Danger and opportunity in Katima Mulilo: A Namibian border boomtown at transnational crossroads

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 35, Issue 1, 2009, Pages 133-154

  Zeller, Wolfgang ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI   (Finland)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

BORDER REGION; ECONOMIC ACTIVITY; ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT; GLOBAL ECONOMY; GOVERNANCE APPROACH; INDUSTRIAL INVESTMENT; MULTINATIONAL ENTERPRISE; SOUTHERN AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITY; SOVEREIGNTY; TRANSPORTATION DEVELOPMENT;

AFRICA; NAMIBIA; SOUTHERN AFRICA; SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA; ZAMBIA;

EID: 67650512284     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: 14653893     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057070802685619     Document Type: Article

References (130)

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2. Compare Gregor Dobler's article in this issue.
3. Roitman makes a distinction between state regulatory authority and state power to account for what she regards as a 'paradox between the increasing intensity of unregulated activities and the persistent efficacy of state infrastructures' in rural Chad. See J. Roitman, 'Productivity in the Margins: The Reconstitution of State Power in the Chad Basin', in V. Das and D. Poole (eds), Anthropology in the Margins of the State (Santa Fe, School of American Research Press and Oxford, James Currey, 2004), p. 104.
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5. Other examples are the Trans Kalahari Corridor, Trans Cunene Corridor, Trans Oranje Corridor, rehabilitation of the Benguela Railway, Maputo Corridor, Lubito Corridor, Beira Corridor, Mtwara Development Corridor, numerous individual road and bridge projects under construction in Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique and a 'Copper Corridor' through Angola, supposed to connect Zambia's copper mines directly to the Angolan port of Lubito by 2010 (Bundesagentur für Außenwirtschaft, 12 May 2006, 'Sambia plant "Kupfer Korridor" durch Angola', retrieved on 4 August 2006 from http://www.bfai.de).
6. See also F. Söderbaum and I. Taylor (eds), Regionalism and Uneven Development in Southern Africa: The Case of the Maputo Development Corridor (Aldershot, Ashgate Publishing, 2003).
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8. J. Ferguson, Global Shadows: Africa in the Neoliberal World Order (Durham, NC and London, Duke University Press, 2006), p. 40.
9. V. Das and D. Poole, 'State and Its Margins: Comparative Ethnographies', in V. Das and D. Poole (eds), Anthropology in the Margins of the State (Santa Fe, School of American Research Press and Oxford, James Currey, 2004), pp. 3-33.
10. Ibid., p. 8.
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18. Compare W. van Schendel and I. Abraham, 'Introduction: The Making of Illicitness', in W. van Schendel and I. Abraham (eds), Illicit Flows and Criminal Things: States, Borders and the Other Side of Globalization (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2005), pp. 1-37
19. Roitman, 'Productivity in the Margins', p. 218.
20. See K. Meagher, 'Manufacturing Disorder: Informal Enterprise and Economic Ungovernance in African Smallfirm Clusters', Development and Change, 38, 3 (May 2007), pp. 473-503.
21. See also Dobler in this volume.
22. A. Mbembe, 'Ways of Seeing: Beyond the New Nativism. Introduction', African Studies Review, 44, 2 (September 2001), p. 4
23. see also A. Mbembe, On the Postcolony (Berkley, University of California Press, 2001)
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25. Mbembe, 'Ways of Seeing', p. 5.
26. Ferguson, Global Shadows, p. 207
27. W. Reno, 'How Sovereignty Matters: International Markets and the Political Economy of Local Politics in Weak States', in T.M. Callaghy, R. Kassimir and R. Latham (eds), Intervention and Transnationalism in Africa: Global-Local Networks of Power (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2001), pp. 197-215.
