SWAKOPMUND - Fishing right applicants will have to wait for at least three more months before the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources announce the list of successful candidates.

 Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Bernhard Esau yesterday said the committee appointed to select the successful applicants is hard at work to ensure justice for all the applicants for hake, horse mackerel and other species who are over 5000.

“Five thousand applications are a lot that we have to get through.  The process has to be done thoroughly as we do not want anyone to say that their application was not touched,” he stated.

“The commission wants to be able to make a detailed report at the end so that proper and direct answers can be given if applicants or government make enquiries,” explained the fisheries minister.

According to Esau, the interest to participate in the fishing sector has been overwhelming this time around unlike in the past
“Before I was appointed as the minister, my predecessors had to deal with 300 applications that took them a month to work through.

The first time I called for applications in 2010 1500 people applied and it took us six months to go through the applications,” he said.

 “The commission is having a hefty task to thoroughly fine comb all applications regardless if it’s not fully completed.
We are pushing to complete the task within the next three-months as we really want to do justice to the applications, be accountable and be able to answers any queries with regard to application forms,” he assured.