By Agnes Tjindjo
In recent years mining has increasingly encroached upon the small patches of land reserved for indigenous black Namibians after their ancestral lands were dispossessed during the 1904–1908 genocide. This genocide exterminated 80% of the Ovaherero people while the survivors were comprehensively dispossessed of their ancestral land. When they attempted to reclaim these ancestral lands, they were relocated to marginal land by the South African authorities who administered Namibia under a League of Nations mandate after Germany lost her colonies. These marginal areas became reserves for small-scale farmers. Otjohorongo, an area comprising 330 000 hectares, was declared such a reserve in 1925.
While trying to eke out a living on marginal land, disenfranchised communities are once again subjected to dispossession and displacement. We feel a sense of outrage and betrayal that this is happening in a democratic and independent Namibia. With unbridled lawlessness, mining companies dispossess indigenous communities of their land, water sources and public infrastructure. They violate Namibian laws and the rights of indigenous communities with impunity. Communities suffer income and livelihood losses, environmental destruction, and the loss of cultural heritage sites. We are left with little recourse because the institutions mandated to protect our rights and interests fail to do so, and often side with the perpetrators.
Members of the Otjohorongo community are experiencing the severe impact of mining on their livelihoods and their environment. There is a sense of outrage amongst community members, for as people who had historically suffered colonial genocide, land dispossession and the loss of livestock, history is repeating itself, and they are once again being dispossessed of common resources that support their livelihoods. Members of the community primarily make their living from livestock farming. Land access and rights, including access to natural resources, are governed by customary practices. Traditional authorities (chiefs, headmen and traditional councilors) still play an important role in the allocation and cancellation of customary land rights Granite Mining started about 15 years ago with different companies operating in the area during different periods with close to four mines on side. As the years went by, they started little by little removing their operational equipment overnight and left the area without any rehabilitation after they became aware that the community was preparing a case against them for environmental damage to heritage sites, and this is because their operation was in the area where most cultural heritage sites are located. The last mine that was left on side was than operating with an expired license Once they were reported for operating with an expired ECC, operations ceased, but they left behind destroyed mountains and grazing areas that have still not been rehabilitated until today. The community is concerned about how these companies will be held liable for the environmental destruction and livelihood losses they have caused. As they have opened another mine 20 kilometre from the one left unrehabilitated recently
The community is concerned about how these companies will be held liable for the environmental destruction and livelihood losses they have caused. There is a nebulous web of owners and operators that is steeped in secrecy. In some instances, formal license holders are Namibian citizens, but operations are run by foreign nationals, mainly Chinese. The community is of the opinion that the Namibians (from outside the Otjohorongo area) are fronting for these foreign companies. There is also the suspicion that the same company may be using different local proxies to obtain licenses. In some instances, mining started without community consultations or Social and Environmental Impact Assessments, as required by law.
