Making A Better World - Milton Louw

Facebook and social online media is today becoming a method of sharing our ideas with friends and relatives from all around the world, and all around our country too. It allows us to share our ideas, photos and private comments with each other and we know that our friends often think in the same wey that we do - that is after all why we are friends. Many of us do not think that our comments or posts should be considered public, or often consider that people we might not know can read our posts and judge us accoring to these comments. Last night, 5 January 2012, I was rather saddened to read a post by one of our leading artists who has over 29,000 people following him on Facebook. The Dogg posted the following at around 20h00 on his fan page: "A MULE IS A CROSS BREED OF A DONKEY AND A HORSE.....SO A BLACK PERSON AND A WHITE PERSON OFFSPRING IS ALSO A MULE SINCE IS CROSS BREED?....HAHAHAHAHAH"   This is obviously a racial slur and can lead to a charge of racism. What was ...

It is quite common to hear politicians admonoshing the white communities for not participating in natinal events. I am not a history buff, but have recently been talking about my student politics days and placed a few pohotos from this period. It got me thinking about the participation of young people (white, coloured or black) and the following struck me in an article, "..But maybe memory is what young people need to be taught before they can be taught actual history." So, I have started a small project to ensure that our common memory becomes available to our youth through the Wikipedia website. This site covers almost all areas of knowledge, but I found very little written about Namibia. While doing this I found that there were no templates on the languages or cultural identities of many of our peopls.  I have started the  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coloured_People_in_Namibia  and hope to assist in developing similar sites about our common memories. At t...

I feel very much honored to be asked to write a foreword to this book by a political and economic researcher about our country and our times. The author of this book has spent many years studying the political and economic set up of our country. In my opinion, he has come up with many constructive ideas that can contribute to Namibia`s development. During the liberation struggle, we were building our sand castles and dreaming of how we wanted an independent Namibia to be. After we took the reins of power, we realized that it was not so easy to realize our dreams. It became apparent that even if the leaders of the government have good ideas, they cannot implement programmes and projects alone, but must rely on the commitment of civil servants to work in the interest of the Namibian people. As we set about to transform a system that has been based upon apartheid and colonialism, we were also challenged to transform the thinking of some staunch ...

During the 1980's the battle for the hearts of the Namibian people was being fought. The PLAN combatants were waging war with their Angolan, Cuban and Russian allies, but this was taking place outside the borders of the country. Inside the country, the battle was in the form of protest and civil disobedience. The internal struggle included famous Namibians such as Hendrik Witbooi, Danny Tjongarero, Niko Bessinger, Anton Lubowski, John Pandeni and Ben Ulenga. They were harassed, beaten and arrested continuously by the South African regime. However, the regime felt it was winning. They had created ethnic authorities and many of these leaders had convinced the people of the need for managed democracy versus the communist take-over by SWAPO. All that changed when the students started participating in the struggle. In 1987 the police were unable to control and prevent the students from running through Katutura and Khomasdal, with some of the marchers reaching the central busine...

Google is looking for bright youngsters (aged 13 - 18) from around the world to submit interesting and creative Science projects that are relevant to the world today. It would be fantastic to see a Namibian student emerging as one of the 15 finalists who each get a $25 000 scholarship, An internship (at CERN, Google or Scientific American) personalized Lego kits Digital Access to Scientific American for their school If I was still in high-school, I'd be scheming to win this thing. For more information, check out the Google Science Fair website.

There was a proliferation of NGO’s created during the pre-Independence and immediately thereafter. They are involved in business development, cultural groups, agriculture, Aids, etc. They include international organisations such as the Red Cross, or local chapters of internationally accepted bodies such as the Namibian Society for Human Rights (NSHR). Local NGO’s can work at gender issues such as the Women’s Action for Development (WAD), or animal rights such as the SPCA. They also include a variety of welfare organisations such as the Blood transfusion service or industry interests such as the NCCI or ICT Alliance. While most NGO’s are doing a good job in Namibia, unfortunately, some have not. They have abused their mandate or become a vehicle for an individual who is seen as the driving force or even “responsible for the success of the organisation”. This leads to the next question, “How do we distinguish between a good and bad NGO?” The following questions provide us with a litm...

The African People's Organisation (APO), originally the African Political Organisation, was formed in Cape Town in 1902 and was initially the most prominent "coloured" pressure group in South Africa. Its interest in SWA/Namibia goes back to at least 1918 when it opposed the transfer of the former German colony to the South Africa Authority. The first SWA branch of the APO was established in Windhoek in February 1923. In informing the colonial authorities of the establishment of the branch, the leaders stated that the aims of the organisation were to defend "the Social Political and Civil Rights of the Cape Coloured Community throughout the SW Protectorate. Another political organisation which devoted itself to representing the Coloured community in SWA, the African National Bond, was also launched in Windhoek in 1925. The APO, although it recruited its members from the relatively small group of educated and economically comfortably off Coloureds, was to become the ...

