Windhoek (dpa) – Ten years after independence the Namibian government says it will stick to its policy of “willing seller, willing buyer” to achieve a long-term, equable redistribution of land.
Around 5,000 commercial farmers, most of them white, occupy large tracts of arable land in Namibia – land which hardliners say was stolen by the colonial authorities and should therefore be taken back without compensation.
Following the violent invasion of white farms in Zimbabwe last year, the debate on land in Namibia gained new impetus, with some politicians arguing in parliament that there was no need to “buy back land that was always ours”.
For years Herero paramount chief Kuaima Riruako has been waging an as yet unsuccessful battle to claim reparations from the German government for his people, 60,000 of whom perished during the Herero wars at the beginning of the 1900s.
“The rest of us were deprived of land that we traditionally owned and grazed our cattle on,” DTA leader and member of the Herero tribe Katuutire Kaura says.
But neither the Namibian nor the German government are prepared to mete out land according to tribal claims and preferences. Germany has repeatedly said it is doing its part in fulfilling its historical obligation as former colonial power by being the biggest single donor of development aid to Namibia.
And the Namibian government, while realizing it may be sitting on a “time bomb ready to explode” as CoD opposition politician Ignatius Shixwameni put it in parliament, is as yet not prepared to bow to pressure from hardliners calling for a land grab.
In the wake of the invasion of farms in Zimbabwe last year, some Namibian farmers received written threats by unknown citizens to evacuate their farms “or else”.
This had farmers worried, but government has tried to allay fears of violent retribution against landowners.
“Our saving grace is that we have a small population and a big country,” Finance Minister Nangolo Mbumba stated, reiterating comments made by President Sam Nujoma when asked whether he would follow his close friend and ally Robert Mugabe’s policy.
“We have lots of land for the landless. We just need to develop it,” Mbumba
added, indicating that for the country’s 1.7 million people there was enough
land to go around.
Commercial agriculture, mainly livestock farming, forms one of the mainstays
of the Namibian economy together with mining, fishing and tourism.
“We need the productive farmers. Nobody will take land from those contributing
to the national income,” Ponhele ya Frans, former unionist and SWAPO parliamentarian
said.
But he is in favour of the expropriation where land is not adequately utilised.
“We have many absentee landlords, who come once a year to have a holiday
on their farm. That is not good enough,” he said.
Parliament has been considering the introduction of a land tax, which is
to bring much-needed revenue to the national coffers, in particular the
fund set up for land acquisition and resettlement, on the one hand, and
ensure that land, is productively utilised.
Regarding the development of land, the ministry of lands has now commissioned
studies to look at how the communal areas can be farmed effectively or
used for tourism purposes.
Especially in the populous northern regions, where 60 percent of the country’s
population live, communal land has either been sapped owing to ineffective
farming practises and overpopulation, or it has remained under-utilised
owing to a lack of infrastructure, training and finance.
