WINDHOEK – Dean Willemse was born in the Cattle country, Gobabis on November 2, 1964 but relocated to the city of lights, Windhoek, with his parents at the tender age of four.
Like many other young boys his age in the Khomasdal Donkerhoek neigbourhood, Dean started his schooling at the MH Greef Primary School and although he regularly played street football with his buddies – the stocky fullback only started playing competitive football at a much later stage. He was a founder member of the likeable Khomasdal outfit Swansea FC in the Central Namibia Football Association (CNFA) under the stewardship of Namibia’s football guru Bobby Sissing.
This popular league contacted its business under the much-trumpeted slogan “no normal sport in an abnormal society” – very much against the wishes of the local authorities.
The club was the brainchild of disgruntled youngsters who defected from Young Ones FC, as they could not break into the first team.
After featuring for Young Ones’ second strings in several low key unofficial matches in the absence of official league structures – Dean teamed up with his younger brother Johnny, Hendrik Feris, Ski Steenkamp, Willempie Morkel, Deon Brooks and other youngsters in the neigbourhood to establish Swansea FC in 1983, under the mentorship of astute football administ6rator, the hippy-look-alike uncle Bob Sissing.
Swansea became the toast of Khomasdal and envy of every aspiring footballer drawing large crowds to their games on weekends.
Such was the club’s domination in the Khomasdal league that when the league authorities selected a team to represent South West Africa in the South African Federation Soccer League Provincial Tournament in neigbouring South Africa, Swansea supplied the bulk of the touring entourage. The Namibian team competed fiercely in places such as Beaufort West, De Aar, East London, Durban, Johannesburg, Bloemfontein and Matroosfontein. “We had a very competitive squad and always reached the finals or semifinals in most of those competitions,” reveals Dean.
Having established himself as a steady defender in the less competitive Khomasdal league, winning almost anything there was to be won, Dean retreated to his boyhood Young Ones to team up with elder brother Lance under the tutorship of wily mentor Nose Morgenroth. Younger brothers Johnny and Danny also joined the fray at a later stage. After a few cameo roles with the ‘Kings of the Night’ as Young Ones was affectionately known among its ardent supporters, struggling for game time in the star-studded side – Dean developed itchy feet and jumped ship to join forces with Katutura rivals Tigers Football Club.
He managed to nail down a berth in the starting lineup of the Ingweinyama outfit. Dean went onto form a solid defensive partnership alongside Mentos Hipondoka, Tiwi Kaundje and the Umati brothers Grey and Kumi, with slippery forward Foresta Nicodemus and Issy Naruseb leading the attack.
After two and half seasons in the blue and white strip of Tigers, the prodigal son was back at his beloved Young Ones where he was to enjoy more game time this time around.
His defensive quality propelled Young Ones to several triumphs in high profile knockout cup competitions including the coveted Mainstay Cup, JPS Cup, Castle Classic Cup as well as the Black Africa 30th Anniversary Cup, to add to an array of accolades to his stinking rich collection of silverware during a glittering football career.
“At Young Ones, we were like one happy family and on top of that, we had a very good coach in Nose Morgenroth, he was a strict disciplinarian who put lots of emphasis on fitness and hard work while he never compromised on discipline”.
In between, Dean represented the South West Africa (SWA) Defense Force football team at the South African Defense Force games outside Pretoria, in South Africa. The team finished second in its pool games thus qualifying for the semifinals where they narrowly lost 1-0 against the strong Western Province Defense Force side. Other household names in the squad were; Gabriel Freyer, Willem Wermann, Bernard Newman, Mike Peterson, Jose Viljoen, Lucky Richter and Mario Rodriques.
Off the field, Dean touched many hearts when he single-handedly jogged through searing heat – covering 70-kilometers between Windhoek and Okahandja in a bid to solicit funds for the gravely ill young girl Elretha Gentz.
As fate would have it, Dean’s football career was brought to a premature halt when he was posted to Rundu to take over the reigns as Branch Manager for Supreme Furnishers in the far east-northern town from 2002 to 2004.
He accepted a retrenchment package in 2005 and unlike many others who have fallen prey to the economic hardships – Dean did not rest on his laurels and cleverly invested a large portion from his retrenchment package into what would become a flourishing business.
With a little bit of financial assistance from SME, Dean crawled his way into dog eat dog business of motor parts sales where he started out at Cymot. He opened his own company going by the name of Madiba Motor Spares at the old Engen Service Station in Khomasdal. The business, which started with three staff members, has since grown into a solid employment supplier currently employing six full time employees. Madiba Motor Spares supplies all kinds of warrantee parts and operates 7-days a week at its premises holed up next to Jarman Funerals in Khomasdal.
Dean regards former Orlando Pirates and Chelsea old-fashion forward Steven Damaseb as the most dangerous striker of his generation and cherishes matches against Chief Santos and Black Africa, which he describes as the most fiercely contested football clashes in his entire football career.