At 03h00 on Tuesday morning in Kuisebmond’s Kilimanjaro Street, neighbours were awakened by screams. Not by thunder. Not by celebration. Not by alarm sirens. By screams.
By the time they ran outside, a hardboard shack was already engulfed in flames. Inside, trapped, were 20-year-old Beauty Guidao-Oas and her two-year-old niece, Gloria Guibes. Neighbours tried to break into the structure. They tried to save them. The fire was too fierce. It spread rapidly, consuming six shacks and affecting fourteen people.
By sunrise, two lives were gone. Another shack fire. Another funeral.
Another police statement confirming bodies transported to the mortuary and investigations underway.
And another moment where the country must confront an uncomfortable question: Have we quietly accepted shack fires as a normal feature of Namibian life?
Because if we have not accepted it, then why does it keep happening with such predictable regularity?
It is a horrific way to die. To be trapped in a structure made of flammable boards and zinc sheets. To scream for help while neighbours watch helplessly as flames intensify. For some readers, it may register as yet another brief headline, another tragic but familiar occurrence in an informal settlement.
But behind that headline were real people. A young woman. A child barely beginning life. Dreams interrupted. Futures erased in smoke and heat. We must resist the temptation to treat this as routine.
Shack fires are not acts of fate. They are not mysterious disasters falling from the sky. They are the predictable consequence of how we have structured, or failed to structure, urban development in this country.
Across Namibia’s towns, informal settlements continue to expand faster than formal housing delivery. In Walvis Bay, Windhoek, Swakopmund, Oshakati, and elsewhere, families live in densely packed structures built from highly combustible materials. Electrical connections are often informal. Paraffin stoves are common. Open flames are part of daily survival.
One spark. One overturned candle. One electrical short circuit. And an entire block can go up in minutes.
It is easy to direct outrage at central government alone. But housing and spatial planning fall significantly within the mandate of local authorities. Councillors are elected directly by these communities. During election campaigns, housing promises are delivered with theatrical certainty. “We will provide housing for all.” “We will formalise informal settlements.” “We will accelerate land delivery.” Those promises echo loudly during campaigns.
But in the early hours of Tuesday morning, when Beauty and Gloria were trapped, campaign slogans were nowhere to be found.
This is not about scoring political points. It is about governance credibility. Every shack fire forces us to ask: where is the urgency between election cycles? Where is the radical innovation in land servicing? Where is the aggressive roll-out of affordable starter housing? Where are firebreak planning measures in informal settlements? Where is the visible, measurable progress?
Local authorities cannot simply say land delivery is complex. It is complex. But complexity does not absolve responsibility.
We must also confront a deeper societal discomfort: have we subconsciously normalised a two-tiered urban reality? One Namibia where suburbs have fire hydrants, building regulations, insurance coverage and emergency access roads. And another Namibia where entire communities live one candle away from catastrophe.
Because the truth is harsh. If similar fires were destroying formal brick homes at this frequency, the response would be immediate and overwhelming. Emergency summits would be convened. Special budgets would be approved. Task forces would be announced.
But shack fires happen in places many decision-makers do not reside. And so the urgency dulls. We must reject that complacency.
Fourteen people are now displaced. Six structures reduced to ash. Two families planning funerals instead of futures. The trauma for neighbours — especially those who heard the screams — will not disappear when the ashes cool.
This is not merely a housing issue. It is a public safety crisis. It is an urban planning failure. It is a moral test.
There are practical interventions that can reduce risk:
• Properly demarcated firebreaks in informal settlements
• Community-based fire awareness programmes
• Distribution of basic fire extinguishers
• Safer communal electrical infrastructure
• Accelerated incremental housing upgrades
• Transparent housing allocation systems
None of these require miracles. They require political will, administrative discipline, and budget prioritisation.
Namibia cannot claim developmental maturity while accepting that young women and toddlers die in preventable shack infernos. We must also avoid the ritualistic cycle: tragedy, condolences, investigation, silence, until the next fire.
The Windhoek Observer does not write this in anger alone. We write this in insistence. Local authorities must publish clear, measurable housing delivery timelines. They must report quarterly on land servicing targets. They must show communities what progress looks like beyond campaign posters. They must treat informal settlements not as temporary embarrassments but as permanent responsibilities until resolved. Central government must ensure municipalities have both funding and oversight mechanisms to deliver.
And we, as citizens, must continue demanding accountability beyond election season. Beauty Guidao-Oas was twenty years old. Gloria Guibes was two. Their deaths should not dissolve into statistical abstraction.
If we allow ourselves to become numb, then we are complicit in lowering the standard of what we believe our people deserve. No Namibian should die screaming inside a structure built of desperation. This must not become normal.
Another shack fire should not simply mean another funeral. It must mean renewed urgency, renewed accountability, and renewed determination to build cities where survival is not a daily gamble. Otherwise, the question lingers, uncomfortable and unresolved:
Is this the fate we have made peace with? It cannot be. And it must not be.
