A man named Adolf Hitler has won an election in the southwest African country Namibia, and he’s been kind enough to let everyone know that he has no plans to take over the world.
Adolf Hitler Uunona of Namibia’s South West Africa People’s Organization (SWAPO) party was sworn in as councilor of the Ompundja constituency on Wednesday.
Ompundja is located in Namibia’s northern Oshana Region, and during the country’s election on Nov. 27, Uunona won 1,196 votes over opponent Abner Mumbala of the Independent Patriots for Change party.
Speaking with German newspaper Bild, the 54-year-old Uunona said that his father had picked the unorthodox name for him and was likely unaware of Adolf Hitler’s infamous role in history. Namibia was also a former German colony from 1884 to 1915, meaning that a name like “Adolf” would not be uncommon.
“As a child I saw it as a totally normal name,” Uunona said, in a translation by the BBC. “It wasn’t until I was growing up that I realized this man wanted to subjugate the whole world. I have nothing to do with any of these things.”
Uunona added that his wife simply called him Adolf, and he usually went by Adolf Uunona in public. Unfortunately, Hitler remains his middle name on all official documents, making it too cumbersome to change.
News of Uunona’s victory quickly went international and viral across social media, as the novelty of a man named “Adolf Hitler” taking public office in a year as chaotic as 2020 was simply too bizarre to resist.
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