Ya Ndakolo wants military strengthened

DEFENCE minister Penda ya Ndakolo wants the military strengthened in line with the global military and political climate.

The minister said this when addressing his ministry staff in Windhoek yesterday.

According to Ya Ndakolo, today’s military and political events have become difficult to estimate with precision.

“As things stand, we are likely to witness changing military and political environments in many parts of the world, resulting in the formation and realignment of new alliances in the next five to 10 years.

“This means that we, as Ministry of Defence and the Namibian Defence Force, must be ahead and move with the times. Otherwise, we will find ourselves lagging behind and losing the ability to defend the country and its people,” he said.

The Namibian reported in January this year that the defence ministry had signed an agreement with South African state-owned military company Denel for the delivery of a substantial number of military equipment by March 2017.

It was reported that Denel’s subsidiary, Denel Vehicle Systems, had received an order for and been paid to deliver eight landmine-resistant light armoured vehicles and four installations of a lightweight weapons system, simply named Self-Defence Remotely Operated Weapon (SDROW).

The contents of the contract remain a secret as Denel and the ministry refused to divulge the particulars of their agreement nor the value of the contract.

“We all know that the world is becoming more polarised, with nations tending to protect their own backyards and interests as opposed to the promotion of the common good of all nations, including international peace and security,” he added.

Although it is tradition for ministers to grant journalists a platform to ask questions after delivering their speeches, Ya Ndakolo refused to do so, while his officials advised the media to rather address their questions to the ministry’s public relations office.

He could not answer questions such as when the North Koreans would leave the country, nor clarify why the NDF is buying military equipment amidst the cash crunch which government is going through.

In his speech, the minister also expressed concern about the budget cuts, saying his ministry will operate in a resource-strained environment.

“It is general knowledge that our national economy is not performing to our expectations at the moment, which means that our resources available for allocation to the different national needs and sectors could be overstretched. As a result, we need to use sparingly the resources allocated to the defence sector,” said Ya Ndakolo.

Despite this, he said the ministry will try to focus on better equipping the military with the available funds, conduct proper preparations of training, honour bilateral relations, and also finalise the ministry’s strategic and annual plans.

Other ministries, such as international relations, home affairs and immigration, and fisheries have all stated that their budgets have been cut for the 2017/18 financial year, and they will have to cope with less resources at their disposal.

This contradicts finance minister Calle Schlettwein’s assurance that government has managed to rebalance its budget to sustainable levels.