Bad partnership to cost City millions

City of Windhoek councillors last week halted an ongoing public-private partnership between the municipality and Champac Investments for the development and servicing of erven in Kleine Kuppe Extension 1.During a council meeting last Thursday evening, irregularities regarding the agreement surfaced, with Job Amupanda revealing that the project team paid a company that doesn&#039;t exist for work done by the City.According to him, this payment totalled N$392 000.Amupanda, the leader of the Affirmative Repositioning movement, said according to initial documents, the City guaranteed the project if anything went wrong.He further explained that the public-private partnership is funded by Ariya Bridge, a private equity fund manager, which received money from the Government Institutions Pension Fund (GIPF).These funds were used for the development project in Kleine Kuppe.“An amount of N$14 million was advanced to the partnership,” he said.“A letter was written to the City by Ariya Bridge, with the final due date to pay an outstanding N$10 million today [31 August] after Champac defaulted [on the agreement],” he said.Non-existent companyMeanwhile, relocation and electrical repair work was done by the City on behalf of the developer, and the City provided an invoice, Amupanda said.“While the City’s engineers did the work, it seems from the project team, they paid another company - that doesn’t exist - an amount of N$392 000 for the same work the City already did,” he said.According to Amupanda, on the revenue account, the partners have been giving themselves loans.“That is where the profit share is supposed to be coming from,” he said. According to the council documents, the council acceded to the proposed 50:50 profit sharing.“When the revenue account was opened, the agreement was attached and only one party is able to withdraw funds, without the knowledge of the financiers or the City," he said.The second phase of the project, which was due for approval, has since been sent back to the management committee for a thorough investigation.The development agreement for the first phase was signed on 15 May 2017.

Bad partnership to cost City millions

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Namibian Sun 2026-10-20

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Bad partnership to cost City millions

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Namibian Sun 2026-10-20

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