Harsh conditions fail to deter Opuwo villagers from voting

HELL came in the form of the scorching sun and sultry conditions.

High water followed with persistent rains pouring mercilessly, causing streams to flow. But the voters of Ovinyange, about 12 km north of Opuwo, were not to be deterred.They flocked to the Oukango school on Monday afternoon and swamped the classroom turned into a mobile polling station.The voting team must have been caught by surprise at the large turnout in one of the hotly-contested areas despite earlier warnings by Ovahimba chief, Paulus Tjavara, in a grey suit and one of few in western attire, that light will be needed.The Ovahimba, in their habitat, were distinguishable from the outsiders in western clothes.Women had their skins well protected by otjize, a red clay all-purpose, all-weather skin cover and make-up.Women queued to the left side, men to right, as they alternated to ensure that the line was being reduced equally.But the queue kept growing.When darkness enveloped everyone around, with only the glimmer of red hot coals revealing one or two souls crouched around them, the voters stuck to the polling centre.Rain drops forced them to bundle into one another, blocking the entrance to the classroom and making it as inaccessible as rain has made some areas of Okaoko roads impassable due to flowing rivers and streams.Some minutes before midnight about 50 people were waiting to vote their conversations sounding like murmurs in the darkness.The turn-out at Ovinyange appears to disclose the assessment of Congress of Democrats’ Opuwo leader Mbeumuna Muhuka that the race in this part of the Kunene Region will be very tight.Muhuka is “very confident” that his party will come “first or second”, a far rosier outlook compared to 1999 when CoD polled a mere 300 votes in Epupa and Opuwo constituencies.DTA won in the two areas with 5 000 votes, followed by Swapo at 1 800.This time the participation of National Unity Democratic Organisation (Nudo), of Herero chief Kuaima Riruako has added another dimension.Though cautious the Deputy Minister of Women Affairs and Child Welfare, Angelika Muharukua, was confident this week that her party Swapo too would sweep the area.Muharukua said Swapo had campaigned vigorously and many people “realise what they are getting in this Swapo Government, because Swapo brings for them water, drought relief” while “other political leaders” make idle talk.Yet Muharukua acknowledged that people often don’t vote according to what they tell the politicians.The politicians will have to wait until the end of the week to know whether voters had any belief in their promises, while the concern so far has been to get people to the polling stations.With computer glitches sorted out on the first day, rain remained the major concern for people in Kunene.The Electoral Commission of Namibia uses a helicopter to get to parts of the region, particularly Okaoko, that are too rocky and mountainous to get to by motor vehicle.Swapo’s district co-ordinator for Opuwo MHT Hihuangapo said his party will get at least 45 per cent of the votes.The DTA’s Kunene north regional co-ordinator, Hinamundu Tjazapi, expects her party to sweep the elections and played down the Nudo breakaway saying the DTA more than made up for the loss by getting members from other parties, such as Swapo and CoD.Jonathan Katjimune said of Nudo: “We are not going to improve [on the municipal election votes] we are going to sweep” the region.But Katjimune charged that Swapo was likely to rig the elections using the helicopter mobile team to exclude opposition party supporters.SADC Parliamentary Forum Election observers have said the election has so far been “peaceful” and that they were impressed by the maturity during the campaign.George Francis Mlawa, a Tanzanian lawmaker, said he saw people of all parties attending a funeral of a tribal chief while wearing their party colours and admired how they co-existed.Mlawa, who is observing elections in Kunene with Angela Zachepa, a parliamentarian from Malawi, and Ester Nxumalo of the SADC secretariat in Swaziland, said they have had no complaints of substance in their meetings with political parties or while observing the campaign over the past week.But the voters of Ovinyange, about 12 km north of Opuwo, were not to be deterred.They flocked to the Oukango school on Monday afternoon and swamped the classroom turned into a mobile polling station.The voting team must have been caught by surprise at the large turnout in one of the hotly-contested areas despite earlier warnings by Ovahimba chief, Paulus Tjavara, in a grey suit and one of few in western attire, that light will be needed.The Ovahimba, in their habitat, were distinguishable from the outsiders in western clothes.Women had their skins well protected by otjize, a red clay all-purpose, all-weather skin cover and make-up.Women queued to the left side, men to right, as they alternated to ensure that the line was being reduced equally.But the queue kept growing.When darkness enveloped everyone around, with only the glimmer of red hot coals revealing one or two souls crouched around them, the voters stuck to the polling centre.Rain drops forced them to bundle into one another, blocking the entrance to the classroom and making it as inaccessible as rain has made some areas of Okaoko roads impassable due to flowing rivers and streams.Some minutes before midnight about 50 people were waiting to vote their conversations sounding like murmurs in the darkness.The turn-out at Ovinyange appears to disclose the assessment of Congress of Democrats’ Opuwo leader Mbeumuna Muhuka that the race in this part of the Kunene Region will be very tight.Muhuka is “very confident” that his party will come “first or second”, a far rosier outlook compared to 1999 when CoD polled a mere 300 votes in Epupa and Opuwo constituencies.DTA won in the two areas with 5 000 votes, followed by Swapo at 1 800.This time the participation of National Unity Democratic Organisation (Nudo), of Herero chief Kuaima Riruako has added another dimension.Though cautious the Deputy Minister of Women Affairs and Child Welfare, Angelika Muharukua, was confident this week that her party Swapo too would sweep the area.Muharukua said Swapo had campaigned vigorously and many people “realise what they are getting in this Swapo Government, because Swapo brings for them water, drought relief” while “other political leaders” make idle talk.Yet Muharukua acknowledged that people often don’t vote according to what they tell the politicians.The politicians will have to wait until the end of the week to know whether voters had any belief in their promises, while the concern so far has been to get people to the polling stations.With computer glitches sorted out on the first day, rain remained the major concern for people in Kunene.The Electoral Commission of Namibia uses a helicopter to get to parts of the region, particularly Okaoko, that are too rocky and mountainous to get to by motor vehicle.Swapo’s district co-ordinator for Opuwo MHT Hihuangapo said his party will get at least 45 per cent of the votes.The DTA’s Kunene north regional co-ordinator, Hinamundu Tjazapi, expects her party to sweep the elections and played down the Nudo breakaway saying the DTA more than made up for the loss by getting members from other parties, such as Swapo and CoD.Jonathan Katjimune said of Nudo: “We are not going to improve [on the municipal election votes] we are going to sweep” the region.But Katjimune charged that Swapo was likely to rig the elections using the helicopter mobile team to exclude opposition party supporters.SADC Parliamentary Forum Election observers have said the election has so far been “peaceful” and that they were impressed by the maturity during the campaign.George Francis Mlawa, a Tanzanian lawmaker, said he saw people of all parties attending a funeral of a tribal chief while wearing their party colours and admired how they co-existed.Mlawa, who is observing elections in Kunene with Angela Zachepa, a parliamentarian from Malawi, and Ester Nxumalo of the SADC secretariat in Swaziland, said they have had no complaints of substance in their meetings with political parties or while observing the campaign over the past week.