Outjo residents want CEO out

Some Outjo residents, through the Outjo Residents Group, have submitted a letter demanding the removal of the municipality’s chief executive officer (CEO), Josef Urib, from his position.

Urib has been at the helm of the town for over two decades.

In their letter that was submitted last week, the residents claim Urib is responsible for the town’s declining state of infrastructure and poor service delivery.

The residents took it up with the management committee and the chairperson handed over the letter to the local authority.

During a public meeting held by the municipality on 20 July, the community aired their dissatisfaction with the town’s administration.

Present at the meeting was Outjo mayor Johannes Bapello.

According to group spokesperson Uaundja Mazenge, water rationing is one of the challenges currently faced by the town.

“The town has been experiencing daily water disruptions for the past year, even after an offer was made by the residents group to assist financially and technically to resolve the issues. We were told that they had matters under control and had appointed a local drilling contractor to designate and drill a new borehole, which was not successful,” said one of the members of the group.

At the same meeting, community members highlighted another issue with refuse removal, claiming that they sometimes wait up to three weeks for household refuse removal.

Mazenge said refuse has not been removed in the informal settlements for months.

“The piles of household, garden and other refuse, which includes human excrement at Etoshapoort and the informal settlement areas, pose serious health and environmental threats,” he said.

The town CEO said last week that the municipality is not able to do the necessary repairs on the water plant and broken equipment or provide the necessary services, due to financial constraints.

“Yes, we are experiencing water shortages, but this is because currently we only have two functional boreholes, as the third one collapsed in 2021. The water level in the boreholes is very low compared to five or six years ago. In order to mitigate this, we decided to temporarily close and open the water at intervals,” said Urib.

However, four new boreholes were drilled in 2022 but due to a lack of financing, the municipality were not able to do the installation which required about N$3 million, Urib said.

“We submitted a budget to the Ministry of Urban and Rural Development. The ministry approved a budget of N$3,6 million. The local authority expected N$450 000 by (last week) Friday and would start with the installation of one borehole,” said Urib.

Another budget has been submitted for a reservoir, as the current one is more than 30 years old and does not have the capacity to provide enough water to all residents, said Urib.

Bapello said the challenges are worsened by an ageing vehicle fleet.

“Our vehicles are very old. Some of them are from 1947, 1956, 1976. We can’t afford to buy new vehicles because our budget is N$39 million and we can only collect N$26 million. We cannot go and close services such as water to the residents. It’s inhumane,” said Bapello.

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