WINDHOEK: Namibia De Beers (Namdeb) has in the past five years paid almost N.dollars four billion in remuneration to employees, who then paid more than N.dollars 600 million in personal income tax.
Namdeb has 1 600 workers, and 70 per cent of them are Namibians.
Namdeb’s Brand Manager Paulina Thomas announced this on Tuesday during the Rural Women’s Empowerment Parliament Session underway in the National Council Chambers in Windhoek.
“Namdeb is proud to be a significant contributor to the Namibian economy, and as a glittering corporate citizen, the company has contributed more to the gross domestic product (GDP) of the country than all other mining activities combined, and has earned one in every three Namibian dollars of Namibia’s foreign earnings,” she said.
In addition, Thomas said Namdeb has ploughed back and shared with the community where the company operates, and beyond.
The company has donated N.dollars one million to the Karas Region Science Project that provides training to science teachers and manufactures science kits for schools.
It also gives assistance to 237 learners at the Oranjemund Primary School with school fees to the tune of N.dollars 661 131.
The company also donated N.dollars 60 000 to Project Igoaran in Bethanie and Karas, and sponsored N.dollars 74 000 for Karas schools to participate in the SpellQuizBee competition.
After Thomas’s address, many of the ‘parliamentarians’ rose to call for Namdeb to extend its donations and contributions to other regions, in order to uplift the living standards of rural people elsewhere.
Sebby Nakatana from the Oshana Region called on Namdeb to help in the construction of roads, bridges and rural sanitation in the north-eastern and north-western parts of the country.
“Without neglecting the Karas Region, please help us, as rural people in these parts of the country who suffer during the flood season,” he said.
Sara Zung from the Tsumke Constituency called on Namdeb to upgrade their roads and communication networks, as well as to construct a health facility.
“We have a problem in Tsumkwe. We travel 304 kilometres to be attended to at a hospital in Otjiwarongo. We have no network to call an ambulance, and the road is very bad to drive a sick person to hospital,” she said.
In turn, Thomas promised that Namdeb will look into those issues and see what will come up.
The first-ever Rural Women’s Empowerment Parliament Session is hosted by the National Council Standing Committee on Women Caucus, and is aimed at empowering women on grassroots level with regards to Namibia’s democratic processes.
Two women and one man from each of the country’s 13 regions are attending the Special Parliament session under the theme ‘Promoting Gender Equality in the Democratic Process from the Lens of Grassroots Women’.
Topics to be debated include child-bearing, maternal and child deaths, as well as issues concerning violence, illegal abortion, baby dumping, passion killing, suicide, among others.
The ‘parliamentarians’ will also deliberate on issues of economic empowerment, while the Ministry of Trade and Industry will be called in to explain to the women how the Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) Bank, which is yet to be launched, will operate.
The three-day Rural Women’s Empowerment Parliament Session kicked off on Monday.