Project Whistleblower Namibia

17/09/2024

The opposition parties need to start asking for a full and final copy of the voters roll so we can audit it in good time BEFORE elections this time around.
I for one am a little leery of the official census that claims we have 3.1 million people when Botswana - which did a much more thorough job - only has 2.7m people.
After all, we have exactly the same demographics.
Elections are always rigged well in advance of the actual event.

16/09/2024

A reminder of how SWAPO got to where they are right now.

LAWYER Sisa Namandje has confirmed to the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) that his law firm handled millions of dollars that now form part of the Fishrot investig*tion. […]

15/09/2024

Calle calls out the Hyphen GH2 project in the Tsau//Khaeb Park and Rusatom's Stampriet uranium mine for what it is:

"Unfortunately, it appears that economic and money issues are regarded as much more pressing, while environmental concerns are regarded as considerably less important.

This is especially relevant for the ‘green hydrogen, green industry’ components.

The demand for economic growth overshadows, by far, the need to act in an environmentally sustainable way.

This is substantiated by the fact that the industrial development of green hydrogen is happening in a proclaimed national park and is being funded through the Environmental Investment Fund.

This is important to note as Namibia’s national parks are proclaimed to protect and conserve biodiversity and ecological systems and processes on state land, not to develop industries.

To use them for industries, even if they’re called green, is a misuse of statutory power."

Bless you, Calle.

%%title%% %%sep%% %%primary_category%% %%sep%% %%sitename%% %%sep%% Namibia is endowed with many diversities: Cultural, ecological, geological and geographic.

11/09/2024

Who is Neo Global Minerals Namibia (Pty) which holds 28 Exclusive Prospecting Licenses (EPLs) totalling over 1.9 million hectares for everything except oil and uranium since March last year but does not appear to have a Namibian office?
Any of my geologists friends ever heard of them?
DM, of course.

10/09/2024

Why the argument that trophy hunting reduces poaching is utter nonsense: after Botswana's greedy little President decided to increase the quota to 400 elephant bulls, poaching has since surged to alarmingly high levels - and they're both targeting the same bull population of the largest tuskers.
While in Namibia, the cull is to target bulls as well, some of which are to be sold as trophies in violation of the law in this regard.
This is a crime against Nature.

There has been a dramatic increase in elephant poaching in northern Botswana, with little official concern about reports of the poaching. An aerial survey in July revealed 19 poached carcasses, bringing the total to 105 since October 2023. Mary Rice, Executive Director of the Environmental Investiga...

03/09/2024

As everyone should know, the MEFT considers me Public Enemy No. 1 and won't let me anywhere near their culling operations. If any of my friends know of any impending cull of elephants in the Erongo - Kunene regions, please be so kind as to let me know?
And if there is anyone with any footage of this cull, or of the meat being distributed, also please get in touch urgently - DM, of course.

02/09/2024

So there is some outfit called Chekai Investments CC that is trying to get the Henties Bay municipality to sign over 3 500 hectares to it for a green ammonia plant.
Objections to CEO Biana Hamutenya 064 502027 / [email protected] close Wednesday 4/9/2024

23/08/2024

Most overlooked article of the week: when looking for a new political home, Namibians would do well do read this article in yesterday's issue of The Namibian (22/8/2024) to see who has the best grasp of the facts and understanding of the political environment.

So please do us all a national favour, dear colleagues, and post this article on your website as well?

13/08/2024

I've asked this question before, but let me do so again:
When the NWR developed Shark Island into a camp site about 15 years ago, did they come across any graves of colonial-era PoWs in the process - and if so, where is that EIA report? Was one ever done?

There are a few things that the people now clamouring for mega cash pay-outs from the German government as reparations for the 1904-1907 anti-colonial uprising do not seem to know about Shark Island, its surroundings and why this expansion is happening in the first place.
As for the claim that PoW corpses were just dumped in the sea:
- Can you show us the evidence you have to prove this happened? Because as far as I know, those were buried in the forgotten old cemetery behind Ag*te Beach.
- Any corpses dumped into the sea off Shark Island would get washed up at Ag*te Beach or taken out to sea by the very strong tides here within a day.
- Those corpses would have been stripped clean by the crayfish of any soft tissue within a few days. This will make proving ancestry of 120-year-old skeletons - in the highly unlikely event of finding such skeletons in the water around Shark Island - by means of DNA very difficult if not impossible.

