By Victor Angula |
The Director of the Anti-Corruption Commission, Mr Paulus Noa, has been reappointed back to his position for another 5 years. At the end of his term in 2026 he will have made it 20 straight years as the head of Namibia’s anti-corruption watchdog.
The reappointment of Noa back at the helm of the ACC was done yesterday during a session of the National Assembly which was divided along the bridge between the ruling party and the opposition parties.
According to the law the director and deputy director of the ACC are nominated by the President of the country, who then has to forward the names to the National Assembly for confirmation.
This was exactly what was done. Although the National Assembly does have the power to reject the nominations, this would not happen because the ruling party has the majority of seats in the Assembly, so that the President’s nomination had to be approved, despite the loud protestations of the opposition parliamentarians.
Members of the opposition rejected Noa and his deputy Ms Erna van der Merwe’s reappointment because the two failed over the last 15 years to bring corruption on its knees.
Apart from the case of the former parliamentarian and Minister of Education Ms Katrina Hanse-Himarwa who was convicted of corruption in 2019, there has not been any other serious corruption case by a top government official concluded by the courts ever since the ACC was established 16 years ago.
So that opposition parliamentarians have labeled Noa and his deputy as incompetent hand-picked individuals who have been serving the interests of the corrupt ruling class.
Although a storm of heated words went through the chamber of parliament during the last two days, Noa still managed to sail through it all and get back to his office steering the ACC ship for another 5 years.
In the photo: ACC director Paulus Noa.
