WALVIS BAY – Landless People’s Movement leader Bernardus Swartbooi says Swapo can never be the choice again for Swakopmund, as they had 32 years to develop the town, but failed.
Swartbooi made the remarks on Tuesday in Swakopmund when he announced that local teacher and community activist Elizabeth Smith will be contesting on behalf of LPM in the upcoming by-election.
The by-election is slated for August this year, while parties and independent candidates have until 2 July to nominate and submit their candidates to the Electoral Commission of Namibia.
The position became vacant after Ciske Smith-Howard who served as the Swakopmund constituency councillor was expelled by the Independent Patriots for Change party last month.
According to Swartbooi, LPM is very serious about the by-election hence decided to place a candidate that will oversee the development of the constituency.
“This is a challenging constituency with many needs and huge responsibilities and the political party that will win the election will have to tackle it seriously,” he said.
According to him, Swapo had the chance to make tangible development in Swakopmund but left the town with a huge informal settlement.
“We now have to fix municipal services, upgrade sewage services, housing. Hence Swapo can never be the choice in Swakopmund, there is also no other political party that can match LPM. Only us can work with the private sector and that is evident in the success we achieve within the last two years,” Swartbooi said.
He added their campaign for the by-election will be a consultative one whereby the candidate and the community engage to see what needs to be done in Swakopmund.
Smith also said that she is eager to work with the youth once she is elected into office as the town lacks youth development.
“The youth are very close to my heart and I want to work with them. They are the ones that will one day take over from all of us. That is why we need to have youth-focused programmes and initiatives to groom them as future leaders,” Smith said.