The whole world is becoming focussed on social media and the number of users on Facebook, Twitter, etc. However, very little reliable information or statistics seems to be available about Namibian user and their preferences. So, while I had very little to do this weekend while sitting in a cold Düsseldorf, I decided to look at what figures I could put together. This first place to start was Twitter. Twitter is the site where I get most of my introductions to a topic after which I may decide to look into it further and click on the link. Because of the limit of only 140 characters, I don’t have to worry much about missing a comment by a friend because some other “friends” has loaded dozens of pictures or played lots of games. News providers I started my Twitter search by looking at the Namibian media, that is, the companies or websites who provide information on Namibia. This is what I found in order of the most followers (as at 22.02.11): #namibia_news - 1,980 followers. Mos...

I have just received a briefing paper from the Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik / German Development Institute concerning "The potential of pro-market activism as a tool for making finance work for Africa: a political economy perspective". The author argues that: " This suggests that information on creditworthiness is basically a public good, in the sense that it is non-rival in consumption and it is very costly to exclude anyone from using it. When the market fails to let banks appropriate the returns of information about their costumers, banks will under-invest in the acquisition of such information. ..... Credit registries give access to clients’ credit history and increase the transparency of borrower quality, which makes it safer for financial institutions to lend to new customers. ....... The Kenyan Central Bank (CBK) took the initiative and issued a regulation which mandated financial institutions to share information with credit bureaus ." ...

Your bank manager looks at your credit report – Not at You. This is one list you never want to be on – the Credit Blacklist. A bad credit rating can put your life on hold for many years as it makes getting credit impossible. More and more Namibians are getting caught out, sometime unfairly, and the Namibia Consumer Protection Group felt more information must be circulated to consumers about the issue. A credit default is a black mark against your name that doesn't wash away and the three Credit Bureaus, (Transunion ITC, Compuscan and Credit Information Bureau Namibia) currently list over 50 000 Namibians that are branded as credit lepers. I have found that mostly young Namibians are prone to having problems with credit. The advertising makes it sound so easy, “Buy Now, Pay Later”. Unfortunately, when it comes time to pay, these items are not always first on their list. This then causes problems as they start falling in arrears and eventual find themselves blacklisted. Often...

Namibia’s regulatory position is like stepping back ten years if you’re more used to the competitive rough and tumble in Africa’s more developed markets. The historic incumbent Telecom Namibia still has some monopoly privileges and the new incumbent, Government-owned mobile operator MTC is in danger of behaving in much the same way. Sadly the country has closed its regulator with a view to opening a new one. However, this has meant all things regulatory have gone into a holding pattern. Russell Southwood looks at the key market barriers that are holding things back. Historic incumbent Telecom Namibia has an infrastructure monopoly and although the power utility NamPower has fibre assets, it has only recently tendered them: MTC (which may build a link to South Africa), Telecom Namibia and some ISPs are all interested in the capacity. Telecom Namibia invested in what was then Africa’s only real international cable, SAT3 but didn’t invest enough to get a landing station. This is someth...

PARLIAMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF NAMIBIA NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FEBRUARY 2009 BY: Chief Ankama, SWAPO MP Comrade Speaker, I regard this motion as an extraordinarily important one, not just to me but to other many Namibians if not all. This is the third time that I move this motion in the house. It first lapsed during the first term of 2008 when parliament went into recess and then re-introduced during the last term of last year but ended without reaching its intended goal, the goal of finding a lasting directive to solving unemployment situation in Namibia. Now comrade Speaker, I am here again standing to re-introduce the motion on unemployed Namibians with or without professional qualifications, accompanied by some amendments. The motion seeks to: 1. discuss, assess and ascertain the seriousness of unemployed Namibians with professional trainings and qualifications obtained from recognized educational institutions here in Namibia or abroad; 2. this motion equally should include in ou...

By: Milton Louw The banking population in Namibia has increased substantially in 2009 according to the World Bank’s Financial Access 2010 report released on Thursday, 16 September. The number of deposit account holders in Namibia has grown by 23 percent, with statistics confirming the resilience of the seven commercial banks during a year weighed down by the international financial crises. According to the report, more than three quarters of the population (752 per 1000 adults) hold deposit accounts and 20 percent have loans with financial institutions. In comparison, the report shows that sub-Saharan Africa had an average of 163 deposit accounts per 1000 adults and only 28 bank loans per 1000 adults. In addition the report shows that the disbursement of loans shrank across sub-Saharan Africa last year, with Namibian loan accounts declining in volume by 36 percent. The most remarkable was that Namibia scored the highest with 1185 “Depositors with Other Depository Corporations” ...

The ability to save information on a computer (for example in the central register) will also necessitate new legislation to be promulgated. These laws are especially necessary in our Information and Communication enabled society where information is stored on electronic retrieval systems. Legislation for informational privacy The Namibian Constitution states in Article 13 Privacy: “(1) No persons shall be subject to interference with the privacy of their homes, correspondence or communications save as in accordance with law and as is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the protection of health or morals, for the prevention of disorder or crime or for the protection of the rights or freedoms of others.” The Constitution thus guarantees only “Physical Privacy”. The storage of personal and business information (“Informational Privacy”) must have legislation that will prevent misuse of...