This article examines how Namibians recalled colonisation by Germany (1884–1915) under subsequent South African colonial rule (1915–90). Focusing on Herero communities and political leaders between 1915 and the beginning of an armed struggle in 1966, it argues that invoking the first colonial occupation became an idiom that allowed the Herero to challenge the continued depredations of settler colonialism, negotiate the colonial encounter, and advance particularistic interests. Drawing on hitherto neglected documentary sources and newly collected oral histories, I illustrate how Herero petitioners to the United Nations intertwined memories of the genocide of the Herero and Nama (1904–08) with those of what came to be understood as the Holocaust during the 1960s to criticise South Africa’s imposition of apartheid in Namibia. In this way, I demonstrate the ways in which remembering the first colonial occupation shaped the emergence of modern Namibian political discourse as well as post-colonial restorative justice campaigns. The article thereby underlines the importance of memory making in the decolonisation of Namibia and contributes to a long history of the end of empire and restorative justice in Africa that reaches back to the First World War.

本文考察了纳米比亚人如何回忆德国（1884-1915）在随后的南非殖民统治（1915-90）下的殖民统治。着眼于 1915 年至 1966 年武装斗争开始期间的赫雷罗社区和政治领导人，它认为，援引第一次殖民占领成为一种习语，使赫雷罗人能够挑战定居者殖民主义的持续掠夺，谈判殖民遭遇，并推进特殊利益。借助迄今为止被忽视的文献资料和新收集的口述历史，我说明了联合国的赫雷罗请愿者如何将赫雷罗和纳马 (1904-08) 的种族灭绝记忆与 1960 年代被理解为大屠杀的记忆交织在一起批评南非在纳米比亚实行种族隔离。通过这种方式，我展示了记住第一次殖民占领如何塑造了现代纳米比亚政治话语以及后殖民恢复性司法运动的出现。因此，这篇文章强调了记忆制作在纳米比亚非殖民化进程中的重要性，并为可追溯到第一次世界大战的非洲帝国终结和恢复性司法的悠久历史做出了贡献。