Niël Terblanché
Namibia’s fishing industry is again under siege by foreign-flagged fishing vessels from China and Angola that are mercilessly pillaging the country’s northern waters.
Several persons, who witnessed the flagrant acts of piracy last week and who wished to remain anonymous, said these fishing trawlers are plundering irreplaceable fish stocks in critical breeding and spawning zones immediately south of the Kunene River mouth.
“For at least a month, these criminal vessels have operated openly, dragging the seabed with massive, weighted dragnets that obliterate everything in their path,” one witness who visits the area regularly said.
According to the witness, not even the endangered sea turtles, which rely on these waters to lay their eggs, have been spared.
The recent visitors to the Kunene River mouth were able to capture pictures of the vessels near the shore with their mobile phones.
They also used a drone to record unmistakable evidence of the ships in action.
Eyewitnesses counted nine foreign trawlers dragging the ocean floor for three hours each before brazenly sailing off with their illegal haul to offload onto a floating factory ship in Angolan waters or even possibly sailing further north to the Angolan fishing port of Tombua, where processing plants are equipped to receive their stolen catch.
As can be seen in the pictures, the poachers draped shade nets and tarpaulins over the hulls of their vessels, obscuring the names and registration numbers.
According to a witness, a ship with a grey hull, which he suspects is one of the law enforcement and research vessels belonging to the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources or even the Namibian Navy was seen in the area.
People witnessed that rather than challenging the illegal trawlers, the only vessel they approached was a Namibian-flagged vessel legally harvesting crab or octopus.
According to one eyewitness, the foreign poachers, completely undisturbed by the ministry’s vessel, continued their assault on Namibian waters, leaving behind a veritable graveyard.
As can be seen from footage taken by a visitor’s drone, the seabed in the shallow waters now bears deep scars from the relentless scraping of the nets of the pirate vessels.
One of the witnesses said that this is not just an attack on Namibia’s marine ecosystem—it is an economic war against the Namibian people.
The fishing industry, already struggling with low quotas and declining fish stocks, is being deliberately crippled by this unchecked plundering.
Klazen said that the current situation in the northern territorial waters of Namibia has been brought to his attention.
“I have called an urgent meeting with officials in operations on Monday to understand why we are not acting because I know one of our patrol vessels is currently up north,” he said.
About a year ago, the chairman of the Confederation of Namibian Fishing Associations (CNFA), Matti Amukwa, stated that the Namibian fishing industry suffers annual losses exceeding N$1.5 billion due to illicit, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing practices.
The industry’s severe revenue losses were revealed last year after the arrest of an Angolan fishing vessel engaged in illegal fishing activities within Namibian territorial waters, serving as a stark warning to other vessels operating illegally in the region.
At the time, Amukwa said that the losses incurred by the Namibian fishing industry are both significant.
