NAMIBIA CONNECTS | COST OF LIVING CRISIS HITS WINDHOEK RESIDENTS - nbc

[00:00:00]investment to me. So I need to make money from this investment because I have a mortgage. I'm paying off a mortgage and all of that. So they take p they take those perspectives into account. But I think for households the rent is killing us and not only for the working class. Students are being are being treated the same way. We have now working class that are actually in student accommodation. It's very interesting.

[00:00:27]Now, how are the low-income households coping differently compared to the middle-class households?

[00:00:33]>> They are not coping. They are barely coping.

[00:00:37]The minimum wage is at 4,000. You get a household where you have round about 10 individuals in that household and there's only one bread winner. How are they making ends meet? We recently um got a an increase tariff increase in electricity. You get 37 units for $100.

[00:00:57]Now imagine one bread winner in a house of 10 individuals. How long is that electricity going to last? It isn't. You get someone who makes $50,000 a month and someone who makes 50,000 perm. The 50,000 that's the lower income. uh the 50,000 per NM is the lower income while the 50,000 per month that is um the the upper class or let's say middle spending $100 for the person who makes little is not the same as the one who takes 50 per month. It's not the same but it bears the same weight. It bears the same weight but it's not the same.

[00:01:42]Namibia has a guinea coefficient of 0.59.

[00:01:47]What does that mean? It means most of the economic resources are being enjoyed by the few the few wealthy that we have and most of the population we have a population of 3 million people. Most of the population is not actually reaping the benefits of these resources. We have a lot of resources in the country. But I tell you the story is different when you go to the informal settlements, when you go to Calura. But when you move up this side, it's totally different.

[00:02:25]>> You're speaking about, you know, informal settlement. Do you see a change in behavior, people maybe moving further out of the city, you know, starting a new settlement out there where they can have shacks? because there were stories online where people would, you know, were complaining saying that they'd rather stay there. Do you agree with that? Do you see any behavioral changes in terms of people or maybe should it be a thing where people cut transport and use less transport? What do you think is the behavior of people right now and how can it change?

[00:02:58]>> People move because they have no choice.

[00:03:02]They actually forced to move.

[00:03:04]Uh yes, we are focusing on increasing various um various uh tariffs. The municipal bills are up, electricity tariffs are up. We are focusing on that.

[00:03:20]But rather we should be focusing on housing, creating homes for people.

[00:03:27]In Botswana, there's a concept that says a home is a human right. I'm supposed to have a home and not a shack. It's supposed to be structure, proper structure.

[00:03:39]People are forced to then move and and yes, the behavior is there. People are moving. But remember at the back of my mind, I still have it that the city creates opportunity. I move far, but I'm still able to get to the city center.

[00:03:56]That's why we have people who set up all these uh illegal uh structures that are called homes while they were not supposed to be setting up there. It's because as a country and as a government we have not taken the initiative to ensure that we are creating enough housing opportunities as per the population that we have. So people yes the the behavior is there the patterns do show we you know if you are driving out of vint so many structures set up there they are not supposed to be there some are set up even uh when you are driving on your way to the airport and that is not how we are supposed to welcome tourists that are coming in this country because we paint an image of as we don't care about our citizens especially those that are then in the positions to to change the nature of these issues.

[00:04:52]>> Now, we spoke about behavior, we spoke about, you know, the issue right now in households, but maybe you can expand a bit in terms of the factors that are pushing these costs to go up.

[00:05:05]>> Yes, some are international factors. Uh we understood with what happened in the Middle East, yes, prices were going to go up.

[00:05:16]Uh And it only took one thing to happen. We had the Middle East. We had what was happening in Ukraine. We all saw that oil prices were up. And that is a cost for businesses. You know, most things are brought to us through logistics, you know, transportation. So if fuel is expensive and I am then bringing uh products from a certain country, I then have to kater for that extra dollar of fuel. But who do I push that burden on to to the consumer?

[00:05:53]But I was reading recently and and and the the the city of Vint indicated that no part of the reason as to why we have increase the the municipal bills is because first we have acquired a new labor force or an additional labor force and also for financial sustainability.

[00:06:19]But how do you then address the issues that are there on the ground you know it shouldn't just be about cost cost?

[00:06:27]It should be about what is on the ground. And yes, if you look at [clears throat] in terms of the waste management, refuse removal. Yes, you do need labor. You actually need more labor in order for you to to cater because now you have a bigger population. Population isn't as it was back then. back then were estimated to be round under 2 million. Now we at 3 million meaning you need a bigger labor force but we should be addressing the issues on the ground and we should not just be you know Namibia takes a blueprint from South Africa know what what the South Africans do somehow we always tend to do it and and fairly so because they the two economies are more or less the same but the cost of living in South Africa is totally different because their population is different. Namibia is a smaller population. We are supposed to be living lavish here. It's not supposed to be that expensive. [snorts] >> Now, what immediate interventions could government or the city of Windu put in place to give residents some sort of relief?

