A truck driver told daily newspaper, the Namibian Sun, that he and other truck drivers were forced to urinate in empty cold drink bottles and sleep in the trailers of their vehicles.

The newspaper reported that it had seen a video, showing a man being given food without cutlery to use and a bed a quarantined person is supposed to sleep in, with claims that the sheets, pillows or blankets were not replaced after being used by someone else.

According to the daily, the police said on Monday a truck driver left a quarantine facility in the Khomas Region to fetch a blanket at home because he said it was cold.

Khomas regional police commander, Commissioner Joseph Shikongo, told the newspaper that another truck driver snuck out of a quarantine facility last weekend in the Khomas region to visit his girlfriend, while another trucker escaped and was later found at his home.

Government blamed miscommunication for some long-distance truck drivers being made to self-isolate in the trailers of their vehicles. 

Health ministry executive director Ben Nangombe acknowledged that the quality of quarantine facilities would differ and said the ministry placed persons in supervised isolation where it found space that was deemed of an acceptable standard.

"We quarantine people where we find space," he told the newspaper.

"I would like to think that the facilities are not the same. We take what is available to us as long as it is in good quality.”

He said truck drivers were quarantined in the areas where they deliver their last load.

Nangombe said it was not the intention of the ministry for drivers to sleep in their trailers of their trucks. He acknowledged that there may have been miscommunication within the ministry regarding the placement of truck drivers in quarantine at the coast.

The Namibian newspaper reported that Namibian truck drivers have been crossing borders to pick up and deliver essential goods, risking their health in the process.

According to a report in the newspaper one truck driver tested positive for Covid-19 on Sunday, while another contracted the virus in Zambia where he was currently quarantined.

A 47-year-old truck driver, returned from South Africa on May 8 and was quarantined at the truck depot.

Before receiving his test results, the man allegedly entered the community with a colleague, but was later apprehended by the police.

A truck driver told The Namibian that they do not receive a risk allowance and were not allowed to go home to their families once they returned to the country.

"We have to wait for our results. It is dangerous, because we come from different countries and you do not know who is sick. We are using the same toilets and office, so every trip is stressful," he told daily.

African News Agency