28. Ferguson, Global Shadows, p. 103.
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31. Mbembe, 'Ways of Seeing', p. 5
32. T.B. Hansen and F. Stepputat, 'Introduction', in T.B. Hansen and F. Stepputat (eds), Sovereign Bodies: Citizens, Migrants, and States in the Postcolonial World (Princeton and Oxford, Princeton University Press, 2005), pp. 1-38
33. W. van Schendel and I. Abraham, 'Spaces of Engagement: How Borderlands, Illicit Flows, and Territorial States Interlock', in W. van Schendel and I. Abraham (eds), Illicit Flows and Criminal Things: States, Borders and the Other Side of Globalization (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2005), pp. 38-68
34. M. Niger-Thomas, 'Women and the Arts of Smuggling', African Studies Review, 44, 2 (September 2001), pp. 43-71
35. Nugent, Smugglers, Secessionists & Loyal Citizens.
36. C. Lund, 'Twilight Institutions: An Introduction', Development and Change, 37, 4 (July 2006), pp. 673-84.
37. IRIN Plusnews, May 30 2006, 'Namibia: Curbing HIV/AIDS along a transport corridor, retrieved 10 July 2006 from http://www.plusnews.org
38. G. Agamben, Homo Sacer. Sovereign Power and Bare Life (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1998).
39. The dynamics of danger and opportunity were already an integral part of the Lozi kingdom's rulers' attitudes and strategies with respect to their Southeastern frontier, the present-day Namibia-Zambia borderland. For further details, see W. Zeller and B. Kangumu, 'Caprivi Under Old and New Indirect Rule: Falling off the Map or a 19th Century Dream Come True?', in H. Melber (ed.), Transitions in Namibia - Which Changes for Whom? (Uppsala, Nordic Africa Institute, 2007), pp. 190-208
40. L. Flint, 'Historical Constructions of Postcolonial Citizenship and Subjectivity: The Case of the Lozi Peoples of Southern Central Africa' (PhD thesis, University of Birmingham, 2004), pp. 114, 256
41. M. Mainga, Bulozi Under the Luyana Kings: Political Evolution and State Formation in Pre-colonial Zambia (London, Longman, 1973), pp. 133, 154.
42. The official name of the document is 'Anglo-German Agreement of 1890'.
43. Anglo-German agreement of 1890, Article III. 2.
44. Allgemeine Zeitung 1907-08.
45. For further details see Zeller and Kangumu, 'Caprivi under Indirect Rule', p. 194.
46. G. Sandner and M. Rössler, Geography and Empire (Oxford, Blackwell, 1994), p. 118.
47. This was the rationale for Seiner's expedition to the Okavango and Zambezi in 1905-06 (see F. Seiner 1909, 'Ergebnisse einer Bereisung des Gebietes zwischen Okawango und Sambesi (Caprivi-Zipfel) in den Jahren 1905 und 1906', Mitteilungen aus den Schutzgebieten, 22, 1 (January 1909), pp. 2-106
48. F. Seiner, 'Die wirtschaftsgeographischen und politischen Verhältnisse des Captivizipfels', Zeitschrift für Kolonialpolitik, Kolonialrecht und Kolonialwirtschaft, 11 (1909), pp. 419-21
49. see also Erklärungen des Professors Dr. Hahn in der Sitzung der Kommission vom 12. Dezember 1906, Deutsches Kolonialblatt, 18, 2 (January 1907), pp. 25, 73
50. M. Fisch, Der Caprivizipfel während der deutschen Zeit 1890-1914 (Köln, Rüdiger Köppe Verlag, 1996), p. 16.
51. No Author, 'Der Caprivi-Zipfel', Deutsches Kolonialblatt, 19 (1908), p. 1,153.
52. Contemporary sources ostracised them as 'lichtscheue Weisse Elemente': 'white elements avoiding the light of day' (N.A., 'Der Caprivi-Zipfel', p. 1,152)
53. and 'weisses Gesindel - Aasjäger und direkt dem Gefängnis entsprungene Verbrecher': 'white good-for-nothings - poachers and prison escapees'. See K. Streitwolf, Der Caprivizipfel (Berlin, Süsseroth, 1911), p. 1.
54. D.J. Walther, Creating Germans Abroad: Cultural Policies and National Identity in Namibia (Athens, OH, Ohio University Press, 2002).
