Swapo Women’s Congress: Paving The Way For ‘A Neutral’?

THE outcome of last weekend’s Swapo Party Women’s Council congress has given many following the 2012 Swapo succession debate much food for thought.

While, for instance, there were attempts by both camps of the two main candidates for the vice presidency race in Swapo to block the incumbent women’s league secretary Petrina Haingura from re-election or even standing, she thrashed her opponent and came out tops with a huge majority.
Her victory was not entirely surprising but the huge number of votes gave an indication that there is a third group – the silent majority – who prefer neither Hage Geingob nor Pendukeni Iivula-Ithana as the party’s candidate for the 2014 national presidential election.
That group could be key in next year’s congress of the party and President Hifikepunye Pohamba’s recent outburst against the two candidates indicates that he was driving home a message that Geingob and Ithana should remember that other possibilities do exist.
I can safely mention the likes of Deputy Prime Minister Marco Hausiku and Speaker of the National Assembly Theo-Ben Gurirab as two of the possibles.
Both are in the mould of Pohamba and having either of them will mean that the “ship will remain as steady as Pohamba kept it”. That’s continuity in Pohamba’s eyes and mind.
He likes to play it safe and under Hausiku or Gurirab, we will neither make a big leap forward nor deteriorate significantly.
A ‘neutral’ like those two would also be a surprise to all those who have so far invested in one way or another in the underground campaigns of Geingob and Ithana.
So when we see attempts fail, like the one to remove Haingura by lobbying Pohamba, it gives us an indication that the President has made room for an outsider in the race, in the event the two key candidates do not toe the line as he requested.
Of course we know that Haingura had to be wheelbarrowed in by former President Sam Nujoma (as one of his 10 choices for the National Assembly). Therefore, the former nurse from Rundu was seen as one of Nujoma’s favourites and it was not a surprise that Pohamba gave her a deputy minister position when he took over in 2005.
It is worth pointing out that although Ithana supported Haingura to become the SPWC secretary during the Rundu congress election five years ago, much has changed since then.
For instance, Ithana’s camp included those who blamed Haingura for failing to push the party top structures for a 50/50 representation which would have ensured that more women were elected to Parliament. Geingob’s people also supported the push which failed to materialise.
But Haingura managed to shrug off both sides, thanks to support from the neutrals.
Many would then ask how it was that Ithana topped the list but was not able to convince the congress to elect her candidate of choice.
Swapo’s voters, especially at congress, have a voting pattern that perplexes me continually.
When they target one person, they seem to forget another opponent.
In simple terms, the women were out to stop Karin Nghishidimbwa from becoming secretary of the SPWC and that is where their energy was concentrated. In the process they ‘just ticked’ the name of Ithana without realising that they were voting for her!
It has happened in the past.
When they targeted Ithana because she was a supporter of Geingob at an earlier congress, she was not even able to make it to the top 15 of the SPWC.
So Ithana being number one on the list could also only last until the next chance they get to vote. I think she knows this very well!

Should We Continue To Call Them Honourables?

A STUDENT was recently expelled from a youth skills centre for asking whether councillors should indeed be called “Honourable”.

