EDITORIAL: Polishing Dingara's rough diamond

Swapo member of parliament Elifas Dingara’s idea for each Namibian citizen to be allocated N$1 million is wild, but it can be polished into something workable.

Many Namibians, like Dingara, are sick of the platitudes. We live in a country of abundance and poverty.

In Kavango East, 16 people died last year from consuming contaminated food made from the residue of a traditional alcoholic brew.

Days later, a man died while trying to jump onto a garbage truck as it arrived at a dumpsite in Walvis Bay. The deceased was trying to beat fellow scavengers to the refuse being delivered.

Walvis Bay, a harbour town, sees the capture and shipment of thousands of fish consignments to other locations - while its residents feed on garbage. The irony of this situation is deeply unsettling.

Namibia, with its relatively manageable population and abundant resources, could become a model African welfare state. The essentials - including social stability, a functioning democracy and institutions, and raw materials - are already in place.

As a country, we had two choices to deal with poverty and other social challenges befalling us.

The initial option was to invest in the expansion of our economy, which would afterwards generate jobs, but we are lagging behind in this area.

The second choice is to create a welfare state to form a buffer against poverty, but even that is hard without the first option being implemented. The bottom line, however, is that we have enough resources to kick-start either of the two.