[00:07:35]the the the ideal um route to take here would be yes policy takes a while but policy needs to be reactive to what is on the ground. It needs to speak to issues on the ground. We need to look at the dynamics of our population.

[00:07:56]Um we need to ensure that the resources that we have and I tell you we have a lot of resources. resources that we have they need to be used to capacitate everybody in the country.

[00:08:11]We should be transparent.

[00:08:14]We should hold ourselves accountable.

[00:08:17]Decisions willn't be made without considering the the the the next individual. You know, uh, usually when you you have one spectrum, you you you tend not to see the whole playing field.

[00:08:32]But we need to do things for for for our citizens, for the taxpayers because taxpayers should be holding the government accountable because it's taxpayers money. We have a progressive tax system to say the more you make, the more tax you pay. And um let's focus let's let's bring back uh low cost housing. What happened to low cost housing?

[00:08:58]Let's bring it back to ensure that everybody has a home. We are we are currently in the process of uh extraction in the in the energy sector.

[00:09:08]Let's look at the case studies of uh Angola and Nigeria. Let's learn from that. fuel in this country going ahead should be very affordable and I hope it will be.

[00:09:22]>> Now what role do you think that uh employers play in all of this in helping uh the workers that are going through these challenges housing and transport just to make the cost of living easier for them? Should there be maybe some sort of a policy that governs you know employers to say well every it's mandatory after a year or two that there should be an increase because every other thing is going up but the salary remains the same.

[00:09:51]>> I think um think nowadays companies are quite ahead. You get a few companies that say your salary should be linked to the CP, the inflation rate to say when it goes up, it tracks your cost of living. Cuz uh if if a bottle of cooking oil is $20 today, tomorrow it will not be $20, it might be 25 because in most cases it's very unlikely that inflation goes down. The hope is always that it goes down but most of the times it usually goes up because of the lifestyle but you know they they have a a an a a rate to say they have an agreement to say your salary tracks the index but there are consequences to those. As an employer the best thing you could do for your employee is increase the salary. But what happens when you increase the salary? There's more money in the economy. More money chasing good leads to what? More inflation. Because and and that's how we are not cing inflation. But from an employer's perspective, the idea is yes, have have a have an agreement that says an employee salary should be linked to the CPI. So it tracks when the CPI goes up, salary goes up with it. Cool.

[00:11:16]Now in if current trends continue in Ventuk or maybe as Namibia in the next two three years what does that mean for an average household?

[00:11:27]It's going to be tough if if it continues the way it is without us looking at remedies to create employment opportunities, without us without us actually trying to, you know, uh, put a ceiling on the on the cost, especially the rent market.

[00:11:55]It's ridiculous. The rent market is actually fluctuating massively and not to the betterment of the tenant in favor of the of of of of the landlord. If we don't look at all these things and if we don't ensure that we capacitate our people with the necessary skills they need in order for us to actually specialize and work on having a comparative advantage on the resources that we have then it's going to be a different case. We are going to be we are going to be importing importing and when it gets here I am going to be adding on a 50% profit margin and you as a consumer are going to be experiencing those con you're going to be carrying that burden. So if it continues this way, unfortunately it's we are going to be scrambling and we don't want to see to see Namibia experience what happened to to to Zimbabwe, you know, where the currency is just losing its [snorts] value.

[00:13:07]>> What's the one message you'd want every Fent resident and policy maker to take from your report?

[00:13:17]>> The costs are going up. Policies should be reactive. As policy maker, we need to speak to issues on the ground and before raising costs, we need to do public consultations. We need to engage the public on why is the cost is going up and let's let's open a debate to say from a consumer's perspective what do you think if we seek to increase a specific tariff by 5% then the consumer should provide their input to say the 5% is not reasonable let's meet halfway 3% and then you provide the pros and the cons of the 3% % if it's feasible or not. And but as as consumers and as citizens, I think we should really try to be informed and we should be vocal about this. You know, I say most decisions are published in the government gazette. You get 14 days to provide commentary on a specific item in the government gazette. Use the government gazette.

[00:14:36]Use the government. If something is going up, you you provide response to say no this cannot be going up by this much. Why is this and this and this? And then you give the governing institution time to respond to say the reason we are increasing this by this much is because of this. and let's keep the conversation. That way it enables us to hold each other accountable both from a consumer's perspective and from a policy maker.