I was surprised that no student movement or political organisation came to his defence.
Could I take it that their silence is confirmation that they agree with what has happened to Matuundju Kavaka? And what has happened to freedom of thought or expression?
Kavaka, a young man from Omaheke Region, was a student at the Kai //ganaxab youth skills centre outside Mariental and was doing his internship at the Hardap Regional Council.
Whilst working in the corridors one day, he passed a regional councillor. Kavaka did not notice the councillor and thus did not greet him – something which did not go down well with the politician, who felt the young man was being disrespectful.
According to Kavaka he was later called in by the councillor and told that he should “bow down” to him when greeting and also address him as “Honourable”.
The event ignited something in Kavaka, who put his thoughts in a letter that he submitted to newspapers for publishing, but he was subsequently disciplined by the youth centre.
As a youth who aspires to become a leader, Kavaka was right in asking why politicians should be called “Honourable”.
I agree with his assertion that when politicians need people’s votes they pretend to be humble servants. When you go to their rallies, some would even stand up to give you a chair to sit on or carry water to you. In some cases they’ve been known to bow down in front of the electorate.
But that changes as soon as the results are announced and they are proclaimed victors.
They become pompous (or was it there all the time, just hidden until the votes are in?) and are not prepared to listen to an ordinary member of society.
Some even deny the people the rights which they have sworn to defend, such as in Kavaka’s case where freedom of thought and expression was taken away from him by someone who has yet to deliver tangible results for the voters in the constituency.
Such elected leaders forget that they are people just like anyone else. They should insist that there is no need for them to be called “Honourable”. The title alone will not engender respect from the people. But respect for the people and delivering on promises will!
In Namibia too much time is spent on titles and words such as “Honourable” and “Comrade”. When some Cabinet ministers write letters they refer to themselves as “Honourable Minister”, followed in brackets by “Member of Parliament”.
If we repeat phrases or words such as “Honourable” all the time, and especially when addressing politicians who are known to be useless in society, there is a risk that the words will lose their meaning. We need to break with this verbiage.
Therefore it is sickening to note that a prospective future leader like Kavaka faces the wrath of the authorities when he publicly ponders on the role of leadership in a society.
Instead of removing him from the Hardap Regional Council so that the youth centre that seconded him there will continue to receive favours, the discussion started by the young man should have been encouraged by institutions such as the National Youth Council, Namibia National Students’ Organisation and the youth leagues of various political parties.
The youth centre was wrong to withdraw him to maintain a good working relationship with the Regional Council because the council is an institution that will be there even after the so-called ‘honourables’ are gone.
And the ‘honourables’ should be reminded that they are there to represent people like Kavaka. They are their servants and not their bosses.
We have had enough of ‘honourables’ who are full of themselves and holier than thou but have done little or nothing to keep the promise they made to the people.

Cost Of Talk-Shops Is Huge For The Economy

EVERY day around N$1 million in tax money is spend on Subsistence and Travel (S&T) allowances for Government officials.

It makes one wonder whether we actually get good value out of such massive spending.
Travelling on a Sunday, one often sees a fleet of Government vehicles heading towards Windhoek from especially north of Okahandja. The majority are civil servants on their way to one or other workshop. This sight repeats itself almost on a weekly basis.
Earlier this year, Prime Minister Nahas Angula had to explain to fellow members of the National Assembly why N$388 million had been budgeted for S&T for this financial year and called on public servants to be "very cautious about the pennies that we spend”.
Some civil servants cash in on subsistence and travel allowances by 'creating' trips outside the office by claiming that they are going work but in some instances many don't even attend the workshops half the time they say they do.
I am not against workshops but having talk-shops just to spout hot air is costing the country not only in terms of S&Ts, but also valuable time.
Too much time is spent on workshops and seminars but decisions taken there are hardly ever implemented.
In some instances such workshops are on the insistence of donors or those who indirectly want to benefit from the amounts donated.
As a result, a lot of time and effort is put into organising them but participants, especially those from outside the city, will spend the time to touch base at head offices of ministries, visit relatives, make appointments for annual medical check-ups or go on shopping sprees.
The S&T payments are fixed amounts per day which are determined through the S&T rate policy for different levels of employment as well as different destinations and officials do not account for the actual spending. Neither do they have to submit receipts.
Very few of those who attend will in all earnest seek to come up with workable solutions or contributions during the meetings.
It is lots of hot air and little action.
We must move away from talk-shops (however well intended) and towards real action!
It is unacceptable that we spend over N$1 million a day on S&T alone (this does not include related costs such as accommodation) yet we do not even make time to reflect on what was decided at a certain workshop.
In some instances, people who attend workshops will return from one and head off to another one the next week without even briefing colleagues.
When will the decisions taken in the first one be implemented?
Isn’t it then right to conclude that in most such cases opportunities are simply created to generate S&T?
Worst is the fact that some officials undertake multiple trips for events that do not even fall within their scope and ambit. Many hog trips so that others cannot benefit.
Cases have already been reported where some officials even sleep in Government vehicles in order to avoid using their allowance for accommodation while others share rooms on trips, especially abroad, with the intention of saving foreign currency.
Those who go on trips to supplement their monthly income normally resort to things such as keeping their meals strictly to canned beef (and maybe bread) throughout their trip.
The end result is that a large portion of an S&T allowance is going towards financing own personal costs.
It is important that Government takes tighter rein on trips and that supervisors become more strict.
For this to happen, leaders such as Prime Minister Nahas Angula need to call the shots and ensure abuse is kept to a minimum.
He and others must demand regular reports on S&T expenses and seriously curb the culprits.
Also, Namibians should demand that either President Hifikepunye Pohamba or Angula, as the leaders of Government business, give regular briefings to account as to how we are doing at S&T level.
My call is not merely to cut S&T expenses but to ensure that those who go on trips do so only when it is essential and the trip will contribute towards improved governance. Ultimately, it will be for the benefit of the people we serve.

