Uncovered

This, believe it or not, is blog number 100!!

Interpol?

If you saw her in a bar, perched on a stool, you’d never believe it. Her blonde hair, fresh complexion, ready smile and piercing blue eyes are much too pretty. But you’d be wrong: she really is with Interpol.

She is seconded from the South African police force and located at the embassy in Kinshasa, where she wears two hats: responsibility for embassy security and management of their ambitious police training and equipment project.

The stories she tells about how the Congo’s management of the aid received from South Africa are appalling. South Africa gave a fleet of four-wheel drive vehicles to the police to manage the election in 2006. Within a week the vehicles had been seized by the commanders for their personal use because they didn’t see why their staff should be given such good cars, while they had nothing. Similarly, most of the police radios which were supplied for the election were sold by the recipients to the public. Recently, because the civil service was very behind in payment of salaries, to pacify senior civil servants a fleet of cars provided in the interests of more efficient government which had been given by another donor were given to them in lieu of salary. That’s it – an official gift of a car from the government, transferred into their name. Whereupon, of course, the beneficiaries seized the opportunity for windfall profits and sold them to the public. One such vehicle had just been bought by our host.

Even in matters of diplomatic relations with South Africa, a country which should surely be considered a friend, the relationship is abused. When the President of South Africa visited the DRC officials were demanding absurd payments at the last minute to give his plane permission to land. Luckily our friend was brought in and sorted it out at the highest level. Similarly the South African Embassy was held hostage over the cars for his motorcade: they were not to be allowed out of the plane until a substantial bribe had been paid. That is, until she used her contacts to get the matter sorted out.

The worst story comes from GTZ, the German aid agency. They had ordered a large quantity of wood for use in refugee camps, but of the 3,400 cubic metres of wood ordered, 2,800 cubic metres (worth about $200,000) was never delivered. GTZ naturally refused to pay the supplier for the wood not supplied. To him, the supplier, this was an outrage. He protested that it wasn’t his fault – the wood had been stolen, so he sued GTZ, successfully. They were ordered to pay him $303,000, which they refused to do. Thereupon their bank accounts in the DRC were frozen and they were slapped with a fine of $924,000. Amazingly, they are still here, operating in force. Not surprisingly most donors now only put money into intangible things like training or immovable things like roads.

Her background is as interesting as her work. She worked as an undercover policewoman with drug gangs in Hillbrow – Johannesburg’s violent drug centre. Later she was transferred, as an obviously innocent Afrikaner girl, to infiltrate the far right movement in South Africa. She told us that it was terrifying for two reasons. The obvious one is that they are well organised, and have multiple arms caches which can be used at a moment’s notice. The more scary thing is how stupid they are and how little they know about the country they live in – they live in a pre-1990 world in which black is bad and white is good. And for that they are prepared to die.

We’re off the subject. She told terrifying stories of her experiences during the last election. There was massive rioting in the streets of Kinshasa, to do with allegations of election fraud by the loser Bemba. He was so frightened of being assassinated that he took refuge in the South African Embassy. This made it the target for the soldiers loyal to Kabila. They were under siege for days, and since he had not requested permission, or given any warning of his arrival, they had been unprepared. They couldn’t use the majority of the building as it was too exposed to the street, so were holed up in the back of the embassy with nothing to eat for days.

It so happens that very near to the South African embassy there’s a patisserie – a nice one. At the end of each day they give any unsold cakes and pastries to street children. That’s a noble idea, but . . . it means that the area is always full of these disaffected kids. They are not tinies: many of them are rough tough adolescents. So?

They just love harassing single women, which she is. As soon as she leaves the embassy they jump on top of her car (a pick up), they bash the sides with sticks, the jump on the bonnet, make faces at her through the windows etc. As she approaches work the same thing happens: if she has the misfortune to be stuck at a junction they hop on. Once she gave a boy who was being particularly offensive a nasty shock by opening the door in his face, and bashing his nose. Since then he snarls at her and shakes his fist every time she passes. In a way it’s lucky that it is an embassy vehicle and the multiple dents are not going to affect her pocket.

A colleague of hers had similar treatment and after a month insisted that she should be repatriated. But her – after six years, with her tour ending in a few months would she come back?

“In a flash.”

That says it all.

A Good Man in Africa

He’s call Celestin, which has an angelic ring. But his mien is anything but angelic. He’s small, with a slight stoop, and his face is expressionless, repressed maybe by the level of his responsibility. He rarely smiles, his brow is knitted, and his eyes, as they say in thrillers, are hooded.

He’s our driver, but his duties extend beyond mere driving. He carries the cash to pay our hotel bills, he helps organise meetings and has a vast network.

