Observer

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Momma Oteya has a baby girl

Momma Oteya has a baby girl

Staff writer Mother’s Day this year was a perfect celebration for popular Afro pop artist Oteya who was blessed with a bouncing baby girl a month before the popular day. The veteran songstress gave birth on the 1st of April 2020. Even more interesting, Oteya managed to have a baby on her own birthday! The former Gal Level queen confirmed the news on her social media posts. We had wondered what Oteya was up to these days. Lockdown is tough, but bonding with a new baby during these times is a blessing. We wish her a Happy Mother’s Day! Her…
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Lioness finds closure with new song

Lioness finds closure with new song

Here to work through some recent heartache, Namibian rapper and singer Lioness has dropped a new album this week. She is switching things up from her usual rap-focused sound with something a little more melodic on Wish You Were Here from the album of the same name. As the track unfolds, on her smash hit video filmed in Cape Town, it becomes clear this is about more than the beautiful South African setting. “I wrote Wish You Were Here when I was infatuated with my ex-partner," Lioness told Complex via email. "It was a long-distance relationship where I felt very…
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The price of not knowing why

Our educational system teaches students to ‘do’ but not to think. Beneficiaries of apartheid and colonialism loved this. Thinking people will quickly and easily perceive weaknesses and attack strategically. After independence, in most public schools, that same back-handed educational trend continued. The reason changed. The priority was increasing higher literacy statistics and ‘grades.' The government did not want to slog up the hard road of educating teachers and teaching students critical thinking. In this pandemic, we now pay the price for this. We ask people to wear masks, but do not help them to understand why. That is the reason…
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Couch Cat: Mask etiquette rules

Jackie Wilson Asheeke For now, we all have to wear masks on our faces. So, let’s make the best of a weird situation. It cannot be all doom and gloom. Let’s look at this whole thing with a different eye; shall we? I put on my mask for the first time to go to work on the first day after the lockdown ended. My rude awakening is that I dirtied the inside of the thing immediately with my face make-up and lipstick. Duh-uh. I must be some smart person to not have thought about that one. Rule #1 – no…
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N$500m required for e-learning

N$500m required for e-learning

Andrew Kathindi The Ministry of Education needs N$500 million to fully implement its e-learning needs to cater for learners whose normal learning schedule has been disrupted by COVID-19. Deputy Director of Information Technology in the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture, Johan van Wyk, told Windhoek Observer that the ministry has submitted a request to government for a COVID-19 stimulus package and has also submitted a request within its normal ministry budget process. “For an end-to-end package and what we would need for all solutions, not just data, although internet will be the most important part, we are looking at…
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Govt weighs MTC listing plans

Govt weighs MTC listing plans

Staff Writer Government could be forced to review the set timelines and defer the listing of Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTC) due to COVID-19 outbreak, for what was to be the country’s biggest listing of a Namibian company on the Namibian Stock Exchange (NSX). According to the initially announced timelines, MTC was expected to be listed on the bourse by July 2020, after having submitted its listing application to the Namibian Stock Exchange (NSX) by February 2020, with the opening date for its public offer having been set for March 2020 and closing in June 2020. “We are discussing the matter…
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Time to analyse issues ideologically, give them an ideological perspective

Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro Certainly the emergency and lockdown could not but compel all of us to shift gears in one way or another given the time of reflection it may have afforded us. If only if to maintain some sanity from the solitary confinement, for some, and from depression visited by confinement with those some may all the time been trying avoid. For me criticisms which have been floated as analyses in our media, against the administration of Dr Hage Geingob, since the advent of his first term in 2015, compelled me to shift in an ideological gear. A gear that…
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Observatory: Lives are worth more than the economy

Clementine Tjameya Matshidiso Moeti, World Health Organisation (WHO) regional director for Africa has listed Namibia as having reported zero cases of COVID-19 over a couple of weeks. I humbly question this conclusion. I am not a doctor, nor do I have any health care training. Admittedly, I can make my choices about what to believe regarding COVID-19 in Namibia, based only on what I read. With the low level of testing in Namibia (maybe only 1000 tests done for 2.5 million people), I am not certain the number of 16 cases can be accurate. Countries with reportedly high infection rate…
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Focus on the basic needs of the people

. . . anything else is noise Jackie W Asheeke COVID-19 is a game changer. Any business or individual thinking that all will snap back into pre-pandemic shape is delusional. The best thing to do is to lower your barriers against change and thank God you are alive. After that, we all must focus on the needs of the people and step-in to thwart the profiteers, conmen, hoarders, blindly selfish people and other vermin that feed off of other people’s misery. Food stores in Windhoek are raising prices in the middle of a State of Emergency. Government should take legislative…
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The Time Traveler: Towards a freer media

Hugh Ellis It’s a day on which the sacrifices of journalists are honored, and one on which we look forward to greater advances that enable everyone in society to have equal rights to communicate publicly. What is great is that Namibian journalists are not being killed, imprisoned or having their lives threatened. Bribery of journalists is rare. But this does not necessarily mean all is well. Looking back on the tone of many stakeholders’ statements leading up to WPFD 2020, as a career-long media practitioner and educator, I’m a bit disappointed. Politicians and their spokespeople seem to have equated a…
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