Workers Must Oust Napwu Leadership

‘NAPWU defies own constitution’, reads the latest headline of a news report on the troubled union for public servants.

There were others like ‘Workers lose confidence in Napwu’ in earlier reports.
Yet, the leaders of the Namibia Public Workers’ Union (Napwu) seem not to realise that they are messing up and that change is needed.
Napwu members need to get rid of people who have long lost the passion to fight for their interests. Many of the leaders only use the offices they occupy as stepping stones to Parliament or other political appointments.
Also, others have demonstrated that their only interest is to ensure that they use the Napwu ticket to make money as directors of organisations, exploit the union to muscle themselves through to higher Swapo structures and use the office telephone to make calls that will line their briefcase companies up for lucrative deals.
Therefore, it is up to the members to now stand up for their rights and demand that the union hold its long-awaited congress to elect new leadership.
Napwu vice president Moses Ikanga was this week quoted as saying that they cannot hold the congress this year due to “logistical difficulties”. But Ikanga knows of other reasons, I am sure.
He is a unionist who has shown he will take no prisoners when it comes to standing up for membership.
That was why he supported a demonstration of workers who demanded action over the Government Institutions’ Pension Fund issue and were shouting “down Nevonga, down” in reference to Napwu general secretary Petrus Nevonga who sits on the GIPF board.
Before the demonstration Ikanga had also held a media briefing where he asked Napwu leadership who they were protecting in the GIPF saga.
Fellow leaders and Napwu employees reportedly did not like that and tried to initiate a disciplinary action against him but Ikanga hit back by stating that the terms of office of those who wanted to discipline him had long expired and therefore he was unfazed by the vote of no confidence in him.
He had also questioned the constitutionality of the regional meeting which was planned to discuss his position and so it all collapsed.
He is not the right person to speak on behalf of the union even though he is the vice president.
I am sure that he is among those who want the congress as in yesterday already because of differences he has with some of them.
What his case showed was the lack of respect which some of the Napwu leaders have for their constitution.
Those who deliberately delay the Napwu congress until next year fear that holding it at such a crucial moment, when members are not happy about issues such as the GIPF, will cost them their positions.
These same people have protection from seniors in the ruling Swapo Party because they are the ‘right campaigners and voting cattle’ at the party’s elective congresses. Therefore, the seniors will conveniently ignore the workers’ calls for change at Napwu for the time being.
I can thus safely say that the Napwu congress will only take place after the Swapo congress when the work has been done at that meeting.
That will be so unless the workers stand up and demand a congress now as is stipulated in the Napwu constitution.
Workers should not condone mediocre service from their elected leaders nor should they allow their employees like the general secretaries to pull them around by their noses.
It is within their right to demand the resignation of those who want to delay the congress. They should stand up and be counted and the time is now.

We Suffer From Terrorism Paranoia

FOR years Namibia's intelligence services were abused for political ends but in 1990 the new political leaders promised that never again would those in power be placed in a position to misuse the state apparatus not only to spy on their political opponents, but also to harass people.

