Electricity policy in Namibia has become an exercise in managed optics. Announce a modest tariff hike.
Offset it with government “support.” Reference hydropower gains. Mention renewables. But strip away the talking points and here’s what remains: Namibians are being charged more for a service that remains structurally unreliable, imported, and overpriced.
This week, the Electricity Control Board approved a 3.8% hike in NamPower’s bulk tariff—down from the 17.44% originally requested. The discount, we’re told, comes courtesy of a N$283 million cash injection from the government.
Call it what it is: a public subsidy masking a pricing failure. Taxpayers are covering the increase through a back door, turning electricity tariffs into just another form of indirect taxation.
It gets worse. A year of record performance from Ruacana—2,067 GWh—resulted in an over-recovery of nearly N$600 million.
Instead of returning that windfall to consumers or investing it in actual generation capacity, it’s been used as a buffer to prop up the illusion of affordability. NamPower wins. Government claims fiscal prudence. The consumer pays—again.
We’re told that 53% of energy demand will now be met locally. That’s not a success story. It’s a confession that nearly half the country’s electricity is still sourced externally, much of it priced in US dollars. As the Namibia dollar weakens, those costs surge—and the poorest households feel it first.
The regulator, in its usual abstract register, speaks of the “need” for baseload power. That need isn’t new. It’s been on every policy document for over a decade. And yet we’re still commissioning diesel-burning plants and calling it development. This is not infrastructure planning. It’s drift.
Tariff setting in this environment has become a performance: pick a number, soften it with subsidies, frame it with concern. But none of it changes the lived reality—of consumers who pay more every year, with no structural improvements in sight.
Namibians deserve better than boardroom acrobatics and bureaucratic pageantry.
Until we stop pretending that delay is strategy and cost-passing is relief, this cycle will repeat. The lights may stay on. But the system is still broken.
*Briefly is a weekly opinion column offering sharp, analytical insights on business and economic developments.
