Last week's announcement on the revival of the local cement industry by a German company did little to arouse public interest. No politician pitched up for the launch, much to the disappointment of the investors who, according to sources, had specifically asked for such presence in their brief to the organisers of the function.
The lack of excitement was well summed up by the director of industrial development at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Steve Motinga.

From left (seated): Gerhard Hirth, chief executive officer of Schwenk Zement, Ranga Haikali, lawyer Peter Koep, Klaus Bauer board member of Schwenk Zement. Standing: Jan-Karsten Meier, business development manager for Ohorong Cement, Andre Neethling, and Uwe Muller, general manager for Ohorongo Cement.

Schwenk Zement KG, the German company, is not the first investors to discover reserves of limestone in Otjiwarongo district. There has been the Indian TATA group, a Chinese group and an avalanche of local investors. “Nothing came out of all those interests,” said Motinga.
Indeed Namibia has plenty of limestone, the raw material needed to make cement, predicted to last for 100 years. Yet the extraction and manufacturing of cement, as well as the selling of the final product, has eluded investors for decades.
Otjiwarongo Cement did try but with mixed results -they could not guarantee the quality standard of the cement manufactured and critics also says the plant was a hazard to the nearby environment. No other investor was brave enough as Cheetah Cement was in reviving the cement industry in Namibia.
The last attempt by local businessman Zedekias Gowaseb and Brazilian Cemento Pintu through Cheetah Cement came to nothing.
Ohorongo Cement has got to prove to the public that it is serious by wanting to set up a local cement factory. Ohorongo Cement is 60% owned by the family business, Schwenk Zement KG, with the 40% owned by Haikali, lawyer Peter Koep, and the former chief executive of the former OMP, Andre Neethling.
It is envisaged that it will go on line by 2010 producing 600,000 tons of cement per year.
Ohorongo Cement will mine limestone in the Otavi mountainous area. Initial drilling tests have already been conducted with positive results, said the chief executive officer of Schwenk Zement, Gerhard Hirth.
Hirth said the factory will be ideally located since Namibia is the only country with limestone deposits that has no cement factory. And if established the factory will supply southern regions of Angola, Botswana and Zambia through the Trans Caprivi Highway.
The company is currently doing more drilling tests at a cost of N$30 million, to evaluate whether the quality is indeed as established in the first finding. The final results are expected by the year end or early next year. The construction of the factory will commence thereafter. Current estimates put the bill of the factory at N$1.2 billion. A kiln will be station at Otavi while the grinding plant is to be strategically set up at Walvis Bay.