Otjiwarongo Municipality Institutional Profile

Otjiwarongo is strategically located in the centre of Namibia, hence is a gateway to the north, west, south and east of the country. It lies 250 kilometers north of the capital city Windhoek, 380 kilometers east of the harbor town Walvis Bay and 600 kilometers south of Oshikango on the border with Angola.

It is situated on the main road to the legendary Etosha Park, while it is also in close proximity of other popular attractions, such as the Waterberg Plateau Park and the Cheetah Conservation Project. Otjiwarongo is the regional capital of the vast Otjozondjupa region, hence serves as a major business and shopping hub for a number of smaller towns and the surrounding commercial farming community.

The town offers a stable, efficient and helpful local government, endless potential for investors, both in the industrial and commercial sectors as well as attractive residential areas, excellent schools, and modern medical facilities. Otjiwarongo Municipality works hard to live up to its vision statement, “We Commit to make Otjiwarongo a vibrant Socio-economic Powerhouse”.
In 2012, Council adopted the strategy of delegating portfolios to all the Councillors. This saw the major key functions such as Economic Development and Socio-Empowerment/Gender being given to the only two women councillors.

This situation has seen improvements in socio-economic development, especially in terms of improving the living standards of households, most of which are women-headed. Through this strategy, projects have been introduced, such as income generating work and the provision of selling/trading areas.

Before the intervention, a lot of people were struggling to generate an income to support themselves and their households as well as to pay their municipal bills. Cost recovery is especially important for the municipality to continue surviving.

To empower people economically, Council has also embarked upon inviting large investments that can create jobs for the people in an effort to alleviate poverty and solve non-payment of the municipal account.

Results
 Market traders – 70 % of people accommodated at the market built by the municipality are women
 Low Cost Housing – 65% of the Build Together Programme beneficiaries are women

Before the Gender Links intervention, our streets were full of traders, thus giving an unsightly image of the town. Street vending or selling anywhere other than a market is unlawful therefore a lot of the illegal vendors, mostly women, used to be arrested by the law enforcement. Since the market was built, most of the illegal street vendors were re-located to the market.

Another problem before the intervention was shelter or housing especially for low income people. With the high cost of living, it was becoming impossible for most low income people to survive and more so to afford shelter which is a basic need. The Low Cost Housing scheme has enabled such people to afford houses, and Council decided to extend the payment for the plot for a period of about 10 years so that the beneficiary on pays a small amount so that they can still remain with money for food and other necessities.

With this intervention, residents, especially women can now afford to put food on the table, ensure that their children attend school and also pay their municipal accounts to prevent possible eviction due to non-payment. To prevent beneficiaries from being handed over to attorneys for non-payment and risk loosing their houses, Council introduced the pre-paid water system.