55. Streitwolf, Der Caprivizipfel.
56. Ibid., pp. 229-34.
57. G. Caplan, The Elites of Barotseland 1878-1969 (London, C. Hurst & Co., 1970), p. 145.
58. B. Kangumu, A Forgotten Corner of Namibia: Aspects of the History of the Caprivi Strip, c. 1939-1980 (MA Thesis, University of Cape Town, 2000).
59. K.-G. Schneider and W. Richter, Kavango und Ostcaprivi. Periphere Wirtschaftsräume im Entwicklungsland Namibia. Geostudien 13/91 (Köln, Universität Köln, 1991), pp. 130, 133.
60. According to Bennett Kangumu Kangumu they were known by their inhabitants as by such names as Piggery, Coloureds, Dairy, Mission, Forestry, Lewis, Mahohoma, and Mafulo.
61. Kangumu, A Forgotten Corner of Namibia.
62. Mishake Muyongo is a direct descendant of Fwe chief Simataa Mamili, who had been appointed by Lozi king Lewanika and was recognised by Streitwolf as the first Fwe chief in Caprivi in 1909. See M. Fisch, The Secessionist Movement in the Caprivi: A Historical Perspective (Windhoek, Namibia Scientific Society, 1999), p. 42.
63. United Democratic Party, 'Caprivi Zipfel: The Controversial Strip' (2005), available at http://www.caprivifreedom.com/ history.i?cmd=view&hid=23, retrieved on 17 July 2007
64. Flint, 'Historical Constructions', p. 188.
65. P. Stiff, The Silent War (Johannesburg, Galago, 1999), p. 205.
66. According to several Caprivi inhabitants the region's rich wildlife was jointly decimated by local poachers and SADF soldiers and some valuable specimens were allegedly captured and airlifted to South Africa for re-sale.
67. The deployment of United Nations and later Namibian Defence Force troops could only buffer out a fraction of these changes. For Western Caprivi, compare J. Taylor, 'The Politics of Identity, Authority and the Environment: San, NGOs and the State in Namibia's West Caprivi' (PhD thesis, University of Oxford, forthcoming 2008).
68. Examples are a pro-secessionist opinion piece published in Caprivi Vision, 1 September 2005, the controversy over the revival of the United Democratic Party (UDP) (The Namibian, 28 July and 8 September 2006, available at http://www.namibian.com.na/archives/ index.html
69. Allgemeine Zeitung, 4 September 2006, available at http://www.az.com.na/interaktiv/archiv/suche.20154.php?q=1
70. New Era, 4 and 5 September 2006, available at http://www.newera.com.na/).
71. The surfacing of a document which Caprivi separatists claim proves that the 1964 CANUSWAPO merger was agreed on the condition that Caprivi would become an independent state separate from Namibia (The Namibian, 24 January 2007)
72. and the repeated public claims by accused and acquitted high treason suspects that Caprivi is historically 'not part of Namibia' (The Namibian, 2 February 2005; 17 January 2007, 17 April 2007 and 14 June 2007).
73. For example, regarding the SWAPO detainee issue, the emergence of opposition parties Congress of Democrats and Rally for Democracy and Progress, and the National Society for Human Rights.
74. SWAPO leaders frequently refer to Caprivi as a potential 'bread basket of the Nation' (New Era, 4 July 2006).
75. At the 2006 Heroes' Day celebrations in Katima Mulilo president Pohamba declared 'the Caprivi Region played a significant role in the national liberation of our motherland' and singled out a number of local 'heroes and heroines' of the armed struggle (H. Pohamba, 'Statement on the Occasion of Heroes Day Commemoration', 26 August 2006, available at http://www.grnnet.gov.na/grnnews.html, retrieved on 17 July 2007).
76. In 2003, 2004 and 2007 flood relief operations brought high-profile government delegations and extensive media coverage to Caprivi. While some homes, livestock and crops were lost, the dominant rhetoric of 'catastrophe' exaggerated government's role in saving a population that has lived with the Zambezi's natural annual flood cycle for centuries.
77. In recent election campaigns in Zambia and Namibia, candidates of both countries' ruling parties have emphasised the infrastructural development they claim to have brought to Caprivi and Western Province.
