‘Stop selling urban land to foreigners’

25 February 2010, New Era
URL: http://www.newera.com.na/article.php?articleid=9704&sid=9cd54b1b65e64ed3506107f6cb4d9cea

Windhoek:   Namibian Chamber of Commerce and Industry now has its eyes on stopping the wholesaling of urban land to foreign investors, saying the long-term consequences of having most of town land in foreign hands could be disastrous.

The thought comes after the Namibia Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NCCI) has successfully pleaded with Government to invoke restrictions on foreign investors entering specific sectors of the economy.

NCCI’s Chief Executive Officer, Tarah Shaanika, contends that the overall intention is to maintain law and order within the business sector, as opposed to the current state where foreign business people have an unfair advantage over locals because of their deep pockets.  It is also important, says Shaanika, to note that Namibia is coming from a background of apartheid and segregation where black Namibians, who make up 85 percent of the population, could not conduct certain businesses freely. Moreover, many were so poor that they could not start businesses in certain fields where the barriers to entry are so high.

“Now, you have our local authorities selling land to foreign business people who obviously have more money than Namibians and before we know it, most of our urban land will be in foreign hands,” commented Shaanika.

NCCI says the issue of wholesaling land to foreign businesses needs a thorough investigation to determine its impact on the economy, especially in the future.  “Personally, I am opposed to this policy of auctioning town land because only the rich end up owning land and most of these people are foreigners,” said Shaanika.

NCCI is asking rhetorically whether Namibians too are able to own land in other foreign countries and whether there are other countries that allow foreigners to buy land, as Namibia does.

“In my view, we need to urgently discuss this policy and put an end to it. It does not do us any good, it disowns Namibians and we must not forget that once you get ownership of a piece of land, it is yours forever. I get scared when I think about the consequences of this policy,” says Shaanika.

NCCI does, however, maintain that such considerations “should not be understood to mean that we are anti-foreign investments”. For the NCCI the fight is to have a country where competition is fair for both local and foreign business people and where all businesses obey the law of the country.

“There are so-called foreign investors who come here to set up their businesses but are not competing against Namibian businesses fairly. Most of them find ways to avoid tax, pay low wages to our people compared to Namibian businesses, ship money made here out of the country and when things get tough here for whatever reason, they will leave Namibia,” says Shaanika.

Further, he says, true foreign investors are those capable of making meaningful contribution to economic diversification, growth and job creation.