I AM in pain as I write this article on how our government is discriminating against the southern part of this country and also the way it has taken the south backwards after independence. Looking at mineral resources in that part of the country and the condition of physical infrastructure, there is a huge contrast. Southern Namibia geographically starts from the Tropic of Capricorn that links or connects Rehoboth in Namibia and Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, and ends with bordering the Atlantic Ocean at Lüderitz harbour and the Orange river with South Africa, a stone’s throw from South Africa.
In Rehoboth you will find a natural fountain of water on the Tropic of Capricorn, the first settlers at this place, the Ovaherero, named it Otjomeva momutumba before they sold it to the Baster Captain after their arrival from South Africa after the law of anti inter-natives marriage between European settlers and African natives that forced some Europeans to flee South Africa because they were not entitled to some benefits since they conceived offspring with people from other races and these kids must be killed so that they do not represent the European image in the African barbaric people.
I reside more in the north-eastern part of Namibia and have no business interests in the south. However, the Nama community have taken care of my family, of the Vaalgras community, very well since the 19th century even though they deprived them of their heritage, which entails language, culture, tradition and norm.
Today the Vaalgras community call themselves the Herero-Nama speaking community. What a proud people to be associated with after such a long period under the detention of Namas until the likes of Jakob Marenga fought the Nama-German war under the Nama military and not under Samuel Maharero’s army. I completed my high school in Rehoboth at Dr Lemmer High School and as a matter of fact my first son is from a Baster lady and all of us are Namibians.
In the southern part of Namibia we find natural resources or minerals such as diamonds, fish, coal, zinc, Karakul skin, and faming activities especially small livestock such as goats and sheep. Many people working in those mines are not from that area neither are they neighbours of that particular area. I do not want to promote regionalism but I want to make sure the locals or the inhabitants of that area come first in all development activities taking place there. People in the south were psychologically destroyed when a campaign against them stated that Nama people are very weak and cannot work under hard conditions and they like to spend their time in shebeens especially at month-end and don’t return to work until they diminish their salaries.
I regard this as an evil myth and a tactic to destroy the Nama community. No alternative programme was introduced to mentor the Nama people so that they can take charge of their surroundings rather than being regarded as weak and unable to do anything.
Looking at the historical background how Nama people fought the German government with so much bravery as well as with good tactics and charisma, one wonders when the alleged laziness intruded into the brave Nama community. Was it after the independence or are we perhaps forgetting the history or are we trying to distort it? However, all of us took advantage of that and we started to regard ourselves as better than the Namas in everything we do up to their doorsteps.
What a proud tribe that you will hardly see them roaming around the country looking for informal jobs even though we are oppressing them. What a tribe with pride, so much that you will hardly see Nama street kids in multitudes eating from the dustbins or trying to make ends meet from the tourists and any one walking peacefully in Windhoek’s Independence Avenue. We moved into their territory on the pretext of hard labour in mining and take all the resources and develop the northern part up to the Kunene, Kavango and Zambezi rivers at the expense of natives and inhabitants of the south. We have taken enough natural resources from their area and we have forgotten them, even though we cannot recruit them – let’s develop so that they can feel part of this great nation that we call Namibia. The current status quo is telling me that we have introduced a policy that says ‘if you are not working you aren’t going to eat at all,’ or you eat from your sweat.
Did we give any diamond concessions to the Nama people so that they can greatly and proudly associate them with the region they call home? Looking at the recently awarded fishing quotas, how many people from the south have benefited from Lüderitz harbour? All these years after independence we used to hear Suiderlig Secondary School was one of the best secondary schools in Namibia, meaning they were producing the best students for tertiary institutions. But because parents of these bright students were unemployed, they were unable to pay tuition fees for their kids either at the University of Namibia (Unam), Polytechnic or any other tertiary institutions. The government was also unable to give them bursaries, scholarships, neither loans to further their studies because none of the southerners occupy high offices in the Ministry of Education where scholarships are distributed among the best learners, and we have this phobia that they will come take over their region if they are educated thus we have to deprive them the freedom of knowledge.
As a result, today you hardly see a significant Nama man or woman in an executive position either in the public or private sector in Namibia. You will find a fraction in leadership positions starting from the two leading their only two vast regions as political appointees, only one Minister position and a Deputy Minister and a Deputy Prime Minister since independence, one in the office of the Prime Minister as a commissioner, one as a Director of Elections, one in the office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Labour, our statistics man, maybe some in the management of Unam and in the private sector and the rest are just ordinary people below the management structure or maybe these are enough for them?
If you go to Rehoboth, Khomasdal, Narraville and Nossobville you will see for yourself the different art, design of houses or buildings that were constructed by this community that we have replaced with Chinese constructors.
This artistic community was just recently robbed their biological career of building houses in Namibia in the name of Mass Housing. Even if you ask a 10-year-old child playing soccer in the streets of Katutura and you ask which tribe produced the best builder, the answer is Basters. Instead of empowering these people and upgrading their biological skills the government has replaced them with Chinese people and give all construction tenders to the Chinese companies, some owned by the government. If I was in the executive I could have designed a programme aimed to help these people so that the country can produce the best builders or contractors in the world instead of bringing in foreigners on top of your own people.
I would love to see one day a Baster old man pointing to one of the tallest buildings in Namibia and saying I built that tower but that heritage and historical opportunity is gone. We have to import that history from China, what a shame to our own people and our own government that have robbed its own children an opportunity and right to live a better life and trade it to the Chinese in exchange for liberation struggle assistance.
Recently NHE flew over Rehoboth and went to South Africa to find companies that will come and build 3-bedroom houses with our own money not a turnkey project instead but a fully funded government project. I think we could have empowered our own people in the construction industry and construct all houses in Namibia while other Namibians going into joint ventures with them rather than with Chinese or South Africans.
I know readers will think I am promoting tribalism or regionalism, but what I am really doing here is to pull the forgotten Namibians out of the doldrums so that they can also benefit from the natural resources like any other Namibian.
• Vetaruhe Kandorozu is the deputy secretary general of NUDO, and the councillor for Okakarara constituency. He writes in his personal capacity.