Times past

Here’s the shortest ever - a Christmas special.

You are in the offices of a commune with a population of 260,000 – a subdivision of the City of Lubumbashi, probably the most prosperous city per head of any in the DRC. The commune is responsible for a huge range of different matters such as providing markets and community centres, ensuring the provision of education and health services, social welfare and the like.

There are four offices: that of the Bourgmestre (the boss) and just three others, all opening out onto a narrow access veranda.

The accountant (for there is only one) is asleep at his desk, because there’s no money either coming in or going out.

To one side of the accountant’s office is the office of civil registries. Beside the entrance door is a poster: Register your birth here: IT IS FREE! There is a steady stream of people waiting. They are unusually quiet and respectful because there should be no noisy quarrelling at such an important occasion. The events are lovingly entered into massive tomes provided by UNICEF.

The accountant’s slumber is interrupted by an insistent tapping. It is coming from the office on the opposite side – that of the Commune Secretary who is writing a letter. For this he has hauled out his ancient typewriter, and is banging out the words, letter by letter, his fingers hovering, ever so slowly, over each letter before pecking it fiercely. The typewriter itself, like the steam engines on the railways, the post offices throughout the country and much else that we see daily, is a much depredated survival of the Belgian past. It is virtually the only machine in the whole office. There are no computers, no air conditioners, often no power, and indeed not even any filing cabinets (everything lies on rickety shelves).

It is no surprise that the letter, so kindly written on our behalf, is exactly like those fake examples of old typewriters much loved by advertising agents and movie makers, where the letters are purposely out of alignment thus giving the page “character”.

I’d love to reproduce the resulting letter we received, but cannot for obvious reasons of confidentiality. But to give you an idea of what it’s like, here’s a part of it.

Happy Christmas

A captivating tale

When the notorious M23 rebels were about to capture Goma, the guards at its Munzenze prison decided to get out while the going was good. From what we understand their last act was to hand the keys to one of the prisoners so that their captives could follow their example, which they did.  All 1,175 of them.

The prison was built by the Belgians at least 60 years ago to accommodate 150 prisoners. It had been allowed to get into such a bad state that it received the attention of the American Bar Association which went so far as to provide funds to improve it. The UN peace-keeping force had also made some additions. But in spite of that its reputation was nothing short of grisly.

To return to the story. Prison guards are generally considered to be OK types, so after their “escape” they could mingle freely with the townsfolk and quickly vanish. For the prisoners it was a different story. For many members of the public the idea of having thieves, rapists and murderers wandering around their streets was too much, especially when they were unsure whether the M23 was friend or foe. This created, according to the news reports, a state of psychosis as well as an opportunity for revenge, so the hapless prisoners’ freedom was marred by being beaten up. Eight were lynched to the extent of being killed.

Meanwhile, the opportunistic public, always on the lookout for something free, looted the prison, taking bedding, doors, windows, fittings and furniture. By the time the M23 left the town the prison resembled the aftermath of a massive bombing raid.

The prisoners were mortified. They had lost their home and their restaurant service, but they appealed to the authorities to allow them back. This “patriotic” gesture was warmly welcomed by the Governor of the Province who provided them with mattresses, blankets and food. However, many still remain unaccounted for, so he has promised a reduction in the sentences of those who come back home soon.

Isn’t that sweet?

Doing business

The latest “Ease of Doing Business” study has been published by the World Bank. Not surprisingly the Congo is 178 in the world, 5 from the bottom. The documents shows that in the DRC’s case the total value of taxes payable adds up to 339.7% of profit (compared to, for example, the UK where it is 37.3%), and will take 336 hours to manage per year. Importing a container takes on average 63 days at the port of entry, and costs $3,285. (It’s 6 days in the UK).

It was a nice surprise to meet an aid worker who’s here to try and improve the business climate. He’s not expecting to revolutionise things in one go, but hopes that by the time he leaves, the DRC will at least be better in some respects. He’s lucky to have job that can make a discernable difference, and good luck to him.

Meanwhile, you can’t help thinking that if life’s so tough for business why does anyone come here?

But they do. Last year we boggled, with incredulity, at a shiny new billboard on the main road into town:

“Welcome to the new Kinshasa” it said. “Announcing the Cité du Fleuve, a new exclusive island in the middle of the Congo River.”

And to prove that they weren’t lying there was an artist’s impression of a Dubai style island development, right in the middle of the mighty river. What wishful thinking!!

But little by little news trickled out that work had actually begun. Huge dredgers were creating the island by pumping vast quantities of sand just to the north of the main city. Someone said it was being funded by a British hedge fund, which put a totally new perspective on it.

And then, this invitation arrived in our email boxes. “Enjoy fabulous pizzas at the Cité du Fleuve” complete with a photo to prove that it existed.

So, one Saturday, off we go. The journey takes one through some rough areas which makes one wonder whether they’ll ever attract the sort of client they need, but suddenly you are driving on a causeway onto the island which already has tarred roads, street lights and other symbols of modern development.

The pizza place is not much more than a small kiosk, but it serves attractive tables under large umbrellas at the water’s edge. As you sit you can watch regular traffic of dug-out canoes bringing supplies to Kinshasa. On the inland side of the road they are building the new houses.

