Aligning Technical and Vocational Education with Local Labour Market Needs in Namibia: Perspectives of Graduates, Lecturers and Employers

Technical and vocational education can strengthen Namibia’s transition from training to productive work, but curriculum relevance cannot be judged from qualifications or employment status alone. This article critically reviews published Namibian research and selected international evidence to examine alignment through graduate, lecturer and employer perspectives. A targeted narrative review of journal articles, institutional repository records and official publications retrieved in October 2026 distinguishes reported findings from policy aspirations and analytical proposals. The reviewed evidence identifies recurring concerns about practical learning, workplace access, career preparation, institutional capacity and feedback between training providers and enterprises. Recent graduate evidence also indicates that favourable perceptions of teaching can coexist with weak employment in the trained field. However, differences in samples, instruments and labour market settings prevent pooled estimates or national generalisation. The research gap concerns the limited translation of comparable, locally grounded stakeholder evidence into documented curriculum and placement decisions. The article contributes a three-perspective alignment framework, a regional decision cycle and proposed measures that distinguish competence, occupational matching and employment quality. It argues that lecturers’ accounts of instructional feasibility, employers’ task requirements and graduates’ transition experiences should be interpreted together without treating any perspective as conclusive. Recommendations prioritise structured workplace learning, trade-specific assessment, lecturer development and accountable regional partnerships. Future studies should test the framework with linked stakeholder evidence and longitudinal outcomes rather than infer curriculum failure from unemployment alone.