Namibia will hold its Presidential and National Assembly elections closer to the end of the year 2024. The winner of the 2024 presidential election will be sworn into office on 21 March 2025.
The Namibian political parties have lacked any clear-cut ideology that can produce manifestos that will guide their members during electioneering and even when they finally find themselves in office. We have been served with these manifestos before, yet the people remain sidelined and disenfranchised.
We must ensure that we are not fooled. Do not vote based on their false promises, but rather, on the candidates’ and their parties’ track record of helping the people. We must vote for a stable government that ensures economic stability, the rule of law, the independence of the judiciary, and an executive that is accountable through legislative oversight and its functions circumscribed within constitutional dictates. Under a set of legal and moral obligations, it is the responsibility of the government to govern in what they consider to be in the best interests of the country, rather than fulfil the promises and pledges of their party manifestos.
The economy plays an important role in presidential and national assembly elections, as voters often determine their satisfaction with the incumbent administration based on perceptions of how well the economy is doing. The next president must be a dynamic, diversified economy where those who want to work can find a good job. But let us also be a society sufficiently compassionate to help those who cannot help themselves. She or he must revive manufacturing and industrial growth to create jobs as well as produce the goods and services that improve the daily lives of the average person.
Furthermore, the president should focus on the economy. Economic prosperity fuelled by high growth rates should be the primary goal of economic policy. Indeed, it is the lack of prosperous growth that has led to most of our social problems. Without growth, there is little opportunity. And without opportunity, there are severe social problems. Namibia is experiencing slow economic growth and major barriers to public and private sector innovation.
We need smarter policies to take full advantage of the digital economy and strengthen our capacity to build society, generate jobs, and improve long-term economic growth. This focus should be front and centre for policymakers as they wrestle with social and economic challenges.
The next president should take specific steps to promote investment by looking into investment policies, laws, and regulations, and removing clauses that are hampering smooth investments, including unpredictable policies, an unstable tax system and unnecessary bureaucracies. The next president should reform the education system. It is a dream if we expect industrialised Namibia without taking needed measures to improve the education system.
Additionally, the government should focus on land reform and make it part of its agenda. The Namibian constitution has been described as a transformative constitution because it was designed to heal the divisions of the past and establish a society based on democratic values, social justice and fundamental human rights, and to improve the quality of life of all citizens and free the potential of each person. Land reform is a major means of attaining the goals of social justice and economic progress in Namibia. Therefore, addressing the Land Reform matter will not erode property rights, but will instead ensure that the rights of all Namibians, and not just those who currently own land, are strengthened.
Furthermore, good corporate governance is important to investors, and shareholders have rights and expectations under good corporate governance principles and practices. Corruption control is the foremost imperative determinant of economic development and it can impact economic growth. Prioritise transparency in contracting and procurement practices to combat corruption. Contracting processes are one of the greatest sources of corruption. The best ways for curbing corruption in contracting processes are to establish simple and practical rules and procedures, accompanied by impartial and consistent decisions and a means for holding the contracting agency and contractors accountable for their actions. Implementing controls such as requiring dual authorisation of expenditures and audits can help restrict grafting practices.
Namibia should adopt guidelines on how to standardise the establishment of open, transparent, and competitive contracting procedures. At stake are critical resources, necessary services, and the financial credibility of the operation, all of which outweigh the need to be more efficient. Other aspects are to create development more comprehensive and less unequal, racial and sex separation must be killed, promote concentration and obstructions to a section ought to be diminished, and approaches ought to be implemented to guarantee that there’s a more pleasant conveyance of income, resources and openings.
Both the state and market need to function effectively to achieve inclusive growth and become entrenched as a permanent impediment to inclusive growth. Moreover, the President should be committed to energy prosperity. This means that the president should promote a sound energy policy that allows free markets to balance supply and demand, and ensure reliable and competitively priced energy for the future.
Against this background, to realise the true potential of hydrogen locally and to capture the benefits, policy support mechanisms are essential for the penetration of green hydrogen into multiple sectors and encourage sector coupling. I view green hydrogen as the path forward to full decarburisation in a way that is reliable. It is important to note that green hydrogen can create more space for renewables by driving electrolysis with energy that would otherwise be curtailed. I believe that a green economy can only be achieved through the commitment and actions of multiple sectors and stakeholders in society. With public debt levels above, 60% of GDP and in the face of many macroeconomic shocks such as the pandemic, the Ukraine conflict, in a no-reform scenario, is simply too large not to merit urgent and substantial action. Therefore, the next president needs to eliminate outdated and excessive capacity and dispose of inefficient assets amongst SOEs. The current wave of the SOE’s reform has, however, focused on the state’s push for consolidation through mergers and acquisitions, rather than the pursuit of improving corporate governance. Furthermore, it is vitally important that the 4th Industrial Revolution should be aligned to NDPs to enhance knowledge and address the gaps of inequality. In more ways than one, the 4IR is a solution and tool to be harnessed, so that the future of work is inclusive and beneficial for all.
Additionally, at the macroeconomic level, the next president and the corporate sector need to make adjustments to help the country meet the economic challenges of the next phase of Namibia’s development. The policies and regulations may need to be reformed at the state level to better the individual level, such as allowing them to make withdrawal from their pensions to help cope with the high cost of living. It is practical, as Zambia is planning to ease the financial burdens. The president needs to understand that the money shall circulate. We are minded that too much money portends high inflation. The next president should cut taxes, subsidise fuel, cut cabinets and scrap deputy ministers.
As Kevin Buckland writes in Roar “If we fail to offer scalable discursive, tactical and structural alternatives to the extractivist logic that has created the climate crisis, capitalism may itself transform the coming wave of disruptions into its benefit, exacerbating existent inequalities for every social and ecological ‘issue’ as it strengthens its stranglehold of the future on a rapidly destabilising battleground.
While transitions are inevitable, it is not inevitable they will be made based on economic, racial and environmental justice and peace. It is our responsibility to educate ourselves and each other so people understand the root causes of the crises we face, build popular power and create alternative systems that have desirable results. This is not the time for reform or the belief that we just need to elect the right person”.
As an independent economic and business researcher, I conclude by recommending that the next president establish a framework to enhance connectivity and visibility of innovation, including entrepreneurs, research institutions, business support entities and investors to nurture and cultivate a vibrant entrepreneurial network.
Therefore, the development of a knowledge and innovation ecosystem is the key for Namibia to overcome the many development challenges. The next president, cabinets and key stakeholders have to commit by working in synergy to shape and continue to improve this ecosystem.