Political Perspective

ALL RIGHT, so I’m not a big fan of beauty pageants or whatever politically correct titles they’re given these days, but I’m astounded at how even a near non-event such as this can turn into a political bunfight par excellence that requires, yes, even Ministerial intervention in an attempt to sort it out as if it is some kind of priority issue.

THE Ms Malaika was trumpeted as some sort of major pan-African event with the HIV-AIDS issue tagged on to give it some kind of moral acceptability (or perhaps in an attempt by organisers to get funding), but now the competition in Namibia has degenerated into a heated controversy with judges, independent and otherwise, who didn’t quite understand their role; poky potential queens who feel left out in the cold; and a public left dazed and confused by the whole debacle. And, of course, the whole thing has also set in motion Namibia’s notorious gossip grapevine, a formidable machine by any standards! Now the buzz is about who’s sleeping with whom; what ethnic group has been favoured by which judges; why South African performers and musicians were put on show rather than local counterparts; whether money has passed hands from whoever to whatever in the interests of a certain outcome; and so it goes.A number of eminent companies in Namibia jumped on the beauty bandwagon, and hopefully the parastatals or SOEs among them have good reason for their spending priorities on ‘social responsibility’ projects of this nature, as they now have egg on their faces for buying themselves a portion of the fracas.By some great stroke of fate, our Government didn’t partake financially (I think…) so one might have hoped they would be exempt from all the muck flying about.But Health Minister Dr Libertina Amathila is, of course, patron of the event, so the whole bizarre circus kind of rubs off on Government after all.What is most amazing to me is not that the pageant was held at all, because beauty extravaganzas tend to have popular appeal and there’s money to be made from them too, but how quickly things tend to degenerate into much fingerpointing and mudslinging and taking of sides in the whole messy affair.Much like our politics.In fact the whole thing has become quite political in any case, because certain of our Ministers, and even the Prime himself, were there in force (as there are some who like to see and be seen at glamorous events such as these) and ended up bringing in a government role after all as the patron had to intervene in an attempt to bring order among the chaos.It is perhaps noteworthy that disintegration and fragmentation seem to happen so frequently in Namibia.We are supposed to be a united nation.Obviously that’s a myth because we are divided into all kinds of people, and there’s nothing wrong with that.In political terms, divisions continually perpetuate themselves in an amoeba-like manner, as parties split, regroup, rejoin, reunite, disperse, and so it goes on.But must we also fight and fragment ourselves over even the simplest of issues? If the idea behind this continental initiative was truly to give a boost to the anti-HIV-AIDS battle, then somewhere between the lines that noble goal has been lost sight of.And that’s the sad thing about it all.Also, one would have expected to see NGOs in HIV-AIDS involved in one way or another or to have been given a platform at such a gala event, but that apparently wasn’t the case.This is quite strange, given that ostensibly a key role of the Ms Malaika is to be an ambassador in the campaign to prevent HIV-AIDS.So much for the fight against HIV-AIDS, which now has Libertina scuttling around to reconcile the warring parties in the sorry outcome to an event that was organisationally flawed from the outset from the judging point of view.What can I, or anyone else say? This is beauty politics, Namibian-style!And, of course, the whole thing has also set in motion Namibia’s notorious gossip grapevine, a formidable machine by any standards! Now the buzz is about who’s sleeping with whom; what ethnic group has been favoured by which judges; why South African performers and musicians were put on show rather than local counterparts; whether money has passed hands from whoever to whatever in the interests of a certain outcome; and so it goes. A number of eminent companies in Namibia jumped on the beauty bandwagon, and hopefully the parastatals or SOEs among them have good reason for their spending priorities on ‘social responsibility’ projects of this nature, as they now have egg on their faces for buying themselves a portion of the fracas. By some great stroke of fate, our Government didn’t partake financially (I think…) so one might have hoped they would be exempt from all the muck flying about. But Health Minister Dr Libertina Amathila is, of course, patron of the event, so the whole bizarre circus kind of rubs off on Government after all. What is most amazing to me is not that the pageant was held at all, because beauty extravaganzas tend to have popular appeal and there’s money to be made from them too, but how quickly things tend to degenerate into much fingerpointing and mudslinging and taking of sides in the whole messy affair. Much like our politics. In fact the whole thing has become quite political in any case, because certain of our Ministers, and even the Prime himself, were there in force (as there are some who like to see and be seen at glamorous events such as these) and ended up bringing in a government role after all as the patron had to intervene in an attempt to bring order among the chaos. It is perhaps noteworthy that disintegration and fragmentation seem to happen so frequently in Namibia. We are supposed to be a united nation. Obviously that’s a myth because we are divided into all kinds of people, and there’s nothing wrong with that. In political terms, divisions continually perpetuate themselves in an amoeba-like manner, as parties split, regroup, rejoin, reunite, disperse, and so it goes on. But must we also fight and fragment ourselves over even the simplest of issues? If the idea behind this continental initiative was truly to give a boost to the anti-HIV-AIDS battle, then somewhere between the lines that noble goal has been lost sight of. And that’s the sad thing about it all. Also, one would have expected to see NGOs in HIV-AIDS involved in one way or another or to have been given a platform at such a gala event, but that apparently wasn’t the case. This is quite strange, given that ostensibly a key role of the Ms Malaika is to be an ambassador in the campaign to prevent HIV-AIDS. So much for the fight against HIV-AIDS, which now has Libertina scuttling around to reconcile the warring parties in the sorry outcome to an event that was organisationally flawed from the outset from the judging point of view. What can I, or anyone else say? This is beauty politics, Namibian-style!