SMSes of the Day : Wednesday

* WHAT perhaps can we achieve if all of us (from all angles of political affiliations) stand in unity as Namibians and seek ways to overcome socio-economic problems in Namibia? This land belongs to you and me and we surely can make a difference. It takes joint efforts and force from everyone of us to make Namibia a better place to live in. Politics only becomes resourceful when it is made to be a democratic vehicle towards reaching and realising various developmental goals and destinations, not to be a lava flow that buries Namibia under hatred, intolerance, division and injustice.

* ACCORDING to our President, the new State House belongs to no one else but the people. This makes me wonder why streets around the State House are cordoned off and why people photographing the State House at Swakopmund were arrested. If this is my house, will I be allowed in? * TO the white Namibian who feels victimised: Not all blacks view whites in the same light as (Jerry) Ekandjo. We have moved on after 18 years. You are as much a Namibian as all of us. Don’t let anyone make you feel uncomfortable in your own country. – NorahFood for thought* INDEPENDENCE Day is a national day, please don’t campaign for Swapo, that’s why some people boycott the day.* I WANT to remind the NBC Otjiherero Service presenter of religious programmes that Namibia is a secular democratic State. The purpose of his programme ‘Ngatu rihonge ozongamburiro mouye’ is not to warn Christians against other religions but to afford listeners an opportunity to understand many religious principles and practices in a diverse society. So instead of recycling old programmes do research. How on earth in your right mind do you expect a partisan Christian pastor to teach us about Islam?* THE solution to the man-created energy crisis in Namibia is to fire those who proved to be incompetent. In 18 years they failed to foresee the need for more electricity. They proved their dependency by saying that they are comfortable with the cheap import from South Africa. What a dependency syndrome from those who are supposed to run a free Namibia.* ACCORDING to the Namfisa Act, the executives and the MD of Namfisa resort under the Board of Directors of Namfisa. Mr Ritter of Namfisa (MD) please tell the nation and the policyholders of City Funerals when you will honour the decision of the Namfisa Board, which effectively reversed your ill-advised, unilateral and unlawful decision to close down City Funerals? Why are you delaying the execution of a board decision? Or should we be satisfied that at Namfisa the executive functionaries have the powers to simply override the board and do as they please? Please answer.Thank you* MY thanks goes to the Elcin church for donating goods valued at N$200 000 to the flood victims. May God bless your church!From the regions* CENORED, you left the Otavi area in darkness for 14 hours on Saturday. There are rumours that you didn’t have a vehicle to go out. NamPower, please come back, you gave us excellent service.* COUNCILLOR Nambala, what have you done for us? We need electricity at our places, like Tutungeni in Rosh Pinah. Why are we in Tutungeni always left behind? Up to now we don’t have electricity here at Tutungeni.* HOW can you expect someone to work on an empty stomach? The nurses’ home of Otjondjozupa Region has had no electricity for almost a week now because the Ministry of Health didn’t pay Nored regardless of the fact that all tenants living in the nurses’ home pay every month. Now we are buying take-aways every day.* TEACHING in the east of the Ohangwena Region is like a punishment. No clean water, clinics are far, no electricity, no network, accommodation and transport problems. The Government must reintroduce bush (inconvenience) allowance for these suffering people.Education* CAN the inspector of education of the Okahao circuit tell us why the teachers at Shaanika Nashilongo and Etalaleko SSS knock off at 13h00 while the teachers at other schools knock off at 16h00? If they start at 07h00, why don’t they knock off at 15h00? Can we really call this fairness?* TEACHERS are getting three school holidays a year, but they stay away from school a lot, while learners are just sitting idly.* EDUCATION is no longer the first priority in Namibia. Let’s think carefully and do something about our kids repeating classes, while there are no textbooks.* THE Minister of Education should give us feedback about the accreditation of I.U.M courses please.* I’M a Polytechnic first year student and applied for a Government study loan and got a letter of acknowledgement, but they never got back to us whether the loans are approved or not. I will be looking forward to your response.