Windhoek
A number of Okahandja residents say they cannot endure another five years of “empty promises and lies” from Okahandja Constituency Councillor Steve Biko Booys, who will be running for his second term during next month’s regional council elections.
A pressure group, consisting of a number of Okahandja residents, held a peaceful demonstration at Okahandja yesterday to hand over a petition to the Swapo Party district office and constituency council office.
“He must either bring changes, like he promised, or go. When he got his first term he promised us development, such as community toilets and more water-points, but this never materialised,” said the group’s spokesperson Sarafina Edward.
Edward also alleged that Booys is never available to attend to the concerns of local residents. “He does not attend to our concerns and he does not even organise community meetings to listen to the concerns of the people. He is never in the office, so it is also very difficult to get hold of him,” she said.
Booys will run against Sophia Basson of DTA and Welfriedt Goaseb, an independent candidate, to retain his post. Goaseb is one of only eight independent candidates taking part in the regional council elections due to take place in one month’s time.
Demonstrations over service delivery and lack of development in Okahandja are nothing new. In February elderly Okahandja residents demonstrated, because the town council cut off their electricity and water over unpaid municipal debts.
In April residents demonstrated to demand that Okahandja Town Council step down, because it has failed to deliver the necessary services. Protesters accused the council of selling land to developers for peanuts and of allocating land to Windhoek residents and Chinese citizens, at the expense of landless Okahandja residents.
When contacted for comment on Monday, Booys said he was unaware of yesterday’s planned demonstration. “I’m currently in Windhoek attending the National Conference on Wealth Redistribution and Poverty Eradication. The march is news to me,” Booys said.
“As you know the conference is aimed at mapping the way forward to fight poverty in the country, Okahandja included. So how do they want to march to my office if I am busy attending to policy issues?”
Edward told New Era that they handed the petition to Booys personally yesterday and he had promised to respond to the group in due course.
When contacted yesterday, Booys declined to comment: “I am driving now, call me later perhaps.”
VOTING IRREGULARITIES
The protesters outlined a number of grievances in their petition. They said “there were a lot of irregularities during the process of nomination and vetting of candidates for local authority and regional council elections in Okahandja district party primaries and our loyalty is totally betrayed”.
“Most people were issued membership cards only to get positions. If verification of membership was conducted throughout the process, how did all these people pass through all the stages from sections and branches up to the so called district conference? Who did the vetting?”
The petitioners further claim that certain “delegates were handpicked from nowhere by Cde Steve Biko Booys in order to advance his own agenda”. They allege that membership cards were issued to known members of opposition parties and that some people had forged the duplicate stamp on party membership cards.
DIVIDE-AND-RULE TACTICS
The protesters allege that despite the fact that he is Constituency Councilor of Okahandja, chairperson of Otjozondjupa Council, acting SWAPO regional mobiliser and acting SWAPO regional coordinator, Booys was never elected to any of the positions. “Neither was there an extraordinary conference to elect leaders to some of these positions. He was simply imposed.”
“It is evident that Cde Steve Biko Booys has violated the constitution, rules and procedures of the SWAPO Party during the whole process.
“He has been running the process just to implement his agenda of bringing non-party members into positions and party structures, based on divide-and-rule tactics. This is a very dangerous agenda… Therefore, urgent intervention at the highest level is seriously needed.
“We want to vote for SWAPO Party, but we are not going to vote for Cllr Steve Biko Booys as a candidate because his tribalistic behaviour has failed to bring development in Okahandja constituency and we are tired of empty promises.”
They further accuse Booys and Governor of Otjozondjupa Otto Ipinge of failing to provide leadership in the region, “saying their questionable friendship is destroying the SWAPO Party in Otjozondjupa Region”.
“They are not leaders. They must go lead goats and donkeys”.