BEE policy still stuck in starting blocks

FIVE years after Government decided to create a policy for black economic empowerment (BEE), the actual draft document is still waiting for the ruling Swapo Party leadership to give it the go-ahead, while the time frame of having it up and running this year with a tailor-made law in place has run out.

‘The Transformation of Economic and Social Empowerment Framework (Tesef) will be adopted by Cabinet, debated in Parliament and supported by a legislative framework by 2009,’ the Strategy Document for Tesef, which was completed towards the end of 2008, stated. The Namibian recently obtained a copy of the document.Tesef outlines company ownership of up to 50 per cent to be achieved over several years for historically deprived Namibians (HDNs), 50 per cent of HDNs in management cadres, 50 per cent of board members, 50 per cent of deprived women in top, middle and junior management and ’80 per cent of previously deprived individuals (Dis) in all permanent staff’.Preferential procurement from local companies that are majority black owned will also be counting in favour of private-sector firms. The various BEE components will translate into points for an eventual scorecard to be scrutinised by a Tesef Measurement Secretariat, which will be overseen by a Tesef Governing Board. Companies have to register there for Tesef compliance and to obtain their scores.White women also fall under DIs but their ownership is limited to 30 per cent.Prime Minister Nahas Angula, whose office was tasked with the drafting, confirmed to The Namibian earlier this month that the Strategy Document had been lying at the Swapo Party headquarters for the past few months for consideration and to receive the final go-ahead.Asked why an official Government document had to be referred back to Swapo, he said it was a matter of ‘reaching consensus on ideologies’.’We need political consensus in the party as some [there] have the opinion that economic empowerment should not just be given, but should be earned. Others [in Swapo] feel that BEE – or Tesef, as we officially call Namibia’s transformation – should just be the co-option of previously disadvantaged Namibians [into companies],’ Angula said. ‘We must bring together these two thought lines,’ he added.He could not say, however, when this process within Swapo would be completed. Back in 2004, Cabinet had tasked former Prime Minister Theo-Ben Gurirab and his office to embark on the drafting of the BEE policy, but this was not done. His successor, Nahas Angula, embraced the task and advertised for a consultancy. Decti Namibia under local lawyer Malverene Rittmann won the contract for the policy drafting process in early 2007 for N$1,9 million. Several hearings and workshops with the business sector were held over a period of about 12 months, which culminated in the printing of the Strategy Document in December 2008.However, with the delay caused by the Swapo headquarters, no law for Tesef is in sight yet and economic analysts doubt that it will happen this year. The financial sector recently adopted a voluntary BEE policy along similar lines as the proposed Tesef, and it was given the green light by Finance Minister Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila. The Namibian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NCCI) held a business summit last month and published a BEE position paper, which states that ‘the lack of a BEE policy and legislation creates a vacuum, which limits Government’s initiatives … beyond affirmative action.’According to the NCCI the ‘current legislative environment is not supportive of BEE and Government is strongly encouraged to introduce it’.