The transport parastatal bought 17 red Chinese-made locomotives for around N$200 million recently in addition to the four blue ones bought earlier on.The Government-backed loan of around N$200 million (Yuan 250 million) came from the Export/Import Bank of China.

Media reports said the locomotives had become a headache for the parastatal, mainly due to "chronic mechanical problems" resulting in huge financial losses for the company.

Haimbili said they were busy upgrading five locomotives in South Africa and expect them to be back in the country by September.

The 17 red locomotives were all operational, he said.

He said TransNamib was negotiating with the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida) to help upgrade 10 passenger carriages.

Only the four blue locomotives were grounded and were being repaired in South Africa, he said.

However, Haimbili said they had a Chinese delegation in the country to help TransNamib modify the grounded blue trains.

He said TransNamib would continue doing business with China because it was one of the emerging train manufacturers in the world.

Haimbili confirmed that the Omugulugwombashe train to the North had a gearbox breakdown and was in for repairs.

It would be in action by December, he said.

The Namibia Transport and Allied Workers' Union (Natau) earlier complained that the Chinese locomotives had been "dumped on" the workers without training.

Also the maintenance manuals were in Chinese or broken English, the union said.

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