SMSes for Thursday 30 August 2012
SMS Of The Day *I HAVE been reading the daily lost + found section of your newspaper. This is one of the reasons the Ministry of Home Affairs can’t keep up with the issuing of ID cards. People are so careless with their most important documents! I have had to renew my passport at least three times and I have never had a problem yet!
Food for Thought
*TO all public servants, we read daily that you don’t earn enough to buy houses, don’t drive government cars. What about us working for private companies? We don’t earn enough to buy houses or drive government cars, so stop complaining and live with it.
Bouquets and Brickbats
*GRANDMOTHER burying a child in a backyard in Windhoek while we celebrate Heroes’ Day? Does that not yet crystallise our misplaced priorities? Had we increased pension grants adequately, would this have happened?
*LARGE iron ore discovery in Namibia? Is this true? If yes, why do we have to hear it from the Associated Press first?
Note: The Namibia Press Agency (Nampa) was first with the story, which was picked up by international agencies as is standard practice.
*IS The Namibian really not going to publish a single story about Heroes’ Day? Funny how the editors go on about access to information yet they themselves failed to deliver the goods.
Note: See page 1 on August 28, 2012
– Newsdesk
*I WORK for the Ministry of Gender Equality and Child Welfare and sometimes find that the media are very insensitive in their reporting. I really do not see why a daily newspaper had to depict the baby, Madhi, just because his parents are in a custody battle over him. Just imagine what could happen when this child is big one day! He is innocent and a minor and he needs to be protected. It is enough that we are reading the story, why publish the picture? One day if he googles his name on the internet that story will also pop up! Shame!
*I SEE the good behind the current bad. Marikana and Okahandja signal the end of the liberation movement governments in both countries. Goodbye brothers, you cannot rule us with your police generals!
Running the Show
*LAWMAKERS should look at making 50 the retirement age because our country has a life expectancy of 49 years. And also to give young people the opportunity to get jobs.
City Fathers
*BARS, gambling houses and shebeens are evils in our communities. A once quiet respectable and clean neighbourhood can change into a dirty, noisy and undesirable place. Just open a shebeen and a gambling house. Go and check Tauben Glen.
*CITY of Windhoek, are there no children in Otjomuise? Why are there no playgrounds for children in this area? We pay taxes like any other residents of Windhoek, so treat us the same.
Note: See page 16
– Newsdesk
*I CONCUR with the letter writer who says that all soccer fields are closed. In fact, all open areas in Katutura are closed. Our kids don’t have places to play any more. Soccer is now played in the roads which are for cars. Just because of the greed of the City of Windhoek. No wonder crime is skyrocketing.
*CITY of Windhoek, is it true that the water of Windhoek is contaminated? If so, we want to know how and when, please?
Law and Order
*LAW enforcement authorities, could you please tell us how the numerous so-called traditional doctors/herbalists, or whatever enticing title they use, came to Namibia? I bet if you check their papers, you will find that not only are they using fake names, but their visas will show different reasons for entering Namibia. Is that not supposed to be a crime?
*KARASBURG town council why are you not stopping shebeens operating in town? People are drunk for 24 hours. How many people have been killed at bars? Karasburg is just going down.
Talking Tax
*MINISTRY of Finance, Inland Revenue Oshakati, please pay out the refunds for statements you posted out to taxpayers from April this year. If the taxpayers owed this to the ministry then interest would be added on. Please take action at the Oshakati branch. It is so slow in refunding.
Education
*OSHANA Education Region is so disorganised. They failed to arrange transport for the new markers for pre-training in Oshana.
Health Matters
*HEALTH Professions Council you deal with cases of discipline for the different professionals under your umbrella. I cannot see what you are doing to enforce adherence to the different codes of ethics and oaths for those who were sworn in.
*LET the President’s Commission come to Ongenga clinic. People are going home in the evening although they came early.
*THERE’S no way a clinic can be without running tap water. Otjimuhaka clinic in Kunene Region has been without water for years. We fetch water from the river. A nurse has to do it. What about the risk of crocodiles?
Labour Issues
*PEOPLE at Rössing Uranium are getting suspended for simple mistakes they make. They should tell us if they want to retrench us.
ACC Alert
*MEMBERS of the Namibia Defence Force are being robbed in broad daylight. They are paying for an insurance policy, but once a member retires or resigns, he/she doesn’t get even a single cent. Soldiers part ways each and every month with their N$110, but there is no benefit while he/she is alive. It’s only applicable once they die. The Anti-Corruption Commission must look into this matter to find the beneficiaries of these policies. It’s hurting.
Olufuko
*OLUFUKO is not for children. It used to be done for or with adults. A 15-year-old is a child and can’t get married. Let us follow culture and do it with those over 18. Remember Namibia has ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.
*OLUFUKO festival: A 15-year-old schoolgirl is being prepared to be a woman. Yet our Constitution does not allow a man to sleep with a girl that young. Nobody is against culture and tradition, but does it mean we must now overlook our own law for the sake of cultural and traditional practices?
*Do principals in Omusati Region work under the Ministry of Education or for the Governor ‘s Olufuko festival? Leave the principals alone to do their job in peace and go ahead with your money-making project.
*OLUFUKO! The bare breast is ‘sexually enticing and pornographic’ Wooo! NGOs and others, it is not fair. Look around we have women, not girls, walking naked in the name of fashion and Western dressing! It is good? Moral values. Think before you say bad things about culture!
*AGAINST the background of the uproar following Olufuko we may perhaps ban the Himba traditional dress and march against the reed dances in Swaziland and KwaZulu-Natal.
*I AM trying to understand why the Women’s Solidarity Namibia director is calling the aafuko at Olufuko as ‘sexually enticing and pornographic’ and not doing the same with the Ovahimbas. Can she please explain?
*TO the Women’s Solidarity Namibia group claiming that the Olufuko festival is promoting rape and violence: if you think about it carefully in the olden days there were rarely cases of rape, but if you look at modern society, where women wear clothes and the body is fully covered, there are more cases of rape and assault. Let our tradition be.
*OLUFUKO (efundula leengoma in Oshikwanyama ohango yiitsali in Oshindonga) is our Oshiwambo culture and please leave our customs alone.
*I SALUTE the ladies who bared it for olufuko for me, as an Omuwambo lady, to get an understanding of what my great grandma and the ladies before her had to go through. Our ancestors had to take part in olufuko long before the church came to town to declare it a pagan event. The church declared many traditions as paganism, some rightfully so but others simply to achieve whatever goal was more important to them at the time. I am a Christian lady and can appreciate this live museum type exhibition in a time when so many of our traditions and cultural values have been lost.
Lost and Found
*I LOST my ID card in Windhoek! My name is Henock Shatilwe. If found please call or SMS me at 081-202-7332 or 081-839-0761.
*I Mr Jeja lost my driver’s licence. If you find it please contact 081-468-7622.
*I LOST my ID card in Windhoek. My name is Patrick CJ van Wyk born 1972. If found please contact 081-687-7017 or 081-128-1971.