In 1884
Namibia became a German Colony and with the arrival of the
settlers, their transport was mainly horses and camels. A large
number of horses were imported from Europe, mostly warmblood
breeds. Soon the Government realized that these horses were not
breed to survive in the harsh desert environment.
In 1908 Mr
Gustav Voigts approached the German Government to import Arab
horses. Mr Voigts imported the first pure-bred Arab stallion in
1908. HAD-BAN was the horses name and he came from the Babolna
stud in Hungary. Then in 1910 Mr Otto Voigts imported a
pure-bred Arab stallion O’BAYAN and four mares from the Graf
Munster-linz stud. Ancestors of the Arab horses had a huge
impact on the horse population in Namibia at that stage.
The Arabian
horse is a specialized desert breed and a close descendant of
the primitive stock of Arabia. It is a sad fact, however, that
all this pure-bred Arab breeding blood was entirely lost as no
offspring was registered.
The first
pure-bred Arabs bred in Namibia and registered in South Africa
were;
1) INZAM
SAKLABILAH, born 10/04/1961, bred by CJL & F J Uils of the
Nabilah Stud at Omitara.
2) AHBOT
QUANTAL, born 05/08/1963 bred by JJ Botha of Gobabis.
3) AHBOTH
GRUNEZ, born 01/12/1965, also bred by Mr Botha.
In the
past, all Namibian stud breeders used to be members of the South
African Stud Book and Livestock Improvement Association. With
Namibia’s independence in 1990, the then South African Livestock
Improvement Act was amended to make provisions for the
establishment of autonomous breeder’s societies in Namibia.
On the 1st
of October 1994, the Vice-Chairperson Mrs Gisela Uijs, chaired
the inauguration meeting of the Namibian Breeders Association “Telersvereniging”.
There on the Showgrounds, with only a handful of breeders and
but a few pure-bred Arab horses in Namibia, the Arab horse
breeders started to organize themselves. Mrs Helga Aschenborn,
breeder of excellent Asil Arab horses in SA and mother of Mrs
Gisela Uijs, who was also the driving force behind the
organization, was elected to lifelong Honory-President of the
Namibia Breeders Association.
Our
Namibian Association grew immensely and the founding of a
Namibian Association of Namibia was started in October 2000 and
the following committee members were elected; President – Wikus
Esterhuizen, Vice-President – Jan Pienaar, Additional members –
Ernst Vermeulen, Gisela Uijs, Dr Andreas Gaugler, Ronel Delport
and Nita Kotze. The special year meeting on the 23rd
of November 2000, can be considered as the landmark in the
Association’s history, here the affiliation by the “World
Arabian Horse Organization” was finalized, as well as the
approval of the draft constitution of the Arab Horse Association
of Namibia.
Having been
established, the society obtained membership of the Namibia Stud
Breeder’s Association and their own constitution, as approved by
the World Arabian Horse Organization (WAHO) and by the Registrar
of Livestock Improvement in Namibia, all this done in only a few
month’s time. The data of all registered Namibia Arabian horses
and their extended pedigrees were obtained from the various
volumes of South African studbooks and in accordance with WAHO,
Namibia had to publish the first volume of its own studbook.
With the
assistance of Mr Bern von Kunow, Volume 1 of the Studbook saw
the light on the 15th of August 2001, it contained
the information of 432 horses. Since the 15th of
August to date, 1011 horses have been entered in the Namibian
Studbook. As a dynamic Association with a membership of 71
members, there is a bright future awaiting the Namibian Arab
Horses.
