challenges facing this developmental state will remain enormous long after President Nujoma has passed in history.

Without reserve, a Pohamba's Presidency ought to take a transactional leadership style to the affairs of the state.

It is where we find the second movement.

This would demand a more hands- on style of leadership, the adoption of a positive role in relation to policy making and government management.

The government must communicate, it must listen; it must be in constant reflection as Pierre Mendes France would tell us.

Alas, Pohamba's Presidency is expected to do more with regard to the substantive outputs of democratic legitimacy such as welfare, security and identity.

As difficult as they are, these are, after all, the primary concerns of the Namibian people.

It needs emphasis that the raison d'etre of any government is human security (absence of hunger, crime, conflict etc.).

After 15 years, the executive as the source of political leadership ought to seek the actualisation of these outputs of democratic governance.

Thus, there is inherent danger in the political discourse anchored on continuity, for it could create an overemphasized sense of success and contentment.

It could also hamper initiative in the form of necessary reforms with regard to these outputs.

Normally, the survival and stability of a state is threatened by a government's inaction in providing human security and responding decisively to social problems.

Unfortunately, we have noted that the bourgeois revolution of the disenfranchised has been selective and did not take place as anticipated after independence.

As a consequence, the pre-independence obsession with equality in terms of opportunity, knowledge and power has not been too pervasive.

On the contrary, there is unanimity that the three governments have succeeded in redressing the wrongs of colonialism through two broad discernible tendencies.

First, internal deracialization through the policy of national reconciliation, affirmative action, and recently the black economic empowerment debate.

Our investment in social capital under the three successive Swapo governments has been underwritten in such logic.

Secondly, through anti-imperialism externally, as evinced in presidential and ministerial foreign policy statements.

In that instance, continuity is a logical framework.

Undeniably, there has been an evolution in the reduction of inequalities between white and black.

We have focussed sharply on healing relations with the white community and creating a black bureaucratic bourgeoisie in government and a black atavistic business bourgeoisie in the private sector.

At times, the lines between the two are blurred.

Still, we have forgotten at a practical level, relations amongst blacks en masse.

Government has been able to dismantle the physical boundaries of the Bantustans, through the extension of civil liberties and by unifying ethnically designed public management structures.

Yet, certain elements of society at large did not move along with that wave.

Mahmood Mamdani argues that "detribalization could be the starting point in the reorganisation of the bifurcated power created by colonial occupation."

The extent to which our society has gone in detribalizing intellectually, and consequently its relations, remains wobbly.

Sadly, we can note that trust and solidarity have taken on ethnic dimensions.

Our society risks the belief that public office should serve, first our villages and our tribes.

As such, the ingredients which drive the sociology of a state become absent.

In doing so, the danger also exist that we might accentuate Africa's post-colonial particularity where politicians seek public office to serve ethnic constituencies.

In fact, political parties have emerged, whose mantra is to serve ethnic their constituencies.

It should be stressed ad nauseam that the fragmentation of the state could be inevitable in the absence of us de-emphasizing at large, ethnicity and specifically tribalism.

The role of the Pohamba executive becomes primordial in this process, for ethnicity is inconsistent with national consciousness and the formation of a national identity.

In conclusion, Pohamba's Presidency, ought to be driven and motivated by pragmatic approaches to these problems.

State collapse is inevitable in the absence of pragmatism and our society could at worse regress to what the English Philosopher Ernst Gellner refers to as 'a wasteland of non-achievement.' The purpose of a Pohamba presidency is not to dream another vision, but to give practical expression to a vision articulated by the three Nujoma governments.

In short, irrespective of its definition, it should not pour cold water on the enthusiasm of the masses.

* Alfredo Tjiurimo Hengari holds a BA (Politics and Sociology) from Unam and an MA in International Relations from the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. He is currently preparing for doctoral studies at the University of Paris-Sorbonne.