Furthermore, please note following:
- The current, ongoing expansion of the ore-handling quay is not to accommodate any green hydrogen project, but to expand Tradeport Namibia's operations to export manganese ore from the Northern Cape via Lüderitz.
- Those NC manganese mines are owned by - amongst others - Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg and Patrice Motsepe, and TradePort Namibia has NNN's oldest son as their local partner.
- I'm reliably informed that Namport is charging TradePort Namibia well below the actual going commercial rate for this facility and use of the Lüderitz harbour.
- The trucks carrying that ore are all financed by the DBN, who issued unsecured loans to around 50 or 52 such owner-operators; the ore is being delivered to Ariamsvlei by another mysterious syndicate that appears to include the Swazi royal house (see pics).

And before you waste more money on trying to take the German government to court in the USA, please note the late Adv. Vekuii Rukoro had already tried (and failed) to take that route.

So do make sure you're barking up the right tree here, OK?

13/08/2024

People hear - please note, do not say - that:
- fearing defeat in the upcoming elections, the ruling party has decided to sacrifice the core wildlife stocks left in the smaller parks for meat to be distributed among the voters of Kavango as their last political stronghold;
- that in the coming week or so, they plan to cull at least 685 animals of all kinds but also including elephants to be fed to their loyal constituents to keep them loyal;
- that this culling exercise will be conducted using the MEFT helicopter, which method has already been deployed in the recent trophy hunting of an elephant and black rhino in Khaudom and Mangetti on behalf of a dying German industrialist who needed to be kept on an oxygen mask but still missed that rhino, possibly wounding it;
- that a great deal of this culling has been assigned by the Minister to a trophy hunting outfitter known to have senior MEFT staff in his pocket, and who will be offering this opportunity to his own clientele;
- that this decision has put the Minister and his ED at odds with the rest of the MEFT senior management because none of this money will be going to the Wildlife Fund, but pocketed in the guise of fees for doing the culling;
- that this cull is not based on any scientific census of actual wildlife numbers in the parks, but based on the number of connected families in the Kavango whose support the ruling party needs to avert a political disaster for them come November 29.

Never before has a greater disaster loomed for Namibian tourism - because our wildlife is what brings in the foreign tourists.

Culling for whatever reason is always a PR disaster - and never before has culling been used for this purpose.

We have lost more wildlife - including nearly all the desert lions, hundreds of (mostly) black rhinos, elephant etc - under the current Minister than ever before.

All for the love of money.

07/08/2024

Some of the Namibian green hydrogen projects look to be more viable - in great part because of their enormous political capital that no other such project can offer.
Article #2 in series of four.

John Grobler takes an inside look at a green hydrogen project that has made the most visible progress of nine such projects currently under development in Namibia New track: Cleanergy is also in a joint venture to convert a TransNamib locomotive to using hydrogen instead of diesel. Photo: John Grobl...

03/08/2024

By end of next year, the governments of Angola and Mozambique will have been in power for 50 years.
That's twice as long as the majority of their young populations born after 25 years of civil war have been alive.
The only governments that lasted that lasted as long in recent history were all dictatorships: fascist ones like the Salazar regime they had overthrown in 1975, or the Communist police states like the former Soviet Union or China, latter now being the longest-ruling political party ever at 75 years.
And let's not forget the apartheid-era SA, which lasted for 49 years before it dissolved itself.
Next oldest is Zimbabwe's regime, in power now for 45 years, followed by Namibia (33 years) and South Africa (30 years).

The more things change, the more they remain the same.

02/08/2024

I've noticed that people who are disappointed in how life has turned out for them tend to become embittered and start identifying with the fascist-minded types of our world: the MAGA morons, the EFF-luence lot, the MK vandals and of course the Putinistas.
It is understandable on one level: those disappointed and failed by the system tend to support whoever promises to break that system.
Don't get caught between those lines - it's a no-man's land.