78. W. Zeller, '"Now We are a Town": Chiefs, Investors, and the State in Zambia's Western Province', in L. Buur and H.M. Kyed (eds), State Recognition and Democratisation in Sub-Saharan Africa: A New Dawn for Traditional Authorities? (New York, Palgrave, 2007), pp. 209-31
79. W. Zeller, 'Chiefs, Policing and Vigilantes: "Cleaning Up" the Caprivi Borderland of Namibia', in L. Buur and H.M. Kyed (eds), State Recognition and Democratisation in Sub-Saharan Africa, pp. 79-104.
80. Examples are the German engineering company JBG Gauff Ingenieure, which designed the Zambezi bridge and CONCOR (until February 2005 held to 44.99 per cent by German-based construction multinational Hochtief), which built the bridge, Livingstone-Sesheke road and several other sections of the corridor road.
81. KfW stands for Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau. The Reconstruction Credit Institute was formed after the Second World War as part of the Marshall Plan, and is under shared ownership by the German federal (Bund) and state (Länder) governments.
82. JBG Gauff Ingenieure, Bridging the Gap, (Frankfurt, H.P. Gauff Ingenieure, 2004), p. 5
83. K. Dierks, 'The History of the Zambezi Bridge from Namibia to Zambia: 1982-2004', available at http://www.klausdierks.com, retrieved on 20 September 2006.
84. http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2006/01/soaring_commodi.html, retrieved on 5 April 2008.
85. A. Goldstein et al., The Rise of China and India - What's in it for Africa? (OECD, 2006), pp. 25ff
86. The Financial Times reported in 2006 that the price of copper had hit an unprecedented $6,000 a tonne, double the average price in 2004 (Financial Times, 7 April 2006, p. 14).
87. The International Herald Tribune attributes this price hike largely to the rapidly growing demand from China, which in 2003 passed the United States as the world's top consumer of copper (D. Lague, 'China to Sell Some Copper to Battle Rising Price', International Herald Tribune (15 November 2005), available from http://www.iht.com/ articles/2005/11/15/business/copper.php, retrieved on 17 July 2007).
88. Namibia Economist, 2 May 2003, available at http://www.economist.com.na/, retrieved on 15 June 2006.
89. On their journey through DRC they are accompanied by armed convoys. Personal communication, Jan-Bart Gewald, 13 October 2007.
90. Walvis Bay Corridor Group (WBCG), 'Trade: Export, Import Commodities', available at http://www.wbcg.com.na/wbcg/tcc/tcc.htm, retrieved on 17 July 2007.
91. WBCG, 'Members of WBCG', available at http://www.wbcg.com.na/wbcg/group/ thegroup.htm, retrieved on 17 July 2007.
92. The Namibian, 18 June 2007.
93. The Namibian, 12 September 2006.
94. Times of Zambia, 24 February 2006, 'Namibia Paves Way for Zambia's Dry Port', available at http://www.tralac.org/scripts/ content.php?id=4564, retrieved on 6 August 2007.
95. See, for example, Walvis Bay Export Processing Zone, available at http://www.wbepzmc.iway.na, retrieved on 27 July 2007.
96. WBCG, 'About Us', available at http://www.wbcg.com.na/wbcg/about/ aboutus.htm, retrieved on 17 July 2007; (capital letters in original).
97. New Era, 16 December 2003.
98. Times of Zambia, 28 June 2007.
99. As laid out in the Namibian Government's Vision 2030. http://www.npc.gov.na/vision/vision_2030bgd.htm, retrieved on 25 March 2008.
100. Examples are the now-defunct Ramatex textile factory, the failed Northland City investment scheme (see Dobler, this volume), table grape plantations on the Orange River and several new uranium mining ventures. A failed plan from the early 1990s for massive sugar cane production in Caprivi was recently reincarnated in a proposed N$870 million plantation and production plant for bio-diesel fuel by an Israeli investor. SWAPO member Chief Kisco Liswani III of the Masubia Tribal Establishment lobbied strongly for government to fast-track the project which was supposed to put 50,000 hectares of currently communal land under irrigation and result in 300,000 [sic] permanent, plus 300,000 temporary jobs. New Era, 28 February 2008.
