Nicole Asino

The Towards an Inclusive Design of the Renewable Energy Transition (TIDRET) project recently launched an electrification campaign that benefited 32 households in collaboration with ErongoRED. 

The beneficiaries under ErongoRED for the TIDRET rural electrification component are the owners of Shack Dwellers’ Federation of Namibia houses in Swakopmund, Erongo region. 

One such recipient was Iilonna Hoa-Khakis, a single mother who works as a front desk reservations officer at a local hotel in Swakopmund. She moved into her house in December 2022 and has been without electricity since. Managing her day-to-day housing exercises meant that she had to use a gas stove, and a gas geyser for hot water, use solar lights,
and charge devices at her mother’s house. But one of the most challenging encounters was being without a fridge. 

Upon hearing that she was selected as a beneficiary of the TIDRET project, her immediate response was, “Thank God – finally it has happened.” 

She further said “This will change a lot of things for me and my son. He will be able to sit up late and study. We no longer have to chase the daylight or the sun or worry about candle-lit nights.” 

Among other personal struggles, Hoa-Khakis looks forward to being able to cook on a stove. She added that gas tends to damage pots very easily. 

“My son is equally as excited as I am by this new progress, he is happy that the lights are on and that we no longer have to worry about charging (elsewhere) anymore,” she said. 

The areas visited in Swakopmund were 32 Shack Dwellers Federation homes in Olutweni located in the northern part of Swakopmund, which are distributed and built as per municipal town plans and regulations. 

The houses located in Olutweni are brick houses. The owners of these
homes are low-income working individuals and due to circumstances and costly pricing of electrical installations, they can’t afford to purchase supply equipment to connect to the grid. 

As for her message to the stakeholder that made this dream a reality, Hoa-Khakis said: “I just want to say thank you. It may seem small to extend a mere thank you – but thank you, we really do appreciate it – thank you to everyone who was involved”. 

The electrification drive further targeted individual households within the identified communities of which 50% were women-headed households and MSMEs. 

The drive is a partnership between the TIDRET project component serving as project administrator and financier and the respective regional energy distributors (REDs) assuming ultimate project ownership whilst further providing technical expertise. 

The TIDRET project is an initiative led by the Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia (EIF) under the European Union’s Climate Change and Inclusive Use of Natural Resources Project (CCIU-EU) of the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) administered through the GIZ.

* Nicole Asino is the corporate communications officer at the Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia