Maltahöhe is a village in southern central

Namibia Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...

close to the Swartrand escarpment, about 110 km west of Mariental in the

Hardap Region Hardap is one of the fourteen regions of Namibia, its capital is Mariental. Hardap contains the municipality of Mariental, the towns Rehoboth and Aranos, and the self-governed villages Gibeon, Gochas, Kalkrand, Stampriet and Maltahöhe. It is ...

. It has about 6,000 inhabitants and owns about 17,000 hectares of land. Maltahöhe has two suburbs, the ''Andreville'' location and the ''Blikkiesdorp'' (literally af, Tin Town) informal settlement which has neither sewerage nor electricity supply.

History

Maltahöhe was established in 1899 by Henning von Burgsdorff, previously an officer in the German ''

Schutztruppe (, Protection Force) was the official name of the colonial troops in the African territories of the German colonial empire from the late 19th century to 1918. Similar to other colonial armies, the consisted of volunteer European commissioned ...

'', the military force of the Imperial German occupation. Burgsdorff named the place after his wife Malta. After the end of the German colonial era in

South West Africa South West Africa ( af, Suidwes-Afrika; german: Südwestafrika; nl, Zuidwest-Afrika) was a territory under South African administration from 1915 to 1990, after which it became modern-day Namibia. It bordered Angola (Portuguese colony before 1 ...

the settlement became a small hub for tourism, serving as gateway to popular destinations like the

Sossusvlei Sossusvlei (sometimes written Sossus Vlei) is a salt and clay pan surrounded by high red dunes, located in the southern part of the Namib Desert, in the Namib-Naukluft National Park of Namibia. The name "Sossusvlei" is often used in an exten ...

Solitaire Solitaire is any tabletop game which one can play by oneself, usually with cards, but also with dominoes. The term "solitaire" is also used for single-player games of concentration and skill using a set layout tiles, pegs or stones. These game ...

Sesriem Sesriem is a small settlement in the Namib Desert, in the Hardap Region of Namibia, close to the southern end of the Naukluft Mountains. It is especially known because the "Sesriem gate" is the main access point to the Namib-Naukluft National Par ...

, and Duwisib Castle. The ''Maltahöhe Hotel'' was founded in 1907 and is the oldest country hotel in Namibia.

Business and development

Maltahöhe has been in steady decline for a number of decades. There is no retail store in town; the last one stopped business before 1980. Until after the year 2000 Maltahöhe used to have town status. Due to mismanagement and infighting between councillors it was downgraded to "village". Since then many businesspeople have left and unemployment has risen. There is no secondary school, only a primary school and the Daweb Junior Secondary School. The town used to be a centre for karakul sheep farming, but this branch of agriculture has likewise been shrinking. Unemployment is high with only about 500 residents in possession of some sort of job. Alcohol abuse is common, particularly in the suburbs.

Politics

Maltahöhe is governed by a village council that has five seats. The 2010 local authority election was won by the

SWAPO The South West Africa People's Organisation (, SWAPO; af, Suidwes-Afrikaanse Volks Organisasie, SWAVO; german: Südwestafrikanische Volksorganisation, SWAVO), officially known as the SWAPO Party of Namibia, is a political party and former ind ...

party which gained three seats. One seat each was won by the All People's Party (APP) and the Rally for Democracy and Progress (RDP). SWAPO also won the 2015 election and gained four seats (511 votes). The remaining seat went to the APP which obtained 109 votes. The 2020 local authority election was won by the newly formed

Landless People's Movement The Landless People's Movement was an independent social movement in South Africa. It consisted of rural people and people living in shack settlements in cities. The Landless People's Movement boycotted parliamentary elections and had a histor ...

(LPM) which scored well all over Hardap. LPM gained 685 votes and three seats in the village council. SWAPO took the remaining two seats with 330 votes.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Maltahohe Populated places in the Hardap Region Populated places established in 1899 1899 establishments in German South West Africa Villages in Namibia