Black economic empowerment limited to “cousins”

Friday, 25 September 2009 07:46

[McHenry Venaani, Secretary-General of the DTA of Namibia] Namibia Wildlife Resorts’ (NWR) decision to award Public Private Partnerships to companies with ties to the ruling party, has once again re-affirmed that only “black cousins” benefit from such deals, said McHenry Venaani, Secretary-General of the DTA of Namibia at a press conference this week.
He said black economic empowerment (BEE) only benefits a certain number of people. According to Venaani, there is serious inter-trading within government as office bearers who are related issue government tenders to each other. “A person who works in a certain ministry has a cousin in another one who starts a business. They then receive tenders from government, not because thery are good, but because they are related to someone. These tenders are moving around between certain people,” he said. He said civil servants should not be the ones to receive business from government as they are already part of government.
Venaani further said that this inter-trading is affecting other good businesses that need actual empowerment.
According to reports, Tungeni Africa, Prosperity Africa and Reho Spa received tourism concessions from NWR because of their association to SWAPO.
Johan de Waal also questioned Cabinet’s decision to increase Tobie Aupindi’s (CEO of NWR) salary to N$140 000 per month.
He said this situation is unwarranted as many people in the country have to live on N$200 or N$300.
“I do not know if Cabinet thinks or whether they think at all. Now if you travel this country you will see that people are really suffering so how can the same Cabinet who says it is pro-poor give one person a salary of N$140 000 per month when there are so many poor people? We do not agree with this. This shows that this government does not care for the poor, it is only the few elite in SWAPO who are getting richer every day,” de Waal said.