Lazarus Kwedhi and Sem Billy David
The moment you see a whole President with full executive powers reduced to an agent of the Yambuka Housing Scheme, it symbolizes flaws, cracks and fault lines in the Namibian governance system directly from the State House.
Recently President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah officially handed over two fabricated-material houses in Windhoek’s informal settlements of Kilimanjaro and 8ste Laan.
On the surface, it appears to be the President’s effort toward solving the housing crisis. In reality, it is political deception to cool the anger and frustration of the masses in informal settlements who have been victims of empty campaign promises.
From 10 000 houses to two demo houses
During the 2024 election campaign, President Netumbo promised to build 10 000 houses per year. What we saw in Windhoek was two self-funded houses at a cost of about N$200 000 each through the Yambuka Housing Scheme, against a housing backlog of over 300 000 nationally and more than 100 000 in Windhoek alone.
While it looks like a good gesture, in reality she reduced herself to a mere marketing officer promoting a private, profit-driven entity selling prefabricated material houses in informal settlements.
Who built those houses? Not the State. Those are demo houses by Yambuka to attract sales. The Presidency was used to promote fabricated-material houses using the image of the President and the power of the State House.
Who can confirm whether the N$400 000 did not come from the state coffer? And if the Presidency was not abused as a marketing tool, let us see if the next Yambuka sale will also be donated for free.
Acting contrary to executive mandate
The President is acting contrary to the executive powers vested in her as Head of State. The President has no mandate to donate two private houses.
The mandate is to mobilize financial resources and deliver affordable housing through existing state institutions vested with that mandate: The City of Windhoek, the National Housing Enterprise (NHE), and the Build Together Programme.
Instead, by endorsing Yambuka, the Presidency is promoting a private entity that is competing with and deserting state institutions.
It is shameful for the government to pump N$146 million into Shack Dwellers Federation – a private housing initiative – while withholding the same funds from legally mandated state institutions that are collapsing.
This raises a fundamental policy question: Why does the government promote middlemen to build people’s houses, particularly with fabricated materials, when no one built their own houses? Does the President herself, or the owner of Yambuka, live in a fabricated-material house?
The concept of affordability is distorted
The concept of affordable housing in relation to formalization of informal settlements cannot be achieved through middlemen and profit-oriented initiatives.
What Yambuka sells at N$120 000 for 18sqm and N$190 000 for 40sqm is not affordable for a security guard, taxi driver or informal trader earning N$2 000 per month.
Without land, without financing, without bulk services, it remains a product for those who already have land and money. It does not address the core problem: land servicing and tenure.
If the government is serious, the ideal model is known: central government through the ministry of urban and rural development must allocate funds to local authorities to service and deliver land ownership to the public, and let people build their own houses within municipal building standards and regulations.
That is how the Build Together project was designed. People do not need a President to hand them a prefab box; they need serviced land with title deeds.
Money laundering by politicians through tenderpreneurs
We know for a fact that the government has intentionally neglected state institutions and diverted state funds to tenderpreneur housing initiatives to reward middlemen for personal benefit and for funding political campaigns.
Why does NHE have no serviced land, no cement, no credit line, while private schemes get presidential launches at the State House? Why is Build Together given little while Shack Dwellers gets N$146 million?
When the President hands over a private product, she is not solving housing; she is endorsing a market. She is creating unfair competition, using state legitimacy to create private monopoly.
The City of Windhoek cannot compete with State House marketing. NHE cannot compete with a presidential photo opportunity.
Who is the presidency serving?
Policy analysis asks: who bears the burden and who benefits?
The burden is borne by residents of Kilimanjaro who will now be told Yambuka is the government-approved house, and must pay N$200 000 for a structure that can be dismantled and relocated, on land they do not own.
The benefit goes to Yambuka’s sales book, which after the presidential endorsement registered over 2 500 inquiries, and to politicians who want to show they delivered something before the next election.
An enabling state does not sell houses. It enables people to build their own houses by providing land, bulk infrastructure, and affordable finance.
Residents in informal settlements are not asking for donated fabricated houses. They are asking for serviced land, title deeds, and an end to eviction threats. They did not vote for a marketing officer.
They voted for a President. If the President is honest to the public, she should tell Namibians that she did not build those houses and that the sustainable solution remains funding the City of Windhoek and NHE to deliver land.
Otherwise, history will record that at a time when Namibia needed a Roosevelt with a new deal for housing, we got a marketing officer for Yambuka.