We seem to have reneged on that promise.
Nowadays I get the impression that we have paranoia about terrorism and see a possible suspect behind every other bush.
I based my introduction on various recent personal experiences as well as those of friends who keep complaining about how their private calls and short messages from cellphones are intercepted.
And this will probably intensify as we come nearer to next year's Swapo congress. Whenever a Swapo congress comes up, the intelligence machinery goes into top gear with various personnel spying on others for either those in charge of campaigns or for candidates themselves.
Apart from circumscribing freedom of information (which will have an inevitably negative impact on our freedom to communicate), another implication of such behaviour by officials from a certain agency is that it causes fear among people.
Just a few weeks ago there was a big workshop which brought together government officials, academics, practitioners, members of civil society, experts from international organisations and representatives from a number of countries to discuss the practical implementation of the UN global counter-terrorism strategy.
Various papers were presented at the workshop including one on money-laundering.
Despite the paper having being presented at the workshop, The Namibian has struggled for the past few weeks to get a copy of it.
Before being made available to The Namibian, it had to be 'cleared' by the Namibia Central Intelligence Agency and they refused to make it available to the newspaper.
This is the same agency whose operatives keep harassing the media for documents and other information on a continuous basis.
In the meantime, reports this week indicated that a group of Members of Parliament from the committee on defence and security were taken through a session to “sensitise them on security issues”.
Some of them were very impressed with what they were taught.
This is exactly the outcome the spies wanted because they did the training to win them over for when the spies do things in the name of national security.
The decision by intelligence to block the release of a paper which was presented at a public gathering shows the extent of the paranoia we have about terrorism.
Almost every document is seen as confidential and treated as such.
But we should be asking: Is the confidentiality we attach to some of these things absolutely necessary?
Why should we, for instance, deny the existence of a document which is freely accessible in a public office such as a Government ministry.
Such action only justifies the concerns raised by different media houses and media rights campaigners about the lack of access to information in Namibia.
While those who block the media access to information use the lack of such legislation to their advantage, they are the same people who violate laws such as the amended Communications Act which calls on them to get a court order if they want to, for instance, intercept information.
Such things smack of hypocrisy and cannot be left unchallenged.
I know that Namibia was not the first country with a Communications Act which facilitated the interception of information and that those who are for it argue that it has mainly to do with ‘international terrorism’ and cyber crime.
However, we seem to exaggerate our actions against terrorism to the extent that we have now reached levels of paranoia that do not seem warranted right now.

The President Who Can’t Do Anything

I HAVE said it before and I will repeat myself again. President Hifikepunye Pohamba is too soft an individual to effectively fight corruption.

He has repeatedly vowed to fight it tooth and nail but in almost all cases where he should have taken bold steps, he falls short.
This past weekend the President was opening a lodge near Grootfontein and used the platform to complain about how the formerly disadvantaged Namibians sell off fishing and mining rights which they are given in order to economically empower them for the future. He has also spoken out on corruption on many occasions.
We know that Pohamba’s inaugural speech in 2005 was centred on his intention to fight corruption. He had also promised to release reports of various commissions of inquiry established to investigate corruption in different sectors but nothing has come of his pledge.
In my view, the answers to all of Pohamba’s problems are simple. There is no need for him to complain on public fora.
He has appointed ministers to oversee certain functions he cannot take on because he has to delegate some of the enormous work load.
Therefore, he just needs to call them in and demand answers.
If a minister fails to do his or her work, he must give a stern warning and show the door to repeat offenders. It is as simple as that!
But the problem we have is the secrecy with which Pohamba goes about doing things.
For instance, when he appointed ministers for his second term, we were told that all were given a terms of reference (ToR) and that each one was supposed to report on a three-month basis on the progress of their mandate to Pohamba.
It is something I commended him for because I expected ministers to take similar action in the conduct of senior management cadre in Government. If implemented correctly, it should have improved service delivery by Government.
But with the ToR treated as a ‘top secret’ between Pohamba and his fellow Cabinet members, we on the outside can’t hold them accountable.
That is why, for instance, the media can only point out the extravagant travels of ministers while we do not necessarily know how many of those trips are approved by the President and the types of motivation given for them.
The test of leadership is the extent to which those in power bring integrity to our public institutions. And one way of doing that is to be transparent about things such as trips.
But because we are living in a society where cash and materialism is used as a compass for progress, Pohamba now struggles to exert pressure on people he has appointed and surrounds himself with.
The result is what we continue to see. Pohamba using public platforms to ‘cry’ for help when he is the solution to some of the problems.
Had he revealed the ToR of ministers, for example, the electorate would have been empowered to ask questions and help him put pressure on fellow leaders who divert money which could have been used for development projects in thoughtless and self-destructive ways such as uncontrolled travelling and high claims of subsistence and travel (S&T) allowances.
As things are now, not only ministers but others such as those who benefitted from the Black Economic Empowerment schemes will continue to milk the system until it runs dry.
There is hardly any indication that the culture of entitlement which gripped us will loosen its hold in the immediate future.
At least not until people like the President tackle issues head on.