As we shuffle uneasily waiting for someone to notice that we have arrived for a meeting with the Mayor, he goes directly to the head of protocol who greets him with a joke and a smile. When we are together in a restaurant it is he who sees that we get the service we deserve. In the evening he asks to be excused to check his emails, and then drives into town to print our latest list of meetings. Before we move off, he won’t even start the engine until everyone has attached their seat belts, and his conscientiousness in completing the log book is exemplary. I feel he worries far more about us than we do.

Possibly one of the reasons for his serious expression is his bad luck in the realm of breeding. He used to work for Gecamines, the state mining company which offered cradle to grave social services. Free schools, free hospitals, free housing – everything free. Knowing he was onto a good wicket, he set about raising a tribe which would look after him in his old age.

The seventh baby had just arrived and he and his wife (who was still relatively young) were wondering whether two or three more would be about right when disaster struck. Gecamines had collapsed and the 95% of the workers were laid off, him included. Penury loomed.

He was lucky, and got a job with a US company that treats its people well. But if you add up all the costs of rearing seven children its hard to see how he can survive on a driver’s salary, even a US-style one. But he doesn’t complain, indeed maintains that everything is fine. He’s clearly taken the decision that whining is a waste of time, and a stiff upper lip, soldiering on, etc are more to be admired than sniffling self -pity.

We’ve been away for nearly two weeks, and are facing the journey back to Lubumbashi from Kolwezi which is normally about six hours, of which only the last two hours are on tar. It was after three hours that we came across an unbelievable scene. Three trucks had broken down, side by side, two going the same way as us, and the other in the opposite direction. To make matters worse, they had done so at the point where the road was nothing but a muddy ditch. There was room for us to get past between two of them, but the mud there was very deep, and it looked extremely unlikely that we would get through. On the left hand side of the road there was a grassy patch which looked promising, but it too was blocked by a fourth truck that has got stuck.

The view from our little vehicle was daunting. A sea of mud separated us from the trucks. We could see no way out unless and until one of them was moved. One of the huge trucks on the other side of the jam was indeed trying to tow one of them out, but it was laden with ore and was clearly too heavy to move even a few inches.

Suddenly, one of the cars from the other side came charging through at considerable speed, driving on the grassy bank on the right side of the road. It was a Land Cruiser. Everyone nodded sagely. Of course, Land Cruisers can do it. Taking a clue from this, a Land Cruiser belonging to a worthy medical charity tried from our end. The problem was that to get onto the grassy bank one had to drive up quite a steep slope: four times it tried, and four times it failed. Its wheel raced as they tried futilely to grip the bank. A pick-up truck on our side then took a high speed run at it from much further back, where it wasn’t so steep, and made it. There was a muted round of cheers from the drivers, muted because they were too scared to try the same thing. Then medical charity vehicle decided to try again, copying the route used by the pick-up, but it got stuck in the early stages. We watched in horror as its wheels spun helplessly and it sank further and further into the mud.

Our all-knowing driver bided his time. As it happened, he had bought a spade the day before. He asked one of the hundreds of spectators to dig into the bank at the side of the road to make it less steep. Half an hour later the digger, whom we had been directing from our side of the muddy pond, sloshed back to us announcing he had done as much as he could and had got a blister for his pains. We gave him a plaster from the car’s first-aid kit and then a protracted debate started. Two were in favour of, and two against trying. What if we got totally stuck like the medical Land Cruiser?

Celestin was decided. We would go. Revving up like a plane about to take off, he released the brake and we were off. In a flash we had made it, then drove at high speed through the thick grass parallel to the road until we were past the jam. We stopped to celebrate, shouting with relief and joy and giving thumbs up to the many admiring spectators. The blistered man caught up with us to ask for his well-earned reward, which we gave him with pleasure.

And Celestin was smiling. Even the next day he was smiling, almost celestially.

The Good Old Days

When people talk about the good old days they usually forget all the bad and exaggerate all the good aspects of those times. But I recently had a vision which suggests, that for all the horrors of the Mobutu era, it truly was the good old days for a lot of people. Rose tinted spectacles and filtering of the recollections really weren’t necessary.

We are on tour in the mining province of Katanga, driving to the offices of a commune on the outskirts of a large town. Quite abruptly the landscape opens up and we had a view of rolling lush green hills, on the top of one of which is a massive red-brick church. As we drive down the hill into the centre of the township we notice a dramatic change. The houses, though small, are all well maintained and surrounded by large green hedges. They are set alongside attractive streets in which children are playing. As we turn the corner we come across a school built on three sides of a square of fresh green grass: as fine a view as any child at Eton would have. (This is a time for poetic licence, not to be taken too seriously). And behind the school we now get a close view of the magnificent Romanesque church – more of a cathedral than a parish church in scale. My French colleague mutters: “Paradise”.