18/07/2024

Dear fellow Namibians

What price would you place on your personal freedom to choose how to love, live and let live in our own country?
If the question sounds nonsensical (those rights are constitutionally enshrined, so who cares - right?), ask yourself the reverse question: if you didn't have those rights, what would you be willing do to to fight for those basic human rights we take for granted today?

n the past, we did not have all those rights but had 27 years of civil war for this same fundamental reason. It is not impossible that we could lose those rights and have another war the day a military junta takes over because they do not like the election results and suspends the Namibian Constitution indefinitely.

So if you do not want to ever lose your basic human rights and all your freedoms,
YOU HAVE TO VOTE.

It is now only four months left before the November 29 Presidential and National Assembly elections, and
YOU HAVE TO REGISTER AGAIN.

THERE IS ONLY TWO WEEKS LEFT
to register - and by the sounds of that meeting at State House with the ECN and SWAPO, turn-out is so low that it potentially raises questions over validity of eventual results at the end of this year in what will be a water-shed election.

So, spending 15 mins registering again is a very small ask for all your rights and freedoms, for yourself, your children and their children - as long as we all contribute to the democratic process.

Do not take freedom for granted if you do not exercise your right to vote.

11/07/2024

For people interested in reading up the articles we've done at Oxpeckers Investig*tive Environmental Journalism on green hydrogen:

Green Hydrogen Green energy innovations in the desert Green hydrogen features in Namibian projects aimed at producing carbon-free steel and ammonia fuel for shipping and rail transport. John Grobler reports... 05 July, 2024 Mega plans for green hydrogen power in Mpumalanga The province is the focus....

04/07/2024

Biden vs Trump: a fading sense of reality vs a totally faked reality.

Difference being that while the Democrats can still replace Grandpa Joe, the Grand Old Party is in a MAGA neck-lock that is going to be fatal for democracy all over the world if it succeeds in gaining control of the world's sole super-power.

Having a choice is always better than none whatsoever.

27/06/2024

Company secretaries and auditing firms doing secretarial work for private companies, please take note of the following provision in the Companies Act 28 of 2004 (Art. 120A):

(6) The information of the beneficial owner and other information regarding a company held by the Registrar are public information and upon request must be made available by the Registrar for inspection by a member of the public, whether electronically or physically, but the information of the beneficial owner is limited to the full name of the beneficial owner and the nature and extent of beneficial ownership.

Get your house in order, SGA et al.

17/06/2024

Where is the infamous poacher Walvis Bay poacher Fanie Uirab?

Well-known Walvis Bay businessman Steven Louw barely escaped with his life last week Thursday when he set off in hot pursuit of a Walvis Bay gang of poachers whose fresh vehicle tracks he found on the family farm near Solitaire.
That they were poachers became very clear when they started dumping the carcasses of three oryx they had poached from the back of their pick-up, seemingly to try and slow him down.
But then the poachers - believed to be four or five men - were forced to stop at a section of the C14 under construction. Mr Louw, blinded by the dust, could not see them in time and smashed into the back of their vehicle with his own, causing his own car to leave the road.
As Mr Louw was getting out of his car, he was attacked by three of the poachers wielding stones that they were smashing into his head with malignant intent.
It was only the arrival of a bus full of tourists on the scene that saved his life, with the driver and passengers witnessing the attack on Mr Louw who otherwise would not have survived to tell the tale without serious brain damage.
The poachers all fled the scene, but two were later flushed out of the surrounding rough hills and charged with attempted murder, trespassing and illegal hunting. A hunting rifle was also recovered from the scene - and it will be interesting to find out who that rifle is licensed to.
However, a key suspect in the WB poaching ring - one Fanie Uirab - was believed to be the driver or among this group of three who got away.
This is disturbing, because Uirab was arrested about a month ago outside Windhoek along with poaching kingpin Brockerhof and was supposedly being held without bail, pending their next appearance.
If this is true, then there is a massive problem in our lower courts justice system that will need urgent investig*tion.

