Collin Benjamin was an unknown when he left his native Namibia in the 1990s, becoming one of the best African imports into the German league. Back in Windhoek, he wants to improve the professional football club landscape with the virtues learned from his Germany stint. 



There have been thousands of African footballers who have left the continent to seek fame and fortune on the football fields of Europe, where the earnings can be eye- wateringly plentiful and international glory beckons.



The likes of Samuel Eto’o, Abedi Pele, Didier Drogba, Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah have been turned into worldwide icons by their exploits and remain massive role models.



But the cycle of moving overseas to play and then returning home to share the knowledge and expertise gained has been largely limited, making it always heartening when this is competed.



One such example is Collin Benjamin, who was an unknown when he left his native Namibia in the 1990s to try his luck in Germany.


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<figure class="alignleft size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="809" height="1024" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-809x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-61913" style="width:421px;height:auto" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-809x1024.jpg 809w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-237x300.jpg 237w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-768x972.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-1214x1536.jpg 1214w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-1618x2048.jpg 1618w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Collin-Benjamin-image-supplied-scaled.jpg 2023w" sizes="(max-width: 809px) 100vw, 809px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Collin Benjamin, coach of Namibia ©Muzi Ntombela/BackpagePix</figcaption></figure></div>


There have always been close footballing contacts between the southern African country and its former colonizer and the contacts helped Benjamin find a club in the semi-professional ranks. There is little glamor there but players head in that direction in the hope it proves a springboard.



This is what happened to Benjamin, who went on to spend a decade playing in the Bundesliga and became one of the best African imports into the German league.



After his career at Hamburger SV and 1860 Munich, he worked as a junior coach in Germany before deciding to go home to Windhoek.



Since then, he has worked his way through the coaching ranks with Namibia’s junior teams and on to the senior side, when he qualified for this year’s Africa Cup of Nations.



It was only the fourth time Namibia reached the finals, and in the Ivory Coast, they set new standards, winning for a first time and also qualifying for the knockout phase – something they had not done before.



Benjamin felt the urge to return home, knowing his experience could be a force for good.



“Namibia is my country that gave me the chance to become a footballer. I returned to Windhoek in 2016 because I wanted to give something back to the country with my academy after my almost 20 years in Germany,” he explains to FORBES AFRICA.



“The fact that we were now able to give something back with the achievements at the Cup of Nations finals and that I can do this job makes me very happy and grateful.” Benjamin has had to deal with limited facilities, much changed from his time in Germany with their abundant resources.



Namibia’s small population also means a restricted pool of talent to choose from plus the country’s administrators have been reportedly fighting each other over the last decade, leaving the professional club landscape in tatters.



Benjamin says, however, that there was a fire burning within all his players, just as there was with him when he was starting out.



“You know, less talent, more work, and just the hunger. They all want to get out of Namibia and have an opportunity to play outside in another country.”



That spurred Namibia to a successful tournament in the Ivory Coast, including an upset win over Tunisia, who were at the last World Cup finals in Qatar.



“Basically, it was that hunger, wanting to succeed, knowing that clubs elsewhere cannot see them at home. The only platform they have to make a name for themselves is the national team.”



Benjamin has looked to harness that as best he can. “My approach is basically to look at what you have talentwise but also your personality. I’m of the opinion that I was not the best player, but I could make it and go and play in Germany just because of basic hunger and work ethic. I believe that you have to work if you want to achieve. I felt I had to get the team centered and create an ambition in them. They had to know that they should work towards something, and only through work you can achieve those goals. We had to become a lot fitter and play with more aggression and just learn to make things difficult for your opponent. So, it was basically just those principles. Those are kind of like my life principles that I’m just trying to instil in them.”



Moving from Germany has not proven easy because Namibia is hampered not only by a small pool of players but also a lack of facilities. Their two stadiums in Windhoek have both been ruled unfit for international matches by Confederation of African Football inspectors. Namibia have had to host their ‘home’ matches in South Africa.



“It’s not something that I’m going to hide, I do get frustrated. The whole parliament have been congratulating us, influential people, politicians, but we don’t need that. We want them to use their influence to at least have a stadium where we can play our matches, so that these players actually have something to dream about and people to cheer for them. If you want to compete on this continental stage, you need to win your home games and for us that’s not possible as long



as our stadiums are banned because they need to be upgraded.” But his job is still a thrill. “I don’t want hero status. For me it’s about something completely different. In Germany, with my easy nature, I was certainly seen by everyone as an African, and many of the boys in the team probably thought of me as ‘He’s not African, he’s European’. I am of course African. But I have internalized German virtues such as discipline, I try to mix and bring together the best of both cultures. So far, the combination has worked very well. I didn’t have a career plan before. My only goal was to further develop football in Namibia. And we’re not done yet,” warns Benjamin.

