A municipality is a local form of government whose members are elected and appointed to serve and manage the needs of a community or region, advancing development and stability. 

A municipality can be autonomous or semi-autonomous, depending on the provisions of the State constitution. 

A municipality must structure and manage its administrative, budgeting, and planning processes to prioritise the community’s basic needs and promote social and economic development, in addition to regional and national initiatives.

While municipalities have the mandate to self-govern on their own initiative, the affairs of the communities fall under their jurisdiction. 

It does not mean they have to exceed the acceptable limits prescribed in the state or provincial legislature. According to their structure, they fall under the local government, specifically the ministry. 

This makes it mandatory for the line minister and his executive director to closely monitor the management structure of the municipality and how it is applied. 

Several municipalities within major African cities lack knowledge of the financial capacity of residents in their communities. 

They simply impose exorbitant rates, beyond the reach of an ordinary citizen. Windhoek municipality is one such entity. The city’s rates are so high that they keep several residents, especially the elderly and unemployed, in perpetual debt.

On another note, when a State undergoes economic struggle, things like business, employment, and economic growth dwindle as the currency weakens, giving rise to the closure of businesses, an increase in unemployment, and general poverty. 

The big question is, did the Windhoek municipality take note of this, especially what transpired in the past six to seven years? 

The Covid-19 pandemic caused industrial and economic decline across the nation, plunging several communities into poverty. Did the municipality conduct a survey to gauge the state and financial capacity of the residential base?

If they did, they conducted it without efficiency and dedication. The council is simply a group of people who copy and paste management models of other municipalities in other countries. It must always be known that each nation operates within political, economic, and social conditions peculiar to its circumstances. 

In some States, formal employment figures are above 90%, in others, they are very low. Despite this, it is necessary to consider the wage index within both formal and informal sectors of the industry, as well as the trends that influence changes in growth, stagnation, or decline. 

Upon such analysis of these parameters, the City can structure its rates accordingly. 

This means that rates and/or taxes must be adjusted every financial year according to the cost of living indices. 

If the cost of living goes up, rates and taxes must be (decreased) adjusted accordingly, or they must be kept constant. 

Rates must not just be hiked based on the mere unfolding of years, but based on analysis of economic, social, and industrial dynamics in the country at that particular time. One wonders whether the CoW has a structure for use to hike and adjust rates, and whether that structure is designed to analyse the state of the economy and residential financial capabilities. 

If the line ministry officials are not taking heed of the CoW annual rate structures and advice, or giving their input, then somewhere, somehow, something is not right with the minister and his officials.

Why should a local authority council, a governance body duly elected by the people, hire a private entity such as RedForce to conduct debt collection services on their behalf? Does this mean the CoW does not have enough workforce to do such work? Did they inform all stakeholders (the line ministry, the private and public sector, the residents) that they are going to make such a move to retrieve monies owed to them by several customers? 

Did the stakeholder representatives agree to this, especially the methods to be used and the penalties or fines imposed? This makes one wonder whether the council authorities are not privately linked to RedForce and that they might be benefiting secretly.

It is so clear that several municipal clients are heavily fined, or their services are terminated, when they fail to comply with the rules of payment. Several clients fail to pay due to genuine reasons. Some have lost their jobs, others have lost their businesses, and some are deceased, leaving no breadwinner. 

Additionally, some are pensioners supporting large families. 

Windhoek residents, especially Katutura and residents of other towns who are equal citizens of this country, are being given restriction orders, cutting off their water and electricity supply as a result of payment default. 

How can this be allowed in a civilized society within an urban setting, in an independent nation? It simply proves that the leadership does not care enough for their people.

RedForce is simply a thorn in the flesh to most residents and other clients. They impose a 10% penalty on every amount that a person owes. 

When a client defaults in paying up rates amounting N$50 000, RedForce charges them an additional N$5 000 fine on top to make it N$55 000. 

If clients are failing to fulfill their payments, why doesn’t the municipality investigate the real cause of the problem before transferring the case to RedForce? 

For some time now, the debt collection office has allowed defaulters to come up and negotiate payment plans with the debt officers, but how will they know the real reasons behind the clients’ failure? 

This alone proves that the municipality seems strong and accommodating, but internally weak and only bent on hiking rates and punishing defaulters without investigating the core reasons behind all the problems.

Municipal clients have a contractual obligation to fulfill their payments within the stipulated timelines. 

However, if clients default mainly due to economic and social reasons beyond their control, what measures has the city council put in place to address this situation? For now, it seems there is none. 

Several elderly clients lost their properties through evictions and no solution has been found to help them out of this situation.

Residents and other clients do not have an agreement with an organization named RedForce or its owners or shareholders; they have an agreement with City of Windhoek. 

So, when the City noticed a trend in which several clients were failing to pay the rates they should have conducted a thorough investigation, summoned all stakeholders, and discussed the way forward. 

This could have solved a lot of problems. Instead, they went on to hike rates and charges exorbitantly every year for the past five years without taking heed of the declining economy. 

This has directly plunged several clients into perpetual debt, which may result in them losing their properties, in a system that seems to have no amicable solutions to such serious challenges.

There is a grave misunderstanding between the citizens and the local authorities, as a private entity is flagrantly abusing the rights of citizens. 

Yet, an active Attorney General department should have stepped in to halt this abuse of power a long time ago. 

It appears that the Attorney General, the people’s lawyer who sits in government, is asleep and the last time he may have possibly been awakened somehow, he completely overlooked the rights of the citizens here and the duty of the State in preventing the abuse of law and the subsequent disadvantage of the citizens. 

In Universal Contract Law, a contract is between two-person entities where an agreement is reached upon. 

The contract in this instance is between municipal councils, town councils, and the owner(s) or occupiers of residential or commercial property for a service provision where there is water, electricity, and other services, where rates and taxes are charged. 

RedForce should have become apparent here when the contractual obligation was entered into between the council and the client, that such debt collector or any other collector/agents were never a party to that contract,. Therefore, such third party at a later stage cannot and should not, in accordance with the doctrine of privity to contract, be allowed to enter the relationship and make frivolous demands. 

Such an agent in a court cannot enforce a contract as there is no written proof between them and the residents/clients. 

To do so would otherwise corrupt the doctrine of privity. Proof of a new contract will be required by the court (in the form of written proof) that they and the owner/occupier(s) have entered into it. 

Here, negotiation proof would have taken place before entering the Court, which would be the first step. The municipality, through hiring the debt collection agency, saw that it was the right move for clients to settle debts, but the agency has no dealings with the owner/occupier (s). 

The reason why RedForce has been illegally charging a 10% surcharge on the debt paid to the council suggests that the council has no concern for the plight of residents and clients.

Is this not a case of corruption on the part of the municipal authorities and the debt-collector? 

This is a problem that society is failing to solve, as most residents are suffering under a system that does not at all cater to their needs. 

It is necessary for constituency councilors, residential representatives, businesspeople, and even legislators to monitor such acts and face the municipalities about it. It is so clear that poor residents are being abused silently and without any help they can get.

Society must be balanced, regardless of social or economic status. People must be free to enjoy their rights as citizens of a functional and considerate city council, not the abuse and oppression through an exorbitant rate structure that seeks to drain their hard-earned income, plunging them into relentless poverty.

* McDavid Meroro is an ardent Pan-Africanist and former leader of the Swapo Party Youth League.