Dr Joseph Diescho’s article published in New Era of October 9, 2015 titled “Kavango: a Time Bomb” has awakened and raised people’s eye brows on the purported underrepresentation of Kavangos in government.
To recap, not too long ago Dr Charles Mubita had written an article in New Era similar to that of Dr Diecho titled “Are Mweti and Mayumbelo not politically correct CEO names?”, but in his case directly flushed out a position in question, the appointment of a CEO for Windhoek where qualified Namibians from the Zambezi Region outperformed many for the job interview but could not be hired.
In contrast, Dr Diescho had generalised his observation without backing his argument because statistical figures alone don’t tell the whole picture. Nobody can tell why people from Kavango East and West are seemingly left out when appointments are done in government, as people might end-up speculating without evidence, which is dangerous – pitying one ethnic group against another.
A claim can only be investigated when there is good evidence to the effect.
Until Dr Diescho can substantiate his claims, no one can do much about it. There had been prominent ministers from Kavango Region – including a deputy prime minister – over the years.
The irony being, in the same vein, Diecho is attacking “disgruntled secessionists” who would want to exploit fellow regional inhabitants for personal gains, so can it be for him. Just like Diecho, do they have a genuine case or are they making up a case for political expediency because they want to be president, minister or advisor – codenamed politics of the belly?
For the renowned academic, by trying to pull the so-called Caprivian secessionist in his argument, he only proved what the old adage says, “when you point one finger at someone, there are three fingers pointing back at you.”
A lesson to be learnt, when Dr Mubita wrote an article on the CEO appointment, he focussed on the issue at hand, but not chasing ghosts stories. In this case, Diescho must try to stay on the message rather than confuse himself with issues he seemingly have no better knowledge of. He doesn’t understand the Caprivi political question to have it mixed with claims of systematic or perceived discrimination against people from the Kavangos for government positions.
Mulife Muchali
Canada