Editorial

GOVERNMENT of the Republic of Namibia should boldly take the decision to answer to the public out-cry of the young people by creating permanent jobs to the jobless Namibians.

Of recent, the Namibian youth have raised their voice to the Namibian government to be given jobs, of which President Dr. Hage Geingob has been dismissing that “graduates should create their own jobs” which they find as a big challenge due to financial exclusions such as the start-up and collateral attachments are hard to find.

The new Financial Sector Transformation Strategy on Small and Medium Enterprises in Namibia, should otherwise focus on the matter of excluding the MSMEs from borrowing funds from commercial banks. It is evident that the inability to have access to finance is the main obstacle that cause failure to MSMEs not to grow more efficiently.

While this intervention is implemented, we would like to caution that this should not turn out to be like one of the failed MSMEs Bank, where political well-connected individuals and politicians swindled the bank with soft loans which were never repaid and later fizzled out and the SME Bank died a natural death.

Unemployment rate in Namibia is currently stand at 33.4 percent (2021), whilst the youth unemployment rate as of last year was on 50 percent. Namibia is one of the countries in Africa with high unemployment.

Creating jobs to unemployed youth in the country will be another move that will put Namibia as a democratic country that respects the will and wishes of the people as enshrined in its constitution.

The current situation of high unemployment rate amongst graduates is a worrisome phenomenon as the country celebrated its 33 years of independence while unemployment is still topping very high amongst the graduates especially the academic discipline of education in teaching profession.

Here, we should give credits to the government for having allocating a tune of N$200 million for job creations for the Ministry of Basic Education, Arts and Culture for the National Budget of 2023 – 2024 Financial Year.

Why government should consider this as the matter of fact ? Is that since Namibia gained its independence, more jobs have been allocated to the former plan combatants and the children of the liberation struggle with automatic appointments when they protest, with that note government has been neglecting those who did not go to exile, which hardly make them to be employed by the government.

Today, many youths are holding degrees and diplomas on the job market in different fields of studies, laying at home doing nothing because there is no job to do, and some are even involved in criminal activities as a result of unemployment.

However, in order to address this plight, GRN should seriously consider the plea of unemployed youth in the country by building more classrooms in schools and bring some projects at their door steps that can sustain their lives, to distance them from committing crimes in the country.

We believe that in most cases crimes are being committed when unemployed young people involve themselves in alcohol and drug abuse because they have nothing to do, to keep them busy.

In this 33 years of independence, Namibian government should think of investing in its young generation as they are the future leaders who will take the country to another level.

Namibia has a small population when compared to other countries, this means employment was not supposed to be a concern to its people, as others they go on retirement and death, and this give opportunities to young people to take over.

The idea of downsizing the public sector is not the solution to the problem.

We therefore, urge government to look into this as a national plight to avoid favouritism and corruption by not selling jobs as the case in Zambezi region, but should appoint graduates on merits according to qualifications and competencies.