Imagining Impalila Island for military industrial development

It was expected, by July, that the road to Impalila Island would be completed, making it easy for travellers to and from the mainland to access the islands. Around the same timeframe, it was expected that additional classrooms built at Impalila Combined School would allow this school, with more than 350 learners, to offer advanced subsidiary level.

This will bring an end to a 33-year reality that punished learners who did well, for it meant they had to leave the island for higher grades. These additional classrooms were made possible through the kind assistance of the Japanese government.

For 25 years after independence, residents of this island were surrendered to seeking medical assistance in neighbouring Botswana and Zambia. This ignominy ended in 2015, under the leadership of the then hardworking health minister Richard Kamwi, when the island finally received a better equipped primary healthcare centre at a cost of more than N$11 million.

Four years later, in 2019, the Namibian Defence Force established a naval base on the island following a security assessment conducted more than 10 years earlier.

This island remains with untapped developmental potential. This seems to be the point that has not fossilised in the minds of our development planners. The approach, in their development thought, seems to suggest that public infrastructure on the island is bought out of pity and to address the embarrassing lack. There seems to be no deliberate developmental strategy to conceptualise the real prospects of socio-economic development of the island.

This is one of the consequences of both in-poverty and immediate post-poverty mentality. The objective being to address and redress the lack. The tomorrow - after the lack is addressed - would seemingly take care of itself. There has been no development that ever came as a result of this low-level thinking.

If one looks at how the island is positioned, which requires serious thinking beyond in-poverty and immediate post-poverty thinking, it is possible to imagine and understand that the island can indeed be one of the most strategic economic hubs in the region of the Kazungula confluence.

It would seem that the apartheid regime had this understanding and may have had it in their plans, had it not been dealt a heavy blow with the arrival of independence and the black government.

How else would one explain that this small island has an airstrip? Beyond the military, who was to fly in if not the tourists and visitors specifically for envisaged for economic activities?

At present, this airstrip is a sight of snakes and other animals that enjoy the overgrown grass. It is possible that Bisey Uirab, the head of the Namibia Airport Company, has never visited this airstrip. It is also possible that it is not in any of their strategic plans. It is also possible that the airstrip, although seemingly abandoned, may actually be in the hands of the military.

Learning the development path of developed nations, particularly those of the global south, one observes the role played by what is known as the military industrial complex - a fancy term that simply refers to an industry developed and run by military-linked companies and enterprises.

This is often the case in areas that are of strategic importance to the security of a national and those that give the country competitive advantages. Impalila island fits the criteria of this strategic area for a military industrial complex experiment.

Unfortunately, the billions that go to the defence ministry end up in the pockets of corrupt generals, politicians and their relatives. The very generals that are supposed to conceptualise our country's military industrial complex are themselves caught up in corruption scandals and are presently fighting for their own jackets.

Fortunately, the institutional framework is available through August 26. The unfortunate thing is that this company has been rendered an empty shell of its original self. It has been made a conduit and a convenient pathway for looting and enrichment. The company was recently awarded a tender to build several schools, without going through a competition. It only ended up being a chef in the corrupt kitchen.

But this doesn’t mean we should ignore and stop imagining the real prospects, under the right conditions, for a successful industrialisation led by the military. It is possible and the minds in the military, if there are any left, can use Impalila Island as a case study.

A hotel, training centre and internationally recognised football field can be a start. It is also possible to build a shoe-manufacturing factory. A decision could also be taken that for this purpose, a certain percentage of the corporate social responsibility funds of all companies under August 26 could be spent on the island through defined programmes.

It is possible - it is only that it require brains, not stomachs.

**Muthoni waKongola is a native of Kongola in the Zambezi Region, primarily concerned with analysing society and offering ideas for a better Namibia. She is reachable at [email protected] or @wakongola on Twitter.