Former coalition caucus chairperson at the City of Windhoek Josef Kauandenge says the opposition parties in the council need to come up with a new strategy, as the current approach has failed.
Sadly, he said, personal ambitions, lack of leadership skills and exaggerated egos have taken over and the “poor Windhoek residents” are suffering, while politicians continue to try and outsmart one another.
“We have, as a collective, failed miserably to govern the City of Windhoek. Our self-inflated egos, our selfishness and our self-righteous attitudes have cost us an opportunity to lead and to lead with wisdom and empathy for our people,” Kauandenge said.
Kauandenge, who was the chairperson of the coalition between the Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), Affirmative Repositioning (AR), National Unity Democratic Organisation (NUDO) and Independent Patriots for Change (IPC), said his party has tried to intervene behind the scenes to solve what he described as a mess with fellow councillors in the coalition to reason and have clarity of purpose of why they are in a coalition.
“It is sad for opposition politics in this country that we have been given a perfect opportunity to lead the capital city to show cause why Namibians must trust us collectively as opposition parties to lead better than Swapo – and that by so doing, Namibians will remember our leadership and vote for a grant coalition of opposition parties to govern this country come 2024,” he said.
“We collectively, as opposition parties, have failed our city and we should be ashamed,” he added.
For years, Swapo has ruled Windhoek with an absolute majority; however, following the 2020 local and regional elections, opposition parties won 10 out of the 15 seats on the capital’s municipal council.
IPC has four seats, AR movement two, LPM two, PDM and NUDO one.