The Worker’s Enemy

SEEING for too long now the poor situation of the Namibian worker and reading about the LIH’s (Labour Investment Holdings) scandals, we are certain that the worker’s enemy is no one other than the ‘worker’ himself.

It is his union’s leadership and the irrational, untenable affiliation to the Swapo party that condemned him to the status of everlasting pariah in this nation. The Namibian worker, both individually and collectively, is the most abused person in this young nation in which abusing people is, again, rather the order of the day.
Contrary to the worker’s situation in other nations where the employer is so often the worker’s only enemy, this is not the case here in Namibia. Yes, there are from time to time tensions between the worker and his employer but these tensions are most often due to bad management of these relations by the union-leaders.
Industrial action is seldom necessary; industrial action breaks down instead of building up and should be carefully avoided. However, the unions advise their members to go that dangerous route.
Why is this so? Well, the leaders of the workers see themselves not as workers any longer, they feel elevated above that level and they are also a) unable to see the greater, national economic picture and b) therefore are unable to prove their worth other than to stir up crippling labour unrest, whereby employee and employer usually both lose unnecessarily. This the leaders do to divert the worker’s attention from looking at what is going on behind the closed doors of the union’s leadership, which itself changed into rogue capitalist entrepreneurs using the assets of the workers solely for their own benefit.
Let us pray that our good Lord may have mercy on any selfless leader who is prepared to stand up for his union’s membership against the majority of the corrupt, selfish union-leaders who are solely advancing their own agenda.
When will the Namibian worker wake up? When will he/she see what and who harms him/her?

Alfrieda G Hanse
By e-mail

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