DTA says it’s back with a bang

WITH each presidential and general elections new political parties emerge but they are nothing but ‘scrapyards for disgruntled politicians’, according to the DTA leadership.

The party launched its 2009 manifesto at Opuwo on Saturday and claimed that the former main opposition was now back to its strength of the 1990s.’More white people are returning. I had meeting with former Hardap Governor (Pieter) Boltman in Outjo this morning which will drastically change the political landscape of Namibia,’ DTA chairman Johan de Waal told supporters.Young DTA MP McHenry Venaani told the crowd that the DTA was ready to challenge Swapo and had no worries about ‘the mushrooming of political scrapyards’ started by angry politicians who missed out on chances to advance their personal careers instead of serving the masses.’Had (President Hifikepunye) Pohamba accommodated (Hidipo) Hamutenya in is Cabinet, he (Hamutenya) would not have formed the RDP. It was formed out of anger. There are only two political parties in Namibia and that is DTA and Swapo. The rest are angry politicians,’ Venaani said.He said some were disturbingly based on regionalism while ethnicity had taken centre stage with others.De Waal agreed with the claim about ‘political scrapyards’.He said many Swapo leaders would be in Parliament for 20 years while a substantial number had been ministers over the same period, but some were fast heading for the scrapyard.’Some left and formed the CoD (Congress of Democrats) but it is now almost dead. Hamutenya has now started another scrapyard. They all start today but are dead tomorrow,’ De Waal said.He said the DTA had stood the test of time over the past couple of years.'(Clemens) Kapuuo died and Dirk Mudge left but DTA is like the mountains surrounding Opuwo. In the year 1918 these mountains were here, today they are here and tomorrow they will still be here. That is why a lot of people are returning,’ he said.The Namibian understands that many white people who had left the DTA for the Republican Party have started returning to the party.They left the DTA after claiming that the party was dominated by Hereros.Lissie de Vos, leader of the DTA women’s league, said the party must increase its representation in the National Assembly to at least 18 from the current four.At Independence the DTA had 21 seats out of 72 but it went down to 15 seats five years later. In 1999 the party had another setback with former vice president Mishake Muyongo booted a year earlier and they only managed seven seats.With RP and Nudo leaving the alliance in 2003, the DTA lost further ground in the 2004 elections and only gained five per cent of the vote and four seats in the National Assembly.They also lost the official opposition status to the CoD in the 2004 elections.