Who Protects the People?

In the grand halls of the United Nations and the glossy pages of conservation magazines, Namibia is often portrayed as a global hero. At the Africa Keystone Protected Area Partnership Reception, President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah rightly highlighted a remarkable achievement: over 46% of Namibia’s land is now formally protected under conservation laws. This far exceeds the global target set by the Kunming–Montreal Framework, which calls for 30% by 2030.But back home, in the dust of the village and around the fireside conversations, another story is unfolding — one of growing unease. It is a story that ends with a single haunting question that echoes across the protected plains: in our noble quest to protect the environment, who protects the people?A new threat looms, hidden beneath the bureaucratic language of policy. The draft National Policy on Prospecting and Mining in Protected Areas, Other Areas with High-Value Species and Environmentally Sensitive Areas proposes to extend these conservation zones even further, or declare entirely new ones. On the surface, it sounds noble. In reality, it risks declaring war on the livelihoods of ordinary Namibians. This policy will not only halt mining and prospecting — it will also draw invisible fences around ancestral lands, forbidding the communal grazing and subsistence farming that have sustained communities for generations. It is a slow suffocation of a way of life, dictated by lines drawn on a map far from the people they affect.The conservationists offer a simple answer: tourism. This, they insist, is the clean, green industry that will save us. But it is a hollow promise. Tourism offers only a handful of low-skill, low-income jobs — and somehow it remains the only industry never scrutinised for its own environmental footprint. No one questions the jets landing on private airstrips, or the late-night festivities at luxury lodges. It offers our youth a future of making beds and serving drinks, while the real profits flow to the exclusive lodge owners — the ultimate beneficiaries of these ever-expanding protected zones. Heritage sitesHow can an entire nation be expected to survive on the seasonal wages and meagre tips of a fickle industry?More troubling still is what conservationists and tourism advocates choose to ignore. In their clinical assessments of biodiversity, there is no space for culture. No value is placed on sacred burial grounds that will fall within the new protected areas. No thought is given to heritage sites that tell our national story but will now become off-limits. The environment — and the fleeting pleasure of a tourist — is deemed more important than the living, breathing culture of Namibia. We are being asked to sacrifice both our cultural past and our economic future on the altar of conservation.One must ask the forbidden question: is this truly environmental protection, or is it a new form of land grab? Have we learned nothing from our history? What is unfolding is a sophisticated campaign to dispossess land from its traditional owners — either through relocation or by rendering them so economically powerless that they become permanent dependents of the very industry that erased their livelihoods.The argument that other industries cannot coexist with conservation is a convenient fallacy — and the evidence lies in the policy itself. As stated in the draft National Policy on Prospecting and Mining in Protected Areas, 75% of Namibia’s mining revenue over the past decades has come from operations within existing protected zones. Deemed unacceptableThis is not conjecture; it is fact. Namibia has already proven that economic growth and environmental stewardship can coexist. Likewise, subsistence farming — the heartbeat of many rural communities — is not a threat. It is an ancient and sustainable way of life. Why, after hundreds of years, is it suddenly deemed unacceptable?The answer is uncomfortably simple: it empowers Namibians. It allows for self-sufficiency — for economic freedom beyond the tight grasp of tourism magnates.We have already placed 46% of our land under protection. How much more will be enough — 50%, 60%? Who decides when the balance has been achieved? Namibia needs not only environmental security, but also economic opportunity and cultural preservation. They will say that subsistence farming harms the environment, but this is only because more and more land is being fenced off, forcing people and livestock into smaller, overburdened spaces.The world may see a natural paradise. But for many Namibians, it is beginning to look like a gilded cage. Our land must not become a pristine museum where the people are silent custodians of a past they are no longer allowed to live. The time has come to find a true balance — one that protects both the environment and the people who call it home.

Who Protects the People?

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Namibian Sun 2026-01-16

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Who Protects the People?

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Namibian Sun 2026-01-16

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