12/06/2024

One wonders how Netumbo Nandi-Ndaithwa will finance a doubling of old-age pensions when the GRN is already spending N$22.5 BILLION on just servicing the debt taken on by the SWAPO Party government.
Maybe we should ask her to explain instead why her government is spending 45% of the national budget on the so-called security cluster that the party's militarist old guard has surrounded itself with since 2020.
Will they accept a SWAPO loss in elections in November - and/or who are they building all those new prisons for all over the country?

11/06/2024

How to well your crypto-fascist from your pseudo-populist: brilliant data-driven journalism in parsing and analysing the pro-Putin element in US politics.
Turns out the MAGA morons are Russian tools.
Who knew.

More than a hundred American congressmen consistently vote against bills to allocate funds and weapons to Ukraine to defend itself …

06/06/2024

So what became of the 2015 plan to build a new police station and clinic here in Okuyurangava? Did that Outapi contractor chop all the money again, as happens too often with projects like this?
It has been NINE YEARS that nothing happened.
If you're not going to build anything, at least turn this into a temporary community soccer field - or better, cancel all those plans and turn this into a residential area for people desperate for housing.

27/05/2024

Is Jerry Ekandjo secretly trying to push for an Uutoni Nujoma Presidency, as long had been rumoured?

Because if it is true that he does not harbour any Presidential ambitions himself, his obsession with HG's succession and attempts to enforce a new election does not seem to serve any other discernible purpose.

Maybe we should instead ask him to explain this N$58 million hole next to the Old Wheelers Club on Rehobother Road that he had commissioned in one of his last acts as Minister of Youth and Sport back in 2019.

This ostensibly was to construct an international youth hostel for visiting athletes - who you can be sure would prefer a nice hotel room across the road.

Or ask him how many community soccer fields he had built as Minister responsible for youth development. How much can it cost to level a field and put up two goals, maybe donate a soccer ball or three?

That N$58 million could have paid for hundreds of community soccer fields. Instead, thousands of youths who instead of practising their football skills ended up in the shebeens for a lack of any recreational facilities.

And why isn't there even a high school league anymore? The pre-independence league had produced some of our best stars in the early post-Independence years - so why was it discontinued?

It's all about legacy, dear Jerry - and you have only a hole in the ground to show for all your years in Cabinet since 1990.

Soos ons in Afrikaans sê: jy maak jou naam g*t.

27/05/2024

We present Mr. Ruben Koortzen of Keetmanshoop, who was shamelessly sharing this vile and cruel video on his Whatsapp status. Is this the standard for hunting our precious wildlife in Namibia now? I urge our Ministries and Namibian lawyers to address this matter immediately. This individual has previously come onto the radar for serious animal welfare concerns. Perhaps its time that the public has an opinion?

Republikein
The Namibian
SPCA Namibia
Namboer Auctioneers CC
We Love Animals Namibia
Be Kind - Namibia

14/05/2024

All the forms of wildlife crime are present in Namibia - but the corruption one is the biggest enabler here, IMHO.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/13/global-wildlife-crime-untold-harm-un-report-unodc-aoe?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR3KJ1Rc4dLAx2v2Ml0kxfiGG6oiSlI2OyLPaztK8iLRO4-xoHeq0xan1Sc_aem_AZ61BJAA0hvtv3CJvPDKy4nr5geVvi1cL2YmkWDi_5ntaPFKa0uqHhTEnGul3kL3wtxc1yj0Alf8sMubuQSfuzcC

More than 4,000 species are targeted by traffickers, with illegal trade active in 80% of countries, says Office on Drugs and Crime

