President Hage Geingob has said Namibia is facing challenges of unemployment and being unable to easily acquire soft loans due to it being ranked as a higher middle-income country.
Geingob said that is because the population of the country is divided into the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which results in a high per capita income, “assuming that the country is rich”.
Geingob made these remarks during the visit of the two Prime Ministers, Mette Frederiksen of Denmark, and Mark Rutte of the Netherlands, on Monday.
Frederiksen emphasised the importance of forging stronger relationships between the African Union and the European Union, adding that the three countries share the same future, one of which is facing the rise of youth unemployment.
“The difficult task in society is having too many young people not knowing what to do. Many have gone to school, have been educated and therefore have the skills and want to do something with their lives. If we don’t give them the opportunity to put all the skills and measures they have learned into their own future, then we have a common problem,” Frederiksen said.
The Danish Prime Minister noted that many of the multilateral and international institutions were formed and refined after the Second World War, and the world has changed.
“We need a discussion about the United Nations, the UN Security Council, the African perspective on multilateral institutions, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund on how to deal with the new situation where financing climate change has to be at the top of the agenda,” Frederiksen stated.
Rutte on his part said that although the focus is on green hydrogen, the relationship between the countries is more important.
“There are many ambitions that we have for green hydrogen. What we have to do is explore our areas of cooperation to make our three governments more resilient and sustainable,” Rutte said.
The Dutch Prime Minister added that when he looks at the bilateral relationship between Namibia and the Netherlands, the connection goes back many centuries and that the countries have worked extensively in water management, human rights, and governance since Namibia’s independence.
Source: The Namibia Press Agency