* GOVERNMENT has set aside N$340 million for Grade 10 failures, but cannot afford to give a single penny to student nurses who are struggling with transport, accommodation and other allowances. Please, think of student nurses.General* I’M a concerned resident of Pionierspark Extension 1. We are getting mugged every day by thieves who hide in the bushes along Scheppmans and Geiger streets. These robberies happen literally every day. Can the City of Windhoek please have those bushes cleared or have a fence put around there. It serves as a great hiding place for the thieves. Something has to be done before someone loses his or her life because of a cellphone.* WHAT is happening at NamPost? Our parcels from abroad keep getting lost in the hands of your employees. My family has lost about seven parcels sent from Argentina, USA and Germany between October 2007 to March 2008. This is not the first time letters have gone missing. It happened in 2000-2002 when letters were found in riverbeds, as shown to us on NBC-TV back then. NamPost manager please tell us what’s going on, because we have lost our valuables. – Ms Pena Engombe, Box 2396, Windhoek* THERE is a big disparity between the increase in basic salaries and the price hikes in commodities. Mostly, food and grocery price have gone up with more than 60% over the last two years. The same is happening to fuel, building materials on top of that tax is very high. The annual increase of 5% on civil servants’ salaries is nothing in comparison to the price increase. Minister of Finance please reduce income tax, we are suffering at the grassroots level.* WITH all this water in the North, can the Namibian Navy do something to assist the locals. They have been far too dormant.* WE need to call a national dialogue on the quality of our laws. It baffles me that in Namibia the penalty to steal a goat is stiffer than for murder. Whose interest is such a law protecting if not the selfish rich farmers who disregard life. It is a shame on our lawmakers. It is unconstitutional and self-defeating.* HONOURABLE (Richard) Kamwi can the Ministry of Health go back to the old system where nursing students received some incentives while studying. Nowadays newly trained nurses opt to go to private hospitals, while in the past the Ministry had control over student nurses. The foreigners you are busy recruiting are just here for money not to care for patients. Please act now!* SINCE the new leadership of Nantu was elected it is like the union is dead. Teachers are still getting a N$198 transport allowance. We are about to terminate our membership. We want a new union.* MINISTRY of Defence, your budget is too high, yet your troops are suffering, especially privates. We cannot afford to pay school fees for our children, because we are paid peanuts and also poor administration, especially at the Suiderhof military base.* TO the white Namibian who feels victimised: Not all blacks view whites in the same light as (Jerry) Ekandjo. We have moved on after 18 years. You are as much a Namibian as all of us. Don’t let anyone make you feel uncomfortable in your own country. – Norah Food for thought * INDEPENDENCE Day is a national day, please don’t campaign for Swapo, that’s why some people boycott the day.* I WANT to remind the NBC Otjiherero Service presenter of religious programmes that Namibia is a secular democratic State. The purpose of his programme ‘Ngatu rihonge ozongamburiro mouye’ is not to warn Christians against other religions but to afford listeners an opportunity to understand many religious principles and practices in a diverse society. So instead of recycling old programmes do research. How on earth in your right mind do you expect a partisan Christian pastor to teach us about Islam? * THE solution to the man-created energy crisis in Namibia is to fire those who proved to be incompetent. In 18 years they failed to foresee the need for more electricity. They proved their dependency by saying that they are comfortable with the cheap import from South Africa. What a dependency syndrome from those who are supposed to run a free Namibia.* ACCORDING to the Namfisa Act, the executives and the MD of Namfisa resort under the Board of Directors of Namfisa. Mr Ritter of Namfisa (MD) please tell the nation and the policyholders of City Funerals when you will honour the decision of the Namfisa Board, which effectively reversed your ill-advised, unilateral and unlawful decision to close down City Funerals? Why are you delaying the execution of a board decision? Or should we be satisfied that at Namfisa the executive functionaries have the powers to simply override the board and do as they please? Please answer.Thank you * MY thanks goes to the Elcin church for donating goods valued at N$200 000 to the flood victims. May God bless your church! From the regions * CENORED, you left the Otavi area in darkness for 14 hours on Saturday. There are rumours that you didn’t have a vehicle to go out. NamPower, please come back, you gave us excellent service.