By Alexactus T Kaure
The controversial phosphate mining issue is popping up again like the proverbial frog on the beer mugg.
Let us for a context tease out some newspapers headlines.
“Phosphate divides opinion”, was the headline in New Era.
Then an editorial The Namibian reads: “We need clarity on phosphate once and for all.” Recently two articles were published in The Namibian newspaper.
One is by Chris Brown title “Clarity on Marine Phosphate Mining, Namibia’s Misunderstood Project.”
And the other is by Juane van Aardt and Meyer van den Berg titled “Sandpiper Environmental Clearance – Legal Framework and Available Recourse.”
I am not a scientiest nor an environmentalist.
Thus I am not going to talk about the environmental impact of phosphate mining on our marine resources.
Nor I am my disputing the thirty-seven independent scientists who have been involved in this project.
But some of the statements especially by Brown are outrageous to say the least.
He says: “The risk to Namibia’s marine environment and to the fishing sector are minimal. Economic returns are significant, twice that of the fishing sector once the industry has developed, and almost as many jobs.”
He goes on to say that the two can co-exist and that phosphate is good for sustainable development.
But he does not tell us why New Zealand rejected the project.
So is a project without established precedent.
But if the exponent/proponent think that phosphate is more important for the Namibian economy and society than let them go ahead with it.
I am joining the debate from an ideological perspective, if you like.
The question is: Does this natural resource belong exclusively to two individuals?
In this case, businessman Knowledge Katti and his Omani partner.
In layman’s language: Who do natural resources in any given country belong to?
To answer that question in its proper context, we must turn to our basic document, the Namibian Constitution.
“Article 100 of Namibia’s Constitution says that marine resources in the nation’s 200-mile exclusive economic zone belong to the people of Namibia.
“Everything that has happened over the last decade in terms of fisheries policy makes a lie of this provision,” writes economics professor Roman Grynberg.
One can extend that constitutional provision to include other natural resources such as phosphate, oil, and recent headline maker, lithium.
Lithium seems to be plentiful in Namibia if the latest find in the Kunene region is anything to go by.
It is an increasingly critical mineral, especially in the electric vehicle people calling it a ‘game changer’, the late president Hage Geingob said legally the recently discovered oil off the coast of Namibia does not belong to the country.
This is because the majority shareholder of oil rights is not Namibia.
Lithium is too important a national natural resource to be left in the hands of a few individuals and their Chinese cohorts to make massive profits from a natural resource while the rest of us have to settle for a few paltry crumbs.
The public resource-private profit dilemma remains starkly pronounced in this country.
For comparative purposes, when it comes to land and other natural resources, the Constitution of Ghana states: “Every mineral in its natural state in, under or upon any land in Ghana, rivers, streams, water course throughout Ghana, the exclusive economic zone and any area covered by the territorial sea or continental shelf is the property of the Republic of Ghana and shall be vested in the President on behalf of, and in trust, for the people of Ghana.”
So what does our constitution say about our natural resources?
The Namibian Constitution is framed in the same terms as that of Ghana.
Article Sovereign Owner ship of Natural Resources states: “Land, water and natural resources below and above the surface of the land and in the continental shelf and within the territorial waters and the exclusive economic zone of Namibia shall belong to the state if they are not otherwise lawfully owned.”
The question is, are we in breach of Article 100 of our Constitution? “Yes”, as Grynberg pointed out on the fisheries sector.
Because Article 100 is not enforced, it has enabled some politically connected individuals to exploit the system – phosphate and the lithium saga being recent cases in point.
WHAT IS OURS?
Amid the excitement about the oil that has been found and some naïve people saying “Legally it is not ours. Legally it is owned by the investors, with 90%, but we are going to get it through taxes and royalties until we nationalise and become socialists,” the former president said.
So, what is ours?
And when are we going to become socialists, comrade president? We are told that “Namibia typically owns 10% of projects involving the country’s natural resources”.
That is perhaps why Mike Kavekotora has labelled Namibia’s economy a franchise, saying we do not benefit sufficiently from our resources.
“There is one principle problem we have experienced: Namibia has many natural resources, but the benefits to the country are minimal. The benefit to the man on the street has been lacking in our economy,” Kavekotora said.
In the face of this naked truth and numerous studies, as well as one by the World Bank, 1,6 million Namibians live in poverty.
ENTRENCHED INTERESTS
Why has the ruling elite been silent on these issues?
The answer is not hard to pinpoint.
Blame it on the system – the neo liberal economic ideology called capitalism we have religiously been following.
And within that system, there are winners and losers.
The winners are the elite who own farms, EPLs, easy access to government tenders, and fishing quotas, among others.
As political scientist Christie Keulder aptly puts it: “Namibia now has a firmly entrenched political class – politicians, bureaucrats, and tenderpreneurs – whose personal wealth stems from access to public resources.
“Personally, they stand to lose from changes to the status quo and may thus not be approbative to change.”
In addition to their class interests, we are also being governed by people some of whom cannot think conceptually and laterally.
So how do you expect them to come up with new insights and imagine a different world?
Quo Vadis phosphate mining? We are told the two can co-exist and that the risks to Namibia’s marine environment and to the fishing sector are minimal.
- Alexactus T Kaure is a freelance writer and a deconstructionist scholar.
