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Monday, May 19, 2008 - Web posted at 9:49:01 GMT RDP says no to 'no-go areas' OSWALD SHIVUTE at ONGWEDIVATHE Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP) will never again allow its supporters to be chased from a public venue where it holds a meeting, the party's acting President, Hidipo Hamutenya, told an RDP rally at Ongwediva on Saturday. |
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He was referring to last weekend's RDP meeting at Okuryangava in Windhoek, which was called off after Swapo members invaded the venue - an open municipal area near a taxi rank. Hamutenya said the Mayor of Ongwediva, Erastus Uutoni, who is also the Swapo co-ordinator in the Oshana Region, had said that the RDP was not welcome to hold a rally at the town. "Here we are in such a big crowd, and we are going to have a meeting here in Ongwediva, because we believe in democracy," Hamutenya said to thunderous applause from a large crowd of supporters. Hamutenya said Swapo was panicking and making many mistakes in the process. "Swapo must know that we will not accept the notion of no-go areas in Namibia, like the time of homelands, [which] we fought against and won. Those who tried or are trying it must know that that is a daydream they are dreaming," Hamutenya said. He said Swapo was now trying to block all truths because it knew it had made a mistake by sitting on development projects that should have been implemented long ago to rescue Namibians from poverty and high food and electricity prices. He said the Swapo Government had lost vision in many departments, food production included. The Green Scheme was planned and huge tracts of land along the Orange, Kavango and Kunene rivers set aside to reform agriculture and produce more food, but six years later nothing had come of it, Hamutenya said. "Just talk, talk, talk … and nothing happens in the Swapo Government because the leaders have lost vision and there is no collective drive, no capacity to implement the good decisions that are in the interests of the people," Hamutenya said. Similarly, in the electricity sector the Swapo Government had been talking about the planned Epupa hydropower plant for 18 years with no tangible result, he said. Hamutenya also accused the Government of failing to establish a good education system in the 18 years since Independence. He said some top Swapo senior leaders were autocrats who did not accept fellow leaders' ideas. "They will press you down until you give up and dance to their tune. See what they have done with Nangolo Mbumba when he said the action taken by Swapo members and supporters at Okuryangava was not good and that they must not repeat it again. They called him in and dealt with him, till he made a sharp U-turn to say RDP was wrong. Nangolo Mbumba will never be a free man in Swapo," Hamutenya said. He also blamed the Swapo Government for allowing the cattle of Oshiwambo-speaking farmers to be chased out of the Kavango Region. He said these cattle and their owners were now struggling in the corridor between Kavango and the former Owambo border without water and grass to eat, but the Swapo Government was doing nothing to help. Hamutenya called upon Namibians to vote for the RDP because it had leaders with vision and the capacity to implement good decisions. |
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