New Sickness In Namibia: The Middleman Syndrome

IT is probably not illegal to have someone link you up for some sort of deal but the extravagant cost at which it takes place makes one wonder why we need to go that route.

In recent years the country has witnessed millions changing hands and being wasted on luxurious lifestyles while the needy sections of our society go to bed hungry every night.Take, for instance, the decision by the Social Security Commission to invest N$30 million through a little-known asset management company Avid Investment Corporation, and how it backfired.Avid was registered as an investment company but in the final analysis it was more of a middleman than being an asset management company and they ultimately siphoned off millions of taxpayers money which was entrusted to the SSC.As recently as this week reports emerged about a N$5 million fight between some ‘deal brokers’ – African Renaissance Mining Company (Aremco) of Mihe Gaomab I and Knowledge Katti.The Canadian company at the centre of the storm, Pan Terra Industries, had reportedly budgeted N$5 million in their N$60 million bid for the purchase of the mine for the middleman and now Gaomab’s group feels Katiti has swindled them out of the money.Those reports appeared simultaneously with the ongoing dispute between two businessmen Desmond Amunyela and Vincent Sorenson over a commission for land by AroVin Property Developers, a company jointly owned by Sorenson and Aaron Mushimba, bought from the City of Windhoek in 2007 to built houses.Amunyela wants N$2,1 million from AroVin for reportedly linking them up with some officials in the municipality and thus ensuring a smooth deal.The Amunyela-Sorenson dispute makes one wonder how clean the cleanest city in Africa actually is!Why should one need a middleman to have a chat to the officials in the city before you get what you are actually going to pay for? Part of the City of Windhoek’s duty is to make available land for housing and it is their duty to sell land to anyone with the means to use it for development of houses or to build an own residence.Yet, this is surely not entirely the case in the City of Windhoek.Some officials are milking the system by taking money under the table and giving preference to those who are willing to pay them off.For me, that issue should have been addressed by the City fathers and mothers the minute it first appeared in the media but so far they are stuck with their heads in the sand and pretend as if they have heard nothing.By ignoring it they are actually encouraging the officials to continue with their underhanded deals.Ultimately it affects those who will buy such properties because the developers will surely pass the middleman expenses onto them and the houses in turn become more expensive.There are many such middleman examples in Namibia and it is worrying that hardly any institution acts against their employees or those involved in these deals.One of the most notorious places is the National Housing Enterprise where some employees seek ‘a small something’ to move the applicant up on the waiting list.The institution has done well to rid itself of some such officials yet others still remain in the system and many have fallen prey to them.Of major concern is the fact that the middleman syndrome is also driven and encouraged by foreign companies from some of the countries who will later, for example, help compile Namibia’s corruption ranking!And as for a place like the City of Windhoek, there is clearly a need from the councillors to take on their employees.If they fail to do so, we might be tempted into thinking that they also benefit through some ‘token money’ that may reach their accounts.