Usakos (, ) is a town on the banks of river

Khan Khan may refer to: * Khan (surname), including a list of people with the name * Khan (title), a royal title for a ruler in Mongol and Turkic languages and used by various ethnicities Art and entertainment * Khan (band), an English progressiv ...

, 140 kilometres north-east of

Swakopmund Swakopmund ("Mouth of the Swakop River, Swakop") is a city on the coast of western Namibia, west of the Namibian capital Windhoek via the B2 road (Namibia), B2 main road. It is the capital of the Erongo Region, Erongo administrative district. It ...

in the

Erongo Region Erongo is one of the 14 regions of Namibia. The capital is Swakopmund. It is named after Mount Erongo, a well-known landmark in Namibia and in this area. Erongo contains the municipalities of Walvis Bay, Swakopmund, Henties Bay and Omaruru, as ...

Namibia Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the no ...

. It is located on the B2 (part of the

Trans-Kalahari Corridor The Trans-Kalahari Corridor is a paved highway corridor that provides a direct route from the port of Walvis Bay and Windhoek in central Namibia, through Botswana, to Pretoria in Gauteng province in South Africa. It initially cost approximately 8 ...

), the main road between the

Walvis Bay Walvis Bay (; ; ) is a city in Namibia and the name of the bay on which it lies. It is the List of cities in Namibia, second largest city in Namibia and the largest coastal city in the country. The city covers an area of of land. The bay is a ...

and

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

. The town has 5,094 inhabitants.

Geography

Usakos townlands comprise of land. Surrounded by mountains, the town is quite picturesque. Certain spots around the town show the longest uninterrupted horizon in the world. It is the closest town to the

Spitzkoppe The Spitzkoppe (from German language, German for "pointed dome"; also referred to as Spitzkop, Groot Spitzkop, or the "Matterhorn of Namibia") is a group of bald granite peaks or inselbergs located between Usakos and Swakopmund in the Nami ...

, often referred to as the "

Matterhorn The , ; ; ; or ; ; . is a mountain of the Alps, straddling the Main chain of the Alps, main watershed and border between Italy and Switzerland. It is a large, near-symmetric pyramidal peak in the extended Monte Rosa area of the Pennine Alps, ...

of Namibia".

Economy and infrastructure

Usakos is riddled with poverty and alcohol abuse and the unemployment rate, as of 2012, was around 60%. Unlike other Namibian towns, it has not seen substantial development since independence in 1990. Usakos Railway Station connects the town to the Namibian railway network.

History

The settlement was founded in the early 1900s as a workshop and watering station for locomotives.

Herero Herero may refer to: * Herero people, a people belonging to the Bantu group, with about 240,000 members alive today * Herero language, a language of the Bantu family (Niger-Congo group) * Herero and Nama genocide * Herero chat, a species of bird ...

chief

Samuel Maharero Samuel Maharero (1856 – 14 March 1923) was a Paramount Chief of the Herero people in German South West Africa (today Namibia) during their revolts and in connection with the events surrounding the Herero and Nama genocide. Today he is con ...

sold the land to Europeans who resold it in 1903 to the Otavi Minen- und Eisenbahngesellschaft (''

Otavi Otavi is a town with 10,000 inhabitants in the Otjozondjupa Region of Namibia. Situated 360 km north of Windhoek, it is the district capital of the Otavi electoral constituency. Geography The towns of Otavi, Tsumeb (to the north) and Gr ...

Mining and Railway Company'') (OMEG) which operated an industrial railway line from Swakopmund to

Tsumeb Tsumeb (; ) is a city of around 35,000 inhabitants and the largest town in the Oshikoto Region, Oshikoto region in northern Namibia. Tsumeb, since its founding in 1905, has been primarily a mining town. The town is the site of a deep mine (the ...

. OMEG established a

railway station Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...

and a repair shop which was used until the 1960s. When mining operations slowed down, Usakos' importance faded quickly. Today it is just a drive-through from the Namibian inland to the coast. Historic buildings and structures in Usakos are the Roman Catholic church (erected 1905), the now dilapidated railway station building, and the old hotel.

Politics

Usakos was downgraded from municipal to town status in 2010. It is since then governed by a town council that has seven seats. In the 2010 local authority election, a total of 1,029 votes were cast in the city.

SWAPO The South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO ; , SWAVO; , SWAVO), officially known as the SWAPO Party of Namibia, is a political party and former independence movement in Namibia (formerly South West Africa). Founded in 1960, it has been ...

won with approximately 47% of the vote. Of the three other parties seeking votes in the election, United Democratic Front (UDF) received approximately 31% of the vote, followed by

RDP RDP may refer to: Computing * Ramer–Douglas–Peucker algorithm, an algorithm for polygonal simplification * Recombination detection program, for analysing genetic recombination * Recursive descent parser, a type of top-down parser * Remote Desk ...

(17%) and

COD Cod (: cod) is the common name for the demersal fish genus ''Gadus'', belonging to the family (biology), family Gadidae. Cod is also used as part of the common name for a number of other fish species, and one species that belongs to genus ''Gad ...

(4%). SWAPO also won the 2015 local authority elections, gaining four seats (513 votes). Two seats went to the UDF (295 votes), and the remaining one to the

Democratic Turnhalle Alliance The Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), formerly Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), is an amalgamation of political parties in Namibia, registered as one singular party for representation purposes. In coalition with the United Democratic Front ...

(DTA, 76 votes). In the 2020 local authority election SWAPO won again over each individual opposition party but lost the majority of seats in the town council. SWAPO obtained 398 votes and gained three seats. Two seats went to the UDF which gained 260 votes, and one seat each went to the

Independent Patriots for Change The Independent Patriots for Change (IPC) is a political party in Namibia. It was founded by Panduleni Itula in August 2020. As an independent presidential candidate in the 2019 election, Itula won the best result of a losing candidate in a ...

(IPC, newly formed in August 2020) with 163 votes and the

Popular Democratic Movement The Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), formerly Democratic Turnhalle Alliance (DTA), is an amalgamation of political parties in Namibia, registered as one singular party for representation purposes. In coalition with the United Democratic Front ...

(PDM, the new name of the DTA since 2017) with 78 votes.

Notable residents

Usakos is the hometown of the following prominent politicians: * Michael Goreseb, former member of the

National Assembly of Namibia The National Assembly is the lower chamber of Namibia's bicameral Parliament. Its laws must be approved by the National Council, the upper house. Since 2014, it has a total of 104 members. 96 members are directly elected through a system of cl ...

Theo-Ben Gurirab Theo-Ben Gurirab (23 January 1938 – 14 July 2018) was a Namibian politician who served in various senior government positions. He served as the second prime minister of Namibia from 28 August 2002 to 20 March 2005, following the demotion and ...

former Speaker of the National Assembly * Tsudao Gurirab, former Member of Parliament from 1999 to 2009 *

Alpheus ǃNaruseb Alpheus ǀGou-ǃna ǃNaruseb (born 20 March 1954) is a Namibian politician who has served in the cabinet of Namibia in various portfolios. A member of the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO), !Naruseb has served in the cabinet since ...

, former Minister of Land and Resettlement

References