Swakopmund Squatters ‘Disappointed’ in Council

Adam Hartman

27 June 2011

ILLEGAL squatters on the outskirts of Swakopmund’s DRC informal settlement are “disappointed” in how the town’s municipal council and the Erongo Police have threatened them with forced eviction.

Nearly 500 people have set up shacks on the northern and northwestern edges of the DRC since 2009. The northwestern group (of about 180 people) claim through their spokesman, Nataniel Nguatjiti, that the municipality ignored the squatting of over 300 people north of the DRC in 2009, and that action was only taken after the northwestern group started setting up shacks from the end last year.

“We want to know why those plots, which are also not proclaimed, were not targeted, and now suddenly the municipality is taking action,” Nguatjiti told The Namibian.

Last weekend Erongo Police Commissioner Festus Shilongo was called by the municipality to the area to warn the illegal squatters of trespassing and requested them to pack up and leave or face forced eviction.

“We were shocked by the recent meeting whereby the municipality invited the Police commander with his troops to come and threaten us. Since last year we tried on various occasions to meet with the council, but all attempts proved futile. The only meeting that the council has with the affected residents was the one with stern warning from the Police chief,” Nguatjiti claimed.

There were meetings between councillors and the community in the past though, but according to the chairman, these were unorganised meetings.

“We wrote many letters to our councillors. No response until now. We want councillors to give us the opportunity to talk to them,” he said.

According to him, the meeting in the past was spontaneous, where the councillors “just came” and started speaking to the residents without speaking to the concerned group. This is probably the reason why no agreement was found due to lack of proper mediation.

The concerned group is accusing the council of being unclear about its plans to formalise the DRC settlement, saying that the duration or completion of this project has not been outlined.

Nguatjiti said most of those illegal squatters were from Swakopmund, with many of them having lived in other people’s yards, especially in Mondesa.

“The municipal draft on shacks is only proposing for three shacks per plot in Mondesa. As a result, the plot owners have already started acting according to the proposed draft,” he said, explaining why so many homeless residents moved to the outskirts of DRC to set up shelter there.

In the meantime, he said the serviced land for the Build Together programme has not been commissioned yet, adding to the illegal squatters’ predicament.

It is just a matter of the municipality issuing an eviction order and for the Police to step in and forcefully remove the squatters, but Nguatjti is making an appeal to municipal and regional councillors and the Erongo Governor to meet with the concerned group and find an “amicable solution”.

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