08/05/2024

On a point of information: the Elizabeth Bay diamond mine was sold to Sperrgebiet Diamond Mining, a company owned by members of the Nujoma and Lewis families. It only was operational for a few months and has not produced any diamonds but its majority shares were sold to a controversial Zimbabwean outfit called RioZim a few weeks after Chris Lewis strange car accident in May 2022.
What is of pertinent interest here to especially the Buchters is that Sperrgebiet holds a current Mining License, valid until 2035, over ALL areas around Lüderitz including the peninsula, even though this all forms part of the Tsau//Khaeb Park that was declared by President Sam Nujoma in 2004 shortly before his retirement.
This is also where Hyphen was instructed by the NIPDB to build their plant at Angra Point - for which an annual rental fee of EUR10 million is to be paid, according to Green Hydrogen Commissioner James Mnyupe.
So maybe the 40-odd workers still waiting for their salaries should take their problem with the Labour Minister Uutoni Nujoma instead?
(And please note that I am not related to this Abraham Grobler, who I think is a South African - par for the course for this kind of thing.)

07/05/2024

More red flags here than at a May Day parade on Red Square in Moscow.
The question that stands out is why !Gawaxab - who was running his own Eos Capital's N$1 billion investment fund at the time - would want the job as Governor of the Bank of Namibia in the first place.
Wolf het nou skaap-wagter geword.

Business !Gawaxab’s business deals in the spotlight TILENI MONGUDHI May 6, 2024 BANK OF Namibia governor Johannes !Gawaxab is facing alleg*tions that he sold businesses and lucrative shareholding in a major insurance company to family and friends, while declaring that he had sold such interests to...

06/05/2024

One wonders if the NAMPOL PRU and anti-poaching units are aware that the Andreas Hailaula mentioned here is employed INSIDE THE ETOSHA NATIONAL PARK by NWR - and has a criminal record to boot, served a three-jail sentence for similar offences in the past.
What eats the beans is inside the bean.

01/05/2024

So sad to see where the Kamanjab elephant herd had ended up in this al Sharjah Zoo under the fake boababs in a 25 hectare enclosure that must seem like a prison to animals that grew up in an area where they had 25 000 square kilometers to roam in.
This was illegal, plain and simple: what the MEFT so-called executive did was abuse a CITES loophole for the transfer of breeding animals between bona fide research institutes to smuggle a whole herd through, just to enrich certain individuals.
What's more is that they - MEFT, Gerrie Odendaal and co. - had also captured three pregnant cows, and so ended up getting three extra calves they had not paid for.
Those calves are now a star attraction - and Odendaal and Co. did not pay a cent for them.
Which is why and how Nrupesh and I ended up in the Gobabis magistrates court moree than two years later on trumped-up charges of trespassing and "unauthorised use of an aircraft."
This isn't justice, it's mercenary persecution and abuse of Namibia's legal system to cover up the original crime.
And like the elephants, I won't forget who did this to them.

Sharjah 24: Sharjah Safari, affiliated with Sharjah Environment and Protected Areas Authority, has welcomed "Tartouth," the second newborn African savannah elephant after "Samra." Since 2023, over 200 newborns have joined the diverse wildlife at the Safari.

30/04/2024

Where have all the warthogs disappeared to?
One used to see them along every major road, either feeding right on the shoulder of the road of high-tailing it for the fence as one got close.
Now, one does not see them at all any more.

29/04/2024

Who among Namibia's owners and regular users of a drone for the purpose of use in private photography or any other related activity ever applies 60 days in advance for written permission to fly it from the Namibia Civil Aviation Authority for each and every time they want to make use of their drones?

How many professionals like surveyors, engineers etc do so 120 days in advance, as the law currently demands?

Tomorrow, I and a colleague have to face what are basically trumped-up charges of trespassing, operating a drone in a restricted airspace and 'unauthorised use of an aircraft' in the Gobabis magistrates court, charges that relate to my 2022 investig*tion into the illegal export of 22 wild-caught elephant to the UAE.

Which herd turned into 25 elephants, including three new calves, it should be noted, just so someone could cash in some N$50+ million for animals "pre-sold" to local game speculator Gerrie Odendaal and partners for a fraction of that.

It's not us who should be in court, but those responsible for violating every CITES rule and regulation in this regard. And whoever had drawn up these drone laws that are basically unenforceable and amounts to an effort to ban their use altogether.