Observer – Page 813 – Windhoek Observer

15 Sep

Rip off the plaster

ObserverNational NewsGovernment

Government has talked subtly about reducing the civil service wage bill for years. But, this has long been a sacred cow. The time for whispers about this issue has passed. We have too many people on the government payroll; we cannot afford it. In the new normal as we adjust to the realities of the pandemic, there can be no more sacred cows. For the survival of the majority and the country itself as a sovereign nation, everything must be up for serious review with the goal of cutting costs severely. Rather than incrementally dropping hints about the need to…

15 Sep

Fish Trust awaits board appointments

ObserverObserver MoneyCovid-19, Leon Jooste, Public Enterprise Minister

Andrew Kathindi Public Enterprise Minister, Leon Jooste has said that the process of recruiting a new Namibia Fish Consumption Promotion Trust (NFCPT) Board has been derailed by COVID-19. “The process to identify the candidates is ongoing. The entity has not been operating as a result of COVID-19 and the pandemic has also affected our program to recruit,” he told Windhoek Observer. This comes after the terms of the last Board, which served from 2017 lapsed in September 2019. The board was chaired by Suzan Ndjaleka. NFCPT was established with a mandate to promote fish consumption throughout the country, through the…

15 Sep

Govt still to deliver Cuba student parcels …as students plead for President’s intervention

ObserverObserver MoneyCuba, Namibian Ambassador to Cuba, Samuel /Gôagoseb

Andrew Kathindi Namibian medical students in Cuba are pleading with President Hage Geingob to assist with the delivery of parcels organized by the relatives, amid claims some of the items are spoiling in the Health Ministry’s facility storage. This comes two months after a South African Airways plane which was scheduled to travel to Cuba on 3 July with the said parcels left with only Namibian Ambassador to Cuba, Samuel /Gôagoseb, without the packages. The students have now accused the Health Ministry of abandoning them and leaving their items to rot, after no progress has been made on delivering their…

15 Sep

COVID saves Gvt millions in allowances

ObserverObserver MoneyCovid-19, Daily Subsistence Allowance (DSA), Ministry of Finance

Staff Writer The restriction on travel by government officials due to the outbreak of COVID-19 has saved government million in travel allowances, amid revelation only 7.1 percent of the allocated amount of N$222. 8 million for the 2020/21 financial year has been spent. According to Ministry of Finance figures, Daily Subsistence Allowance (DSA) has only gobbled N$15.8 million for the period April 2020 to August 2020, compared to N$116.9 million for the same period last year. This comes as it emerged that most of the travel conducted during the period was COVID-19 related, with the bulk of the allowances paid…

12 Sep

Watch your money or lose it

ObserverNational NewsGovernment, money, Namibians

All too often Namibians as individuals, businesses and the government itself have been the victim of con artists and thieves. It is easy to conclude that someone wearing the ‘right’ clothes, with the ‘right’ introduction and with the ‘right’ deferential behaviour can lay a web of dodgy promises. It is a concern that too many people accept promised from business partners without vetting, follow-up, constant monitoring, contracts with penalties, milestone check-ins and random spot checks. The old adage remains the truth: If you don’t watch your money, you will lose it. The latest embarrassing episode of yet another conman cheating…

12 Sep

Fish quotas’ auctioning bad omen for radical socio-economic transformation

ObserverUncategorisedFish quotas, socio-economic, transformation

Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro Yours Truly Ideologically lately has been postulating that the independence of the country, achieved on March 21, 1990, was merely the Democratic Phase of the Namibian Revolution.. The Second Phase of the revolution, is the economic emancipation of the people. Meaning from an ideological perspective a situation ultimately where the people, foremost the workers, the real owners of the means of production of the country, would in real fact own the natural resources of their country. This is as opposed to being alienated from such, as was the case during the colonial era under a capitalist mode of…

12 Sep

The word ‘corruption’ is being abused

ObserverUncategorisedcorruption, SMS

Jackie Wilson Asheeke SMS pages, letters to the editor and social media conversations give great insight into public points of view. Through these avenues, I have seen an alarming misuse of word ‘corruption.’ When people label everything as 'corrupt', it is like crying wolf. After a while, no one listens to the cry of alarm anymore – that powerful word loses value and impact. Look at how people have killed the impact of the terms ‘terrorist’ or ‘fake news.’ These loaded words had solid meanings once upon a time. But, now, they have been co-opted by people on the left…

12 Sep

The Tour de France

ObserverUncategorised

The Time Traveler: Hugh Ellis One sporting event that I’m delighted has not become a total casualty of the Covid-19 pandemic is the Tour de France. Imagine riding a bicycle up to 200 kilometers a day, every day, for three straight weeks, over mountain passes and along windswept coasts, clocking maximum speeds in excess of 60 kilometers an hour? That’s the kind of feat these athletes deliver, year on year. As someone who takes a bike out for a 10-kilometer spin on Saturdays and Sundays, I’ve always thought it completely out of this world. Of course, the reputation of the…

12 Sep

A Special Tribute to Phillip Shiimi – A True Champion of our Time

ObserverUncategorisedNdangi Katoma, NUST, Phillip Shiimi, University of Namibia

Ndangi Katoma I first met him at the yellow benches, in the present day NUST campus in Windhoek, while we were both queuing up for registration to commence our tertiary education at the University of Namibia, two years after Namibia’s independence. We immediately connected and bonded well, in a journey of solid friendship and camaraderie that lasted for a good solid twenty three years, when he departed from this earth, on that fateful day, 12 September 2015, in a tragic car accident, about 68 kilometres from Otjiwarongo to Otavi. Born on 21 November 1972 at Ondangwa in Oshikoto Region, the…

12 Sep

FirstRand Namibia profit down 23.7 percent

ObserverUncategorisedFirstRand Namibia, FirstRand Namibia Chief Financial Officer Oscar Capelao

Staff Writer FirstRand Namibia released its financial results for the year ending 30 June 2020 where its profit before tax decreased by 23.7 percent to N$1.21 billion compared to N$1.58 billion recorded prior year. “FirstRand Namibia entered this crisis in a position of strength in terms of capital, liquidity, technology and, importantly, talent. Considering the repo rate and prime rate reduction during the reporting period of 275bps, net interest income remained flat, N$2 013.4 million (2019: N$2 012.2 million). Interest expense decreased by 0.4 percent while interest income decreased by 0.2 percent,” FirstRand Namibia Chief Financial Officer Oscar Capelao said.…