“You are there to provide services to the people
and not to yourselves”
KATIMA MULILO – Regional and Local Government, Housing and Rural Development minister, Retired Major-General Charles Namoloh yesterday berated local authorities in Namibia over poor service delivery during his maiden address to the bi-annual congress of the Association of Local Authorities in Namibia (ALAN) underway in Katima Mulilo.
In a frank and open address delivered at the official opening of the ALAN bi-annual congress Namoloh, who was addressing the association for the first time, said many local authorities lack the dedication to provide services to citizens. He said all too often individuals entrusted with administrative responsibilities in local and regional authority structures engage in self- enrichment schemes and behave arrogantly towards the very people they are supposed to serve.
He also emphasised that the ministry would no longer approve any kind of trip in order to curtail the abuse of subsistence and travel allowances (S&T), and reiterated that from now on travelling would be performance-based.
“Travelling will be performance oriented. If you perform you will even travel 20 times, or even to the moon. If you do not perform, no travelling for you,” Namoloh spelled it out in no uncertain terms. Namoloh, who spent more than two hours lecturing the more than 200 delegates to the congress, said his office is inundated with many grievances from citizens over the failure of local authorities to attend to people’s concerns.
“If you do not solve or listen to people’s problems, they will always run somewhere else. This is happening with many local authorities. My office has so many grievances. You are not attending to people, that is why they are seeking our intervention,” Namoloh said.
According to Namoloh decentralisation would be a farce if those entrusted to run local authorities continue to ignore the needs of residents. “People are complaining about land and houses being taken without their consent. Some people think that getting into local authorities is a means to get rich quicker.
You are there to provide services to the people and not to yourselves. Decentralisation cannot work if we behave like that. You are crying every day to us to decentralise and bring money to you.
For what, so that you can enrich yourselves?” he asked. Namoloh further said the proliferation of informal settlements in towns is as a result of the poor administration of local authorities and that a collective approach was needed to rid local authorities of corrupt practices. “That’s why even shacks are mushrooming.
People pay money and you pocket it for yourselves. Some of you are even abusing travel allowances and when a finance person says no, you suspend them. Every cent should be accounted for. We must understand our responsibilities. Some people cause irreparable damage when in power than when they are not in power,” said Namoloh. The straight shooting minister, who most of the time deviated from his prepared speech to drive his message home, accused administrators of local authorities of lacking leadership qualities and affecting government efforts as a result.
“Sometimes we do not understand what leadership is. Some of us are even lucky to be in the position of leadership when we are not leaders at all. When people complain about the government, it’s because of you and what you do because people see you every day. You are the first contact between government and the people. When you take an oath, you commit yourself to work, don’t let people down.”
He also bemoaned the trend among local authorities to ask for bail-outs from the government when in debt with utility companies. “I have seen some local authorities having a tendency of wanting an audience with the minister when they do not pay Nampower. For me to do what? I am not an accounting officer. Account for your deeds. There’s no money to bail you out, put your house in order. Instead of coming to the office to plan, you come to fight and when the office is dark you start asking [for money]. By the way it’s better to fight in the dark,” Namoloh remarked tongue in cheek.
He further appealed to ALAN to ensure that its members commit themselves to the recently introduced mass housing programme aimed at addressing the housing backlog in the country. “We want you to prove to us that you can succeed. Some of us have not even sat down to plan, even though I already wrote in a letter in July.
The mass housing programme is not something in the air it’s something that is practical. We must dedicate ourselves and leave a legacy,” Namoloh appealed.
By George Sanzila