Alfredo Tjiurimo Hengari

Alfredo Tjiurimo Hengari (born 8 December 1974 in Windhoek) is a Namibian political scientist and public intellectual.

Hengari spent much of his early years in Windhoek under the apartheid system when Namibia was still administered as a colony of South Africa. As a high school student, he participated actively in the student protests of the 1980s against apartheid. After completing high school at A. Shipena High School in Katutura, he enrolled for B.A in Political Science and Sociology, with minors in History and German at the University of Namibia. After his studies at UNAM, he taught at his former high school for three years. After teaching, he went to South Africa where he completed his M.A degree in International Studies at the University of Stellenbosch. His Masters thesis at Stellenbosch focused on the regional economic partnership agreements between the European Union and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). While at Stellenbosch, he also served as a tutor in the Department of Political Science.

After completion of his M.A, he was asked by the former Prime Minister of Namibia, Hage Geingob to serve as chief of staff in the Office of the Prime minister. Upon the resignation of the Prime Minister, he served as coordinator for the Civil Service College project for a few months before he left for France in March 2003. After following intensive French language courses at the Université de Franche-Comté, he first completed a diploma in French history and civilisation at the Université Paris-Sorbonne IV, before he proceeded to do an M-Phil in International Relations at the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne.

He is currently completing his Ph.D in Political Science (specializing in International Relations) at the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. His Ph.D is focussing on the transformation of French and British strategies in conflict management in Sub-saharan Africa. As part of his Ph.D research, he was a research intern in 2007 at the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at the United Nations in New York.

Hengari is also weekly political columnist for Namibia's largest independent English daily, The Namibian. He provides regular commentary for other newspapers in Namibia such New Era on political events and developments.