Will We Survive the Day Namibia Stands Still?

Namibians like to believe we are prepared for anything. We have survived droughts, fuel hikes and politicians who campaign like prophets but govern like interns.

We are a resilient people. Or so we say, while standing in a queue at Pick n Pay, clutching imported onions from three continents away. And we pay with new money printed in a garage in France.

Now imagine this: one random Tuesday morning, with no press conference and no dramatic public service announcements, the shelves stop refilling. No imports. No trucks rolling in from the Walvis Bay port. No mysterious container from somewhere in Asia containing things we didn’t know we needed but suddenly can’t live without.

Just silence.

The shops are open, the fridges are humming, but nothing new is coming.

Phase one is the day Namibia stands still.

At first, we would deny it. “It’s just a logistics issue,” we’d say, confidently repeating words we heard on the radio but don’t fully understand.

Social media will blame it on Namra. We’d buy extra bread “just in case”, which is Namibian code for clearing the shelf while judging others for doing the same.

Of course, those from Ludwigsdorp will stock up on toilet paper. WhatsApp groups would explode. Someone’s cousin’s neighbour who once worked at customs would confirm that “things are bad, hey”. Voice notes would be forwarded like gospel.

Then comes phase two: creativity.

Suddenly, everyone remembers they have a backyard. That patch of land that has been faithfully hosting beer bottles and braai ashes for years is now rebranded a ‘garden’. Tomatoes are planted with the same optimism usually reserved for kapana dates. People Google “how long does ‘pap’ take to grow” and immediately regret their life choices.

But of course, Google will think it’s a joke and reply with: “To grow ‘pap’ you would have to be a ‘domkop’ to even try”.

Chickens become the new Bitcoin. Not eggs, chickens. Full, live, clucking assets. A guy who kept chickens for years is now a national consultant. He is interviewed. He is respected. He is tired.

Erasie Kadhikwa will be on ‘Good Morning Namibia’, teaching everyone how to keep chickens and promoting Xwama Restaurant.

Rural relatives, those previously ignored except during funerals, are suddenly very popular.

“My brother,” we say warmly, “how is life there by the cattle?”

We don’t mention that last Christmas we said village life was backward.

We ask practical questions now. How do you dry meat? How many kilogrammes of omahangu can I yield from 10 square metres? Can a donkey be trained for Lefa?

Which brings us to transport.

With cars reduced to expensive garden ornaments, Namibia rediscovers legs. Walking. Cycling. Lifting. That one uncle who always said “in my time we walked 15 kilometresß to school” is finally vindicated and becomes unbearable.

Donkeys make a comeback. Horses too. Cow-drawn carts roll through town, not as cultural displays, but as serious logistics solutions.

Somewhere in Windhoek, a man who once mocked rural transport is now negotiating cow horsepower like it’s a Toyota Land Cruiser. “This one pulls strong, but the steering is slow.”

And then, and this is important, we start remembering things we were taught but laughed at.

Old ways stop sounding old. We rediscover food preservation, seed saving and shared labour. Barter becomes a currency. Skills suddenly matter more than well-polished CVs. The guy who can fix things without YouTube becomes dangerous. The woman who knows which plants are food and which ones send you to your grave becomes powerful.

We rediscover that our grandparents weren’t ‘struggling’; they were structured. They didn’t wait for systems to work. They worked systems around reality. They stored, rotated and planned. They respected seasons instead of fighting them with imported strawberries in winter.

Of course, there will be chaos.

Some people will try to sell a single pumpkin for the price of a second-hand Corolla. There will be arguments. There will definitely be politicians promising to fix things ‘urgently’ while standing next to a donkey they clearly met five minutes earlier.

But slowly, quietly, something shifts.

Communities will organise. Not because it’s trendy, but because hunger is persuasive.

Here’s the uncomfortable part: this scenario is not science fiction. It’s just inconvenient enough that we don’t like thinking about it.

Self-sufficiency sounds like a joke until the joke stops being funny. Until the shelves don’t refill. Until the backup plan is gone. Until you realise that depending entirely on systems you don’t control is not modern, it’s reckless.

One day, whether by crisis or choice, Namibia will have to rely more on itself. And when that day comes, it will be better if we’ve already laughed about it, practised a little and quietly started walking in that direction.

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