City’s parking privatisation sparks outrage

About two months ago, Windhoek residents accustomed to parking around the capital’s streets got a rude awakening with the introduction of a new parking regime.

The new parking regime sparked outrage. Motorists complained about the parking fees, but there is little recourse because the City has outsourced its parking management mandate to private firms. Street vendors who were used to pocketing money from guarding cars on a daily basis have also been hit hard.

Some of them have since been recruited by Keyplot Investments and Charge Tech, the firms that got the rights to manage the parking affairs of the City. Keyplot is owned by one of Windhoek’s property barons, the United Africa Group.

According to the municipality’s spokesperson, Harold Akwenye, the company is expected to pay the city about N$5 million during the five-year duration of the contract.

Namibian Sun established that drivers are charged the minute their vehicle comes to a standstill in a parking bay – N$8 for the busier parts of the CBD and N$3 for downtown, such as the City of Windhoek offices.

Five years

The privatisation of the parking system has seen traffic in the Central Business District (CBD) almost dry up overnight, with empty parking bays clearly visible across Independence Avenue and other prime parking areas in town.

Parking hotspots such as the Windhoek High Court and Magistrates Courts in Lüderitz Street, SWAMED parking and the busy one-way Frans Indongo Street – which would ordinarily have no parking spaces available during working hours – are less congested as drivers opt to park their cars in areas that are not controlled.

Akwenye also pointed out that Keyplots Investments, which has landed the biggest chunk of the bid compared to Charge Tech, which only manages the upper parking of the City of Windhoek, has to recoup investments they made in the City.

"This is a tender for five years, and the agreement is that by the end of these five years they must pay the City a fixed amount of N$5 million. Keyplots Investments upgraded that parking area at TownSquare, where they put up booms – they need to recoup that money."

Claims addressed

Akwenye added that the municipality lost potential parking revenue earnings over the years.

"For the past five years, we struggled to obtain a proper parking device mechanism. The City was losing money for the past five years, and those monies collected from parking are used to maintain these roads – those yellow and white lines you see. Back in the day, we had those old devices in which you put money – those were vandalised, and it was easy to steal the money," he said.

According to him, claims that this has led to car guards losing their jobs are untrue. Allegedly, they were offered positions with the companies at a salary of N$3 500, but some reportedly refused, claiming they earned more than that."

According to a parking marshal, who chose to remain anonymous, they earn N$2 600 as a fixed salary and an additional N$600 for transport allowance monthly.

According to the parking marshals on duty, vehicle registration plates are scanned, and those that have not paid their tickets will allegedly be reported to the City, which will issue a fine of N$750.

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