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The Sportsman Kick-Starting Change From Germany To Namibia

A neatly laid out kitchen made from African Wenge side panels, with high gloss wrapped doors, completed with a black silico nero top imported from Germany, is the work of two young entrepreneurs, Aubrey Dolweni and Simpiwe Malotana. They are slowly transforming the interior design industry in townships in the Western Cape province of South Africa.
Obsido Interiors started in Dolweni’s backyard and is now growing into a successful interior design company.
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It was Dolweni’s father, Amos, a well-known cupboard maker in the Nyanga township, who taught Aubrey how to build and make cupboards. When Amos died, Dolweni decided to continue in his father’s footsteps and start his own business.
In 2005, Dolweni was working for another interior design firm as well as doing odd carpentry jobs on the side. While installing new cupboards at Malotana’s home, who was his neighbor, the idea for Obsido Interiors was conceptualized.
Malotana, an IT analyst, knew that Dolweni was not entirely happy with the job he had and urged him to start Obsido Interiors.
“At the time I wasn’t comfortable at work. I felt like I was underpaid, but I had a fear of leaving because I didn’t have any business or management skills,” says Dolweni.
Eventually, around 2008, Malotana was able to finally convince Dolweni to look at starting a business with him. It was finally registered two years later.
“It took him a while to decide as he was also employed at the time and a sole bread winner in his family. After several consultations with his mother, he finally decided we could start the business,” says Malotana.
Dolweni concentrated on design and manufacturing, while Malotana, a father of two, would focus on the marketing, financial and admin side of the business.
For six months, Dolweni worked on the business in the evenings and on weekends, doing odd jobs in manufacturing custom-made wooden coffee tables and interior design work for friends and family.
Soon, the company grew and he quit his full time job to focus on Obsido Interiors.
“This business grew very fast and we couldn’t manage the pressure in terms of delivering projects on time and so on… And he [Dolweni] had to work full time on the business.” says Malotana.
Obisido Interiors grew from just making wooden ornaments to a business focusing on redesigning and assembling home interiors in townships.
“We saw that a lot of the people were going to the city to get new kitchens and stuff and so we decided to bring this service to the people in the townships,” Malotana says.
Although, it wasn’t easy at first because Dolweni would meet with clients, do the measurements and sketch the designs on paper. Some clients would chop and change what they wanted, forcing Dolweni to redraw the designs from the beginning.
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“We had to look for software to make things easy for us. In 2011, we bought a program which allowed us to do designs in 3D and things start to work and look better. So we could show the customer a 3D view of the design and if they wanted changes, we could do them instantly,” says Malotana.
A few months into the business, Obsido Interiors received its first big client. They were asked to design and manufacture office furniture for another business in another township.
But like any business, they experienced challenges along the way, especially in townships which an emerging black middle class no longer wanted to reside in. They were instead choosing to move into the city and surrounding suburbs.
Many of their would-be-clients are often unemployed.  Some are blacklisted by the credit bureau but still want to spend money redesigning their living areas. Many of them, according to Dolweni, would rather get service from the guys who sell cupboards on the side of the road using off-cut material. He says it is one of their biggest challenges; competing with these sidewalk businessmen and not compromising on the quality of their product, which is sometimes seen as expensive.
“This market is slow. The type of products we offer, we feel like we’re not going to change. We’re not going to offer lower end products. People will just grow into it,” says Malotana.
Running a business and being young in what is labeled as South Africa’s murder capital has proved to be thorn they are trying to pull out.
“The other problem is trust. Because we’re black and young and we’re from Nyanga, people still feel that we’re going to run away with their money, even though we have all the systems in place,” laments Malotana.
But that attitude is slowly changing. They now have showroom in a mall in their township and people know where to find them.
“We recently formed a partnership with one of our major suppliers, Lansdowne Boards. They helped us set up our showroom,” says the outspoken Malotana.
Business might be booming for Obsido Interiors, but the pair have not forgotten about their upbringing in Nyanga. The township is plagued by one of the highest crime rates in the country and rising unemployment. The saying, ‘charity begins at home’ has become part of their life. The pair decided to start a football team, Nyanga Football Stars, in the hope that it will help alleviate the crime in their neighborhood.
“The team is made up of former gangsters, former drug addicts, ex-prisoners and general students. The vision was to help reform them and get them to be accepted back into society.”
They have even taken their philanthropy a step further by hiring or finding employment for promising team members.
Obsido Interiors might have started from humble beginnings in Dolweni’s backyard, but it is an interior design business that is transforming the township.

Tag: Germany

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The Sportsman Kick-Starting Change From Germany To Namibia

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