Unrepentant U-Turns
GOVERNMENT leaders publicly commit serious mistakes and blunders out of political ignorance and arrogance.
After reversing their own mistakes, they expect to be praised and thanked by the people of Namibia. Apparently, we must give credit where it is due to them. Do we owe them any?
These Government leaders must be told that they are not living in a jungle. They are living in a democratic state where all power vests in the people of Namibia and the Constitution is the supreme law of the state. It is the people who vote them into power. It is the people who pay tax. It should be the people who have to influence the decisions, policies and laws made by them whether in Executive (Cabinet) and legislative (Parliament) branches of Government.
The Government’s blunders are, among others, the call for the Grade 10 dropouts to return to school by then Education Minister, Nangolo Mbumba. The decision was reversed by his own junior officials. No one was taken to task on this one.
There were also talks that Kindergartens will be formalised after the very Government abandoned them into the hands of the parents. We saw the same Education Ministry holding a National Conference and only to be publicly contradicted by the Prime Minster Nahas Angula that the recommendations that needed implementations have been contained and shelved in the Presidential Commission of Inquiry on Education some years ago.
This shows how some Cabinet members just wake up with a dream and go to implement it the next day without consulting, not only the fellow Cabinet members.
The Namibian newspaper was banned 10 years ago. The ban was lifted in August 2011. Can a detailed explanation be given as to why the ban was slapped on the newspaper? An investigation must be done to determine whether there was lawful intent or abuse of power.
Now, the nation is told that the NBC-Radio talk shows, Open Line, Chat Show, ‘Silozi’ and ‘Ewi lya Manguluka’, will be re-instated in September 2011. Can the nation be told why the alluded to ‘introduction of a delay device’ was not possible before the ban then? Have the producers and presenters been re-trained?
Many blunders continue to be committed but no tangible actions are taken against the perpetrators. There was a denial by some Cabinet ministers that unemployment is over 50 per cent and poverty has affected over 91 per cent, of which 400 000 Namibians are starving. Currently, as people continue to be exposed by the media, the Government reacted by availing food parcels as a solution to an old problem of people scavenging rotten food in dumpsites. This is the very Government which rejected the Basic Income Grant (BIG).
Minister of Finance, Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila introduced a new tax regime targeting the mining industry only to be reversed by the Cabinet. The Minister of Health, Richard Kamwi, ordered [dubious] medicines from Cuba and only to send them back as a ‘donation’. He reasoned that the N$18 million spent is ‘nothing’. Can he be ordered to pay it from his own pocket?
There were also bills from Swapo Party being or to be paid by the State. The Prime Minister, Nahas Angula, did not feel a thing as he believes the Government is more accountable to Swapo Party than the taxpayers and voters. The sports Ministry has at least protested to finance the Swapo Party Youth League (SPYL)’s sponsored conference called ‘China-Africa Youth Conference’.
Now, it is beyond logic that the Government tainted by its own official blunders and reversed its own uninformed decisions expect to be praised or thanked for that. I reject that! The reason being; if you borrow my bicycle and broke it in the process, do you expect me to give you credit if you fix it? It is high time that the Pohamba administration is held to account for most of its U-Turns made at the expense of the poor and the country without any explanation or apology.
S. Eino
Oshikoto Region