We are in a town built by the mine for its employees. The mining company concerned was Gecamines, a company that had its roots in the Belgian Congo, but was nationalised and took over all mining activities under Mobutu. This allowed him to surreptitiously siphon off much of the massive income for himself. This did not stop him forcing Gecamines to provide cradle to grave welfare services to its employees who were important voters: he was desperately anxious to demonstrate that Katanga did not need to secede. This charming garden city was the result, just one of hundreds of such settlements built at huge (and financially crippling) cost.

In retrospect, I realise it wasn’t the quiet streets or the neat houses, or even the splendid school and church that attracted me, but the sense of order. The mine may have gone under, but the residents still care for their environment. In the Congo that is a rare commodity, and just to have the sense that someone was in charge, was managing, the settlement, was - as they say - paradise.

Double standards

It looks very promising – our hotel in Likasi. It’s fronted by a broad veranda on which people are enjoying a midday drink. At each side of the front door white marble Italianate fountains (fake, and not working) demonstrate this is not a doss-house. In the main dining room, which serves as the bar and reception, there are smart white leather chairs, with stylish stitching, on stainless steel frames. A large flat screen television is placed at the end, showing a French news programme. Light fittings in the form of bottles indicate that this is also a place to have fun.

My allocated room is the most modern room in the place: the corridor wall is entirely glazed. This is rather unnerving, but I accept it, not wanting to make a fuss. It is only when I realize that one cannot lock the sliding glass door that I feel I have a reason to ask to be moved.

The next room I’m given is bigger and better, and I explore it with interest. The taps (see picture) are state of the art stuff. Ever the optimist, I notice that there’s no towel, and fetch one from the previous room. I hang it on the towel rail which promptly falls on the floor. Woops! There’s no soap either, so toddle to go and get some from the reception. Everything looks good. I try the tap – nothing. “Sorry, sir, we have a problem of water.” There is a mini-bar fridge: I check inside – empty and warm. Anyway, at least there is a TV which has three channels.

Now for lunch. We are given a flashy menu. It consists of huge dishes which we just don’t feel like. I tentatively order soup. “I’m very sorry, but soup is only in the evenings.” Try again. “What’s in the ‘Sandwich Parisien’, I ask. “I really don’t know,” comes the reply, “I’ll have to ask the chef.” Then as an afterthought he says, “But even if I found out, it is not available.” We cogitate interminably, and eventually settle for a plate of chips each. Quick and simple.

While waiting for the chips to arrive (1 ½ hours later) we share details of the rooms. My colleague has a window without mosquito netting and no air conditioning, and is dreading the mosquito raids of the night. Unlike us, his room has an internet cable. But it is very short and located in the clothes cupboard, so you can only use it if you’re small enough to sit in the cupboard.

After our chips we adjourned to our rooms where I was to do some work. No power in the electric plugs. “Don’t worry,” says the waiter cum receptionist, “the electrician is coming.”

Dinner time brings its own challenges. Since our lunch was so late, once more one doesn’t want a huge dish. “I’d like some soup,” I say, with confidence. “Oh, sorry, no soup today. You see you have to have water for soup. . . “ I settle for spaghetti bolognese, and try eat as much as I can without deeply offending the chef.

At $80 per night one has to wonder what the owner thinks he is doing with such appalling service and maintenance. Maybe he doesn’t care. But if he did, he would be sitting on a gold mine.

The next night we went to a restaurant in town, which has Indian and local dishes; well cooked, in contrast to the hotel. Moreover, the evening was spiced up by some domestic drama. We were waiting for our food when a huge row broke out. The antagonists were a strong 40-ish man wearing a tee shirt and a wrinkly white man who looked as if he has been here since the 1950s. He was wearing the colonial outfit of shorts and long socks, and was clearly baffled by the offence that he had caused. But he was being gripped on the shoulders by the irate man, whose eyes were bulging in their sockets with anger, and who stood a menacing few inches from his wrinkly foe. At first the contretemps was static, with an ever-growing audience as people left their seats to get closer to the action until the manager intervened and they were hustled outside. A few minutes later the row subsided and the wronged man came back inside. His victim obviously preferred to go somewhere else.

We pieced together an account of what had happened. The white man had entered into conversation with a black woman who turned out to be the wife of the tee-shirted man who was morally outraged and immediately attacked the old man. Judging by his reaction, the old guy clearly had no idea that he was doing anything wrong, but that wasn’t the point.

I’ve no doubt that some financial compensation was eventually demanded and paid to settle the dispute, probably $10.

After the drama, the black man joined a friend of his for a beer near us. The “wife” wasn’t with him. No doubt she continued to sit at the back to entice other gullible people.