DTA to be ‘majority party’ in elections, says Kaura

THE Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA) party will ‘take over power from the ruling Swapo Party’ in the upcoming November elections as the ‘sky was the limit’, its President, Katuutire Kaura, said on Saturday when he opened the party’s annual executive committee meeting.

‘The presidency of this country is not reserved for either Swapo or any other political party. Anyone and any party qualifies to puts its member in State House and the DTA is just going to do that,’ he added. ‘The DTA is the only party with the tested potential to become the next majority party.’Kaura criticised the present Swapo government, accusing it of having ‘messed up quite handsomely over the past 19 years’ with regard to education, housing, corruption and the way it handled the war veterans. ‘The teachers who taught me and Trade and Industry Minister Hage Geingob only had Standard Six but by the time we entered the Augustineum, we were fluent in Afrikaans and Nama-Damara, but today there is a 50 per cent failure rate in Grade Ten and some schools in independent Namibia have a 95 per cent failure rate – a total disaster. When I started school in 1949 I could read and write Otjiherero within three months’, Kaura lashed out, calling the education system introduced by former Education Minister Nahas Angula being ‘from the moon’.Kaura criticised Government for its policy for not recognising all those who fought in the liberation struggle as war veterans or as freedom fighters. ‘Herero Chief Hosea Kutako had sent 154 Namibians into exile to get military training, some went to Ethiopia, others to Somalia, but they were conspicuously ignored by the Veterans Affairs Ministry and this glaring injustice must be rectified as soon as possible. Bishop Asseria Kamburona of the Oruuano Church is not considered as a war veteran, although former president Nujoma slept in his house (in 1960) when he was smuggled out of the country to Botswana to go into exile. Bishop Kamburona made many sacrifices by assisting many Namibians to go into exile.’Turning to housing, the DTA leader said even the Old Location in Windhoek 50 years ago under apartheid had looked much better than the assembly of shacks in the north-western outskirts of Windhoek today in independent Namibia. ‘Namibia is drowning in shacks, but Government spends over 20 million Namibia dollars on a new office building for former president Sam Nujoma – how many two-bedroom houses could have been built for this amount of money?’ Kaura asked.He criticised that the Ongwediva trade fair in the North was hailed as such a major event, but no such fairs were organised in southern Namibia. ‘Everything goes to the North – are the southerners not taxpayers, too?’ he asked.According to him, a DTA government would abolish the water utility NamWater and return water supply and distribution to Government.Kaura further announced that the DTA will launch its 2009 election manifesto next Saturday, September 12 at Opuwo in the Kunene Region. ‘I hope that the national broadcaster NBC, which should rather be called the Swapo Broadcasting Corporation, will also cover the event,’ Kaura said, hinting at the fact that NBC television mostly covers Swapo events than those of the smaller parties represented in Parliament, although opposition parties have complained bitterly about this during the past decade.’Swapo is monopolising the NBC as if it depends on it and I never have seen a party in such serious desperation as Swapo,’ Kaura said. ‘Even a kindergarten is opened with pomp and fanfare in Swapo colours and reported on NBC television.’Kaura said the DTA would not accept it if the ballot papers were once again printed by NamPrint, a company owned by the Swapo Party. ‘If this happens, the elections will be rigged, before the voting has even started!’ the DTA leader cautioned.