101. See H. Melber, 'Poverty, Politics, Power and Privilege: Namibia's Black Economic Elite Formation', in H. Melber (ed.), Transitions in Namibia - Which Changes for Whom? (Uppsala, Nordic Africa Institute, 2007), pp. 110-30 for details on self-enrichment schemes involving high-level Namibian civil servants and parastatal managers misappropriating public funds for the Walvis Bay export processing zone.
102. Namibia's Investment Newsletter reported in June 2004, 'The mere 20 to 30 vehicles per day which braved the pontoon [...] have now been replaced by a traffic flow of over 60 heavy vehicles each day. And these are but early days', Ministry of Trade and Industry, Republic of Namibia, 'Frontiers of Commerce Expanded', Namibia's Investment Newsletter, 5 (May 2004), p. 4.
103. Personal communication, Fredrick Mutesa, 25 April 2008
104. During an interview in June 2004 the Sesheke District; Chief of Police offered me his assistance in case I was interested to 'invest' and 'buy land' in the area.
105. The Post, 18 December 2006, available from http://www.postzambia.com/post-read_article.php?articleId=19629, retrieved on 17 July 2007.
106. New Era, 27 July 2006
107. Barotse Development Trust 2006. Barotse Development Trust, 'Projects' available from http://www.barotsedevelopmenttrust.com/projects.html, retrieved 29 November 2005.
108. Namibia National Planning Commission (Windhoek, Government Printer, 2006).
109. For recent studies describing Caprivi as an access corridor for HIV to enter Namibia, see IRIN Plusnews, 30 May 2006, 'Namibia: Curbing HIV/ AIDS Along a Transport Corridor', retrieved 10 July 2006 from http://www.plusnews.org
110. C. Keulder and D. Lebeau, Ships, Trucks and Clubs: The Dynamics of HIV Risk Behaviour in Walvis Bay, IPPR Briefing Paper No. 36 (Windhoek, Institute for Public Policy Research, 2006)
111. D. Lebeau, Turning Corridors of Mobility into Corridors of Hope: Mapping the Link Between Mobility and HIV Vulnerability in Namibia (Geneva, International Organisation for Migration, 2006).
112. The Namibian, 16 October 2000; 23 July 2003.
113. New Era, 5 March 2008, retrieved 5 March 2008 from http://www.newera.com.na/page.php?id=5983 and http://www.newera.com.na/ page.php?id=5984.
114. New Era, 16 August 2007, retrieved 16 August 2007 from http://www.newera.com.na/page.php?id=3330.
115. The Namibian, 31 May 2002; 12 December 2003, 4 June 2004, 4 August 2004.
116. Lux Development, Namibia-Luxembourg Co-operation (Luxembourg, 2007), pp. 5, 12.
117. Interview Michael Mudabeti, Mayor of Katima Mulilo, Katima Mulilo, 5 September 2002.
118. I have used a pseudonym here.
119. ca. €1 in 2007
120. Interview Godfrey Simasiku, Mwandi, 25 May 2004.
121. N.M. Nickanor, M. Conteh and G. Eiseb, 'Unpacking Huge Quantities into Smaller Units: Small-Scale Cross Border Trade Between Namibia and Her Northern Neighbours' (unpublished manuscript, Windhoek, 2007), p. 23.
122. Nickanor et al., 'Unpacking Huge Quantities', p. 20.
123. Ibid., p. 20.
124. Compare also Zeller, 'Chiefs, Policing and Vigilantes'.
125. Interview, Hieronymus Goraseb, Chief Inspector of Namibian Police for Caprivi Region, Katima Mulilo, 15 April 2004.
126. Zeller, 'Chiefs, Policing and Vigilantes', p. 96.
127. Nickanor et al., 'Unpacking Huge Quantities', p. 30.
128. During field work in the Schuckmannsburg-Mwandi area I heard of several undocumented cases of Namibian border guards physically abusing Zambian nationals they had found crossing the border. These allegations were made by both Namibian and Zambian citizens. Compare Zeller, 'Chiefs, Policing and Vigilantes'.
129. Times of Zambia, 12 March 2004.
130. Schendel and Abraham, 'The Making of Illicitness'.