By:Justicia Shipena
The deputy Minister of Information and Communication Technology Emma Theofelus has called for Namibia’s spending priorities to reflect economic recovery and growth.
Theofelus made this call during the national budget debate in the National Assembly this week.
According to her, this can be achieved through the proper and timely implementation of policy initiatives and improving the ease of doing business in Namibia, and boosting business confidence
“Our spending priorities moving forward should reflect economic recovery and growth,” she pleased.
She stated Namibia needs to move away from heavily spending on the social sector and move more towards directing its spending to activities that have a high return on investment of collected tax dollars.
“These past couple of weeks I took the time to look at some publications by banks, and advisory service providers in the country to gauge their responsiveness to the budget, and my brief analysis tells me that the reception is positive, however, what we do hereon determines economic growth and recovery or not,” Theofelus pointed out.
She said the tabled budget is a tough balancing act between boosting the economy and looking after those who are vulnerable in the Namibian society.
She welcomed the N$74.7 billion budget this financial year, stating that it is an indication that Namibia is moving in the right direction.
On education, Theofelus said the sector once again is well catered for with an allocation of N$570 million for the construction and renovation of educational infrastructure and another N$200 million towards the recruitment of additional teachers.
“Granted the ever-increasing wage bill, there are sectors we cannot compromise on and education is one of them. However, the current modus of simply refurbishing and recruiting without imploring innovative ways to educate our children will not yield the results we seek,”she implored.
Theofelus added that one should invest in digitalising classrooms which she said would reduce the textbook budget by almost half.
“Possibly make do with the existing teaching component to teach learners without heavily depending on the presence of a teacher in a classroom.”
She also welcomed the non-mining tax rate reduction of 2% over the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and the extension of the tax amnesty programme.
Furthermore, the deputy minister said if one assesses the revenue against expenditure in the budget for the last three years, one sees that between 2021/22, 2022/23, and 2023/24 financial years projections can expect a smaller gap where it shows Namibia’s revenue steadily catching up with its expenditure.
“No country can stand tall with a poor social fabric and our social fabric can only be intact with proper safety nets that speak to the needs of our people,” she pointed out.
However, she stressed that it will be a fallacy to believe that only moving in this direction will bring Namibia economic prosperity.
She further stated that not putting dollars towards the sectors that are meant to sustain the economy and investing in the demographic that can bring maximum productivity in the Namibian economic sectors must be a priority moving forward.
However, she concluded that the budget has done well in attempting to balance economic growth and livelihoods.
“The budget is a direct transmission belt that not only advocates for the swift implementation of national policies but also acts as a direct reflectional mirror for achieving our policy and developmental objectives.”