EDITORIAL: What happened to the foreign-trip ban?
In April 2015, President Hage Geingob, barely a month in office, imposed a ban on foreign trips for top government officials - including ministers - in order for them to focus on solving national issues.
The decision was celebrated by all and sundry. Geingob did not mince his words when he said officials were going on global trips to, as primary motive, claim travel allowances.
Not long after that, government officials crawled back to their old habits of globetrotting – with no tangible results recorded from such trips. The only evidence of their lavish expeditions was state coffers getting drier and drier.
In 2020, at the height of the global coronavirus pandemic, foreign trips subsided again but that was mostly due to destinations being in lockdown. Covid-19 is barely out of sight and the extravagant jaunts are again at their peak.
A trip taken by City of Windhoek officials – including former mayor Dr Job Amupanda – to Jamaica is one of the latest examples worth munching on.
On this trip, more than N$90 000 was paid per person in subsistence and travel allowance alone. If all costs are tallied, the numbers will shoot through the roof. This, while the City is on life support of a N$200 million overdraft facility for its operational survival.
The lined-up activities in Jamaica do not inspire much confidence to justify the lavish spend. But that is the ‘Namibian Way’ these days.
The decision was celebrated by all and sundry. Geingob did not mince his words when he said officials were going on global trips to, as primary motive, claim travel allowances.
Not long after that, government officials crawled back to their old habits of globetrotting – with no tangible results recorded from such trips. The only evidence of their lavish expeditions was state coffers getting drier and drier.
In 2020, at the height of the global coronavirus pandemic, foreign trips subsided again but that was mostly due to destinations being in lockdown. Covid-19 is barely out of sight and the extravagant jaunts are again at their peak.
A trip taken by City of Windhoek officials – including former mayor Dr Job Amupanda – to Jamaica is one of the latest examples worth munching on.
On this trip, more than N$90 000 was paid per person in subsistence and travel allowance alone. If all costs are tallied, the numbers will shoot through the roof. This, while the City is on life support of a N$200 million overdraft facility for its operational survival.
The lined-up activities in Jamaica do not inspire much confidence to justify the lavish spend. But that is the ‘Namibian Way’ these days.
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