* COUNCILLOR Nambala, what have you done for us? We need electricity at our places, like Tutungeni in Rosh Pinah. Why are we in Tutungeni always left behind? Up to now we don’t have electricity here at Tutungeni.* HOW can you expect someone to work on an empty stomach? The nurses’ home of Otjondjozupa Region has had no electricity for almost a week now because the Ministry of Health didn’t pay Nored regardless of the fact that all tenants living in the nurses’ home pay every month. Now we are buying take-aways every day.* TEACHING in the east of the Ohangwena Region is like a punishment. No clean water, clinics are far, no electricity, no network, accommodation and transport problems. The Government must reintroduce bush (inconvenience) allowance for these suffering people.Education * CAN the inspector of education of the Okahao circuit tell us why the teachers at Shaanika Nashilongo and Etalaleko SSS knock off at 13h00 while the teachers at other schools knock off at 16h00? If they start at 07h00, why don’t they knock off at 15h00? Can we really call this fairness? * TEACHERS are getting three school holidays a year, but they stay away from school a lot, while learners are just sitting idly.* EDUCATION is no longer the first priority in Namibia. Let’s think carefully and do something about our kids repeating classes, while there are no textbooks.* THE Minister of Education should give us feedback about the accreditation of I.U.M courses please.* I’M a Polytechnic first year student and applied for a Government study loan and got a letter of acknowledgement, but they never got back to us whether the loans are approved or not. I will be looking forward to your response.* GOVERNMENT has set aside N$340 million for Grade 10 failures, but cannot afford to give a single penny to student nurses who are struggling with transport, accommodation and other allowances. Please, think of student nurses.General * I’M a concerned resident of Pionierspark Extension 1. We are getting mugged every day by thieves who hide in the bushes along Scheppmans and Geiger streets. These robberies happen literally every day. Can the City of Windhoek please have those bushes cleared or have a fence put around there. It serves as a great hiding place for the thieves. Something has to be done before someone loses his or her life because of a cellphone.* WHAT is happening at NamPost? Our parcels from abroad keep getting lost in the hands of your employees. My family has lost about seven parcels sent from Argentina, USA and Germany between October 2007 to March 2008. This is not the first time letters have gone missing. It happened in 2000-2002 when letters were found in riverbeds, as shown to us on NBC-TV back then. NamPost manager please tell us what’s going on, because we have lost our valuables. – Ms Pena Engombe, Box 2396, Windhoek * THERE is a big disparity between the increase in basic salaries and the price hikes in commodities. Mostly, food and grocery price have gone up with more than 60% over the last two years. The same is happening to fuel, building materials on top of that tax is very high. The annual increase of 5% on civil servants’ salaries is nothing in comparison to the price increase. Minister of Finance please reduce income tax, we are suffering at the grassroots level.* WITH all this water in the North, can the Namibian Navy do something to assist the locals. They have been far too dormant.* WE need to call a national dialogue on the quality of our laws. It baffles me that in Namibia the penalty to steal a goat is stiffer than for murder. Whose interest is such a law protecting if not the selfish rich farmers who disregard life. It is a shame on our lawmakers. It is unconstitutional and self-defeating.* HONOURABLE (Richard) Kamwi can the Ministry of Health go back to the old system where nursing students received some incentives while studying. Nowadays newly trained nurses opt to go to private hospitals, while in the past the Ministry had control over student nurses. The foreigners you are busy recruiting are just here for money not to care for patients. Please act now! * SINCE the new leadership of Nantu was elected it is like the union is dead. Teachers are still getting a N$198 transport allowance. We are about to terminate our membership. We want a new union.* MINISTRY of Defence, your budget is too high, yet your troops are suffering, especially privates. We cannot afford to pay school fees for our children, because we are paid peanuts and also poor administration, especially at the Suiderhof military base.