Adolf Kaure
The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Land Reform (MAFWLR), Inge Zaamwani, said that an audit into the ownership of fishing rights and fishing quotas is being conducted by the Office of the Auditor General.
According to Zaamwani, the recommendations of the audit will be ready next month.
“We have requested the Office of the Auditor General to do an audit into this GERP, and we have told them (the fishermen). This audit will inform us on the way forward. Until the outcome of this audit is out, we are not going to do anything.”
“The results of the audit are expected to be out at the end of December. Until then, please allow us until the end of January to decide (what to do next), based on recommendations from the Office of the Auditor General,” Zaamwani said when she addressed aggrieved fishermen outside the fisheries headquarters last Thursday in Windhoek.
This comes after the Secretary General of the Mining, Metal, Maritime and Construction (MMMC) Workers Union, Joseph Garoëb, called for the audit.
“We want a forensic audit in the ownership of quota holders and right holders in the fishing industry, including all Members of Parliament, politicians, ministry employees and any other government officials,” he said.
Garoëb also said that the Government Employment Redress Programme (GERP) has not been effective.
“The programme was introduced to uplift the conditions of employment, but we have started to see that it has started to downtrend in terms of the conditions of workers.”
“Some workers are being treated as third parties by labour hirers and are paid ‘peanuts’ and work on contracts of ‘no work no pay’ and the working conditions have also deteriorated because third parties are only managing their companies and not workers’ issues,” said Garoëb.
Initially, the union handed over a petition to the ministry of agriculture’s Executive Director, Teofelus Nghitila, on 31 October in Walvis Bay, demanding answers for the GERP after three working days.
However, after not getting a satisfactory response to the petition conditions, close to 100 fishermen flocked outside the fisheries headquarters last week, demanding answers.
There are over 700 members who are affected by the GERP, who are represented by the MMMC union.
United Fishing Enterprise has over 600 people who are waiting to see if their company will get a fishing quota so that they can start working. Merlus Cormorant’s fishermen want to move to another company, which they say pays better salaries.
Union demands answers
With the Auditor General’s audit and recommendation only expected next month, the union approached Parliament demanding that fishermen to be allowed to relocate with immediate effect, to the company of their choice – a company that is willing to meet the union’s demands.
They also demanded that the casual workers who were dismissed by Merlus Cormorant and Omualu Fishing be reinstated and the MAFWLR technical team must be reshuffled.
The union further demanded equal quotas for all companies in the GERP programme. “The season quota of 2025/2026 must be given in full and not in portions as they have indicated,” said Garoëb. The petition, which was forwarded to the Speaker of the National Assembly, Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila, was received on her behalf by Peter Tjiramba at Parliament last week. The National Assembly was given two working days to respond to the demands.
In 2015, thousands of fishermen lost their jobs due to an illegal strike. This led to a Cabinet directive in 2020 for the formulation of the GERP in the fishing industry. Some of the fishermen have been re-employed mainly in the hake and horse mackerel fisheries.
In total, 2483 ex-fishermen have been absorbed through the programme. From these, 550 have been placed in the horse mackerel sub-sector and 1 933 in the hake sub-sector against a tonnage of 18,370 metric tonnes of hake and 16,500 metric tonnes of horse mackerel.