Khorixas Group Must Step Aside

THE Ministry of Regional and Local Government’s decision not to act against those arrested and charged with corruption at Khorixas borders on hypocrisy.

The Government spends millions on infrastructural development in various regions and also assists local authorities with bailouts whenever they are in trouble, yet the Ministry tells us that it does not want to get involved in driving out graft.
I do understand that the case in which the councillors and employees of Khorixas Town Council are involved might be regarded as sub judice and that they are not guilty until proven as such. Yet, it is best that they be removed from their work stations for now in order to ensure a smooth investigation and prevent any interference from their side.
As it is now, the chief executive officer, Nicodemus Gaeseb, corporate affairs and human resources officer Eben Xoagub, housing and property officer Daniel Geiseb, as well as councillors Berlinda Xoagus (who is the wife of the CEO and a former NamPost postmaster) and Elrey Esau, stand accused of concocting a fake tender to help cover a cash shortage at the local post office.
They are charged along with Jeremias Kheimseb, Isaskar Ganeb and Reverend Barry Goamub. Close to N$400 000 is allegedly involved.
As things stand now, all the employees and councillors have access to the Town Council offices.
In fact they report daily for work and continue as if nothing of the sort has happened.
For the Ministry to say that they cannot interfere is outright hypocrisy because Government has intervened in similar instances at other towns and villages.
Mind you, some of those who are suspected in the case have rights to sign Council cheques and thus have access to millions, such as money for capital projects and the build together scheme which runs in Khorixas.
Also, history can prove that lower-ranked employees in the Khorixas Town Council were suspended for things such as petrol theft the minute such acts were discovered.
Ideally, and if those suspected of involvement in the case were serious about the fight against corruption, they would have stood aside when the Anti-Corruption Commission moved in with the investigation.
That is why I am also baffled at the fact that Swapo, for instance, has not suspended their councillors, Xoagus and Esau.
In 2004, when Joel Kaapanda was still the Minister of Regional and Local Government, the Government vowed to weed out corruption in local councils and declared the era of State bailouts for embattled municipalities over.
After each election the Ministry also spends around N$500 000 on a series of induction workshops for new councillors countrywide. Such workshops are aimed at sensitising the new councillors not to fall into the same traps of corruption and mismanagement of Government resources.
Yet, after spending such amounts and when even more goes missing, the Government throws up its arms in impotence.
That is unacceptable.
Similarly political parties should bury their heads in the sand, because when the people rise up, the same politicians blame them for not following procedures.
This in effect leaves the people without the voice or the means to remove the corrupt and keeps the masses in conditions that cement the propensity for failure and poverty.
When towns such as Okahandja and Rehoboth had problems, the Government intervened to the extent that even the CEO and Mayor were removed.
Why can’t the same be applied at Khorixas?
I am saying this because it affects the confidence people have in the leadership and management of the town. And it should not stop at Khorixas!