By Mbatjiua Ngavirue WINDHOEK Thousands of landless Namibians around the country are eager to benefit from the Government’s Land Resettlement Programme, but at least one beneficiary has not even started farming five years after being resettled. The Government allocated Emilia Amwaalwa Unit A of the farm Schonborn, measuring 1,388 hectares in March 2002. Immediately after receiving the land, Amwaalwa built a corrugated zinc house for herself but then left and has hardly ever returned since. Her neighbours believe Amwaalwa is a government employee somewhere in the Tsumeb area, maybe 600 to 700 km away from her resettlement farm. Before she left, she padlocked every entry gate to her unit including the kraals she was supposed to share with a neighbour. The sum total of her farming activities over the five years consists of two chickens, which have failed to multiply. She gave the duty of feeding the chickens to a worker employed by a neighbouring resettled farmer. Possibly alarmed by an article in New Era on March 9 dealing with irregularities in the resettlement programme, Amwaalwa hurriedly sent a farm worker and nine goats to her farming unit on March 17. Predators have since killed two of the goats, reducing the total to seven goats. It is only by the grace of God that the Amwaalwa’s employee, Frederick Mukuve, is still alive. Frederick suffers from epilepsy and one day suffered an acute attack while crossing a dry riverbed. He lay unconscious in the riverbed from 18h00 until 02h00 the next morning on a farm infested with large deadly snakes. He finally woke up dazed, confused and disorientated but does not know how he found his way back home in the middle of the night. Being good Samaritans the owner of the neighbouring farming unit, Anna Katamelo and her husband, Frans, took Mukuve to a doctor in Gobabis. Ironically, they were reprimanded by the doctor for neglecting Mukuve – who had not taken his medication for 20 days – even though he is not their employee. The Katamelo’s have taken on the responsibility of feeding Mukuve, while he waits for Amwaalwa to arrive with his rations. He spends most of his time with them, because staying alone at an isolated post surrounded by thick, tall grass crawling with snakes sometimes becomes intolerable. The lease agreements signed by all farmers resettled by the Government have certain conditions attached to them. These include that beneficiaries must occupy their units within three months, they must not sub-let their farming units and they must have shown a capacity to farm successfully within two years or forfeit their farming unit. It is arguable whether Amwaalwa met the first condition, and whether building a hut and the disappearing can be considered occupancy. There is no evidence she violated the second conditions, but all the evidence suggests she has patently failed to meet the third condition. Keeping two chickens over a five-year period hardly qualifies as showing a capacity to farm successfully, and even hastily placing nine goats on the farm is not going to disguise that. The Katamelo’s have no personal issue with Emilia Amwaalwa – whom they hardly even know. There was some unhappiness from Amwaalwa’s other neighbour, Judith Boane, when Amwaalwa also padlocked her section of the kraals and the borehole they are supposed to share. This problem was however subsequently resolved, when after many requests Amwaalwa came to remove the locks. The neighbours only question why the local office of the Ministry of Lands does not apply rules equally to all resettled farmers. They say the Development Planner responsible for the Resettlement Programme in Omaheke, Erastus Nghishoono, was perfectly aware of Amwaalwa’s failure to comply with the conditions of her lease agreement throughout the five years. “Nghishoono knew all along about Amwaalwa not occupying her farming unit. We spoke to him about it several times. We even requested him to ask Amwaalwa if we could not use some of her camps in the meantime,” they said. Amwaalwa’s camps, where no livestock have grazed for five years, are rich in grazing while the Katamelo’s have very little grazing.