Driving

1. It’s a Tuesday afternoon and I have to go to an airline office in the centre of town. To be more precise along the Boulevard 30 Juin, 30 June being the date of Independence of the DRC from Belgium.

The Belgians are no one’s favourite colonialists, but like most colonialists they liked to make a statement when it came to their Capital City. In fact, if you compare Kinshasa with Nairobi or Lusaka or Accra, I would say that the Belgians were much better at it than the British.

So the Boulevard which sweeps from the main railway station from the heart of the city was a fine example of what the word Boulevard suggests: a wide, tree-line avenue, with a mixture of gracious buildings on both sides, some fine public buildings like the Post Office, many shops, large and small, and offices and blocks of flats.

That, at least, is my reconstruction. Today many of the building lie unused and even derelict, even pock marked by bullet holes. Paint is a commodity that is not used. Many shops are closed, and the pavements are nothing but dusty cart tracks. Interspersed with the old are a few buildings which look, and maybe even are, new, to house the banks, cell phone companies and similar products of international capital.

So the Bouelvard is not what it used to be. But it isn’t just because the economy has been shattered and recovery is slow. It has lost the essence of its meaning as a Boulevard: its trees.

The President, Joseph Kabila, has decreed that one of his national priorities is to turn the boulevard into a new superhighway – four lanes in each direction. In this he has been ably supported by the Chinese who have adopted it under a barter deal. This is part of a five-part project in which China builds infrastructure for which they will receive copper and other minerals from the DRC in return.

Maybe in the future the Chinese will redeem themselves, but so far the results have been dismal. All the trees have gone, and in their place is only a massive strip of asphalt, wider than an airport runway.

But that is no help today, because the work isn’t finished, and half of the famous Boulevard is closed for road works. The closed side is the inward bound section, the side on which we need to go.

No problem. My doughty driver knows the answer. He seizes a gap in the traffic to cross the road and drive onto the pavement on the left hand side of the road. Once on the pavement he heads into town.

There’s a small problem with this plan. All the other drivers have done the same – no only the ones who are heading into town, but the ones coming out as well. Once on the pavement, by a fluke we move forward about three car lengths, but then come to an intersection.

This intersection has clearly been identified as a problem. The cars coming out of it are totally stuck because the Boulevard is also stuck. The side road is narrow – not an important road – but nevertheless is part of the total blockage. That is why there are about twenty policemen trying to get a gap in the traffic so that cars can leave the intersection. They manage it for a fleeting moment before a car drives from the pavement on the other side and ends up head on facing a car on our side of the pavement, thereby blocking the intersection once more.

At this point my driver gives up and tries once more to get onto the right side of the road. This involves shoving his way, car by car, across the flow of the traffic. Someone is just in front of us, and slowly (everything is a matter of inching forward minute by minute) runs over a market woman’s maize bags. The poor woman protests, and the driver (also a woman) tries to reduce the damage by reversing, but by doing so actually bursts the bags. The car behind hoots. The driver of the offending car can do nothing and eventually just drives off. Maize everywhere.

Meanwhile the many policemen are entreating drivers to hold back. They stand in front of cars to block their way, they argue with the drivers, but ultimately seem to be powerless to control anything. Once there’s any easing the blockage cars surge forward, and the police can do nothing other than blow their whistles in frustration. Their normal response – taking offending drivers to one side to negotiate a bribe – seems to be futile in these circumstances, and possibly it is this realisation that frees drivers of any good sense that they might otherwise have.

After a time we get through, and drive slowly on the right side of the road towards our destination. Suddenly an opening occurs and we zoom to the other side and resume our drive on the pavement. Some blockhead of a driver has had the same idea, only he’s coming from the other direction, and we end up, head to end, with nowhere to go as there are parked cars on both sides.

I get out and walk, and I suppose the drivers must have found some resolution of their confrontation, because when I had left the airline office about five minutes later, the driver was a little bit closer and his opponent had vanished.

Leaving was much faster, as the road was fairly empty. But when I asked why there had been such a traffic jam today, he just shrugged his shoulders – it’s like that every day.