As if to prove a point about the problems of working here, the developer has opted for steel pre-fabricated houses. There’s one completed already and several more are going up. They’re very nice, middle income type houses – not as fancy as the billboard suggested.

Their logic is that although importing stuff is slow and expensive, it’s less hassle than dealing with endless unreliable suppliers. But what a wasted opportunity for developing local skills and manufacturers! I wonder if the business climate were better whether they would have taken that decision.

One day

Here are a few incidents to provide a flavour of life here.

(source for most of the stories, staff reports)

·  In Goma, where all the fighting is taking place: teachers are challenging the M23 rebels to pay them, as the M23 won’t allow government staff to enter the city. Meanwhile a band of ten policemen, not impressed by the fact that the 10,000 strong Congolese Army, already mobilized in the region, cannot retake the city, enters Goma secretly by boat from Lake Kivu to re-establish the power of the government in the city.

·  In Bukavu, a non-government organisation has decided to go into pastures new by founding a University. For their campus they have chose a large house that used to be their office. They promise to deliver bachelor’s degrees in three years (as opposed to four years at the state universities) in subjects as unusual as choreography and music as well as conventional ones such as law and education. This accelerated and novel curriculum has excited the attention of many students. But their joy may be short-lived: the Minister of Education has pointed out that they have neither requested nor received accreditation and might be closed down.

·  In Bandundu, a newly elected Governor of the Province decides to make his mark by ordering that all schools within the town of Bandundu must be cleaned. He gives the staff and children three days in which to complete the job. It is not clear when they will next be cleaned, or why it takes an order from on high to get someone to clean them.

·  In Katanga, teachers from one of the rural parts of the province have not been paid since 2010. They “are considering” going on strike.

·  In another part of Katanga, efforts by the UN Peace Keepers to disarm some well-establish bandits failed when the UN contingent from Benin, who were supposed to be leading the action, decided it was too dangerous and left in haste.

·  In Kinshasa, an unusual disaster struck. The high profile politician, Kengo wa Dondo, (who is President of the Senate, and is best known for being hospitalised for a week after being attacked at the Gare du Nord in Paris by Congolese dissidents shortly after the DRC Elections in November), was taking his usual evening constitutional along the river. To compensate for his somewhat effeminate bearing, and his unpopularity, he surrounds himself with five bodyguards with whom he has nothing in common except proximity.

But today was to be different. Their walk was interrupted by a deafening crash: his bodyguards went into close formation and his normal dour expression was replaced by sheer fright.

Fortunately the crash was nothing more than a massive branch breaking off a tree. Much to his relief the car underneath was not his. (see picture)

(Note: the owner of the car returned about 15 minutes after the event. He organised the many bystanders to lift up the branches to allow him to drive out, and within minutes he and his somewhat dented car were gone – he laughing at life’s absurdities.)

Success stories

If you are not in the mood for cynicism, read no further. But if, like me, you share not only exasperation about the failure of the Congo to pull itself from poverty, warfare, corruption and chaos, but also a sense of helplessness, read on.

What is one to do with a country where the General leading a campaign to defeat an armed rebellion chooses to sell arms to the enemy? What is one to do with a country that is so dependent on international aid that it has basically surrendered all responsibility for its own services?

This thought was triggered by a realisation that international donors are so desperate to claim results that they clutch at the tiniest response from the recipients of their aid as “a success”.

We have a nice example. As part of the gender sensitive principles of our donor, we thought it would be a good idea to help a group of women in the public service to become advocates for equality and non-discrimination. This in a country where women members of parliament are a rarity, and those in high public office can be counted on one hand. So it’s pretty obvious there’s work to be done.

The initiative went down well: a group of women from five provinces decided there’s definitely need for something of this sort. After a three day workshop, broken at regular intervals for refreshments, they adopted hopeful resolutions and elected a committee to draft a constitution and finalise the planning of the first year’s activities.

Hold your breath – this is a big one: the committee met more than once WITHOUT asking us to pay for their transport or refreshments. Now that is what we call SUCCESS. Not what they did, but the fact that they didn’t ask us for money.

Like all good donors, ours looks over its shoulder at the electorate back home. There is a big PR job to be done to demonstrate that the millions being spent are making a difference, and anything that can be called a success must be written up and made available to the general public.

So, without any ado we get down to writing a one page summary of how this remarkable event occurred and without any shame classify it as a SUCCESS STORY, one of a regular stream of similar flimsy claims. The donor loves it.

Looking at the whole situation from the point of view of the Congo and its peoples, one cannot help asking whether their heavy reliance on donor funding is not a product of the well-intentioned efforts of the international aid community. For example, we fall over ourselves to support the health and education systems, to the extent that if anything is wrong with them we feel that it is our fault, and more money must be spent to rectify it. Naturally enough, the Congolese soon pick this up and if they encounter any social or economic problem their first thought is to ask themselves which donor they can ask to fix it.

A Congolese friend recently was asking herself the same question. Is this international aid creating a nation of helpless beggars, a client state that has neither the will nor the means to stand on its own feet? Is aid, in fact, truly helping? Did the United States get aid to develop?

The Congo is widely recognised as having massive wealth in terms of its minerals, forests and agricultural potential; not to mention its potential to supply electricity to the whole of Africa if a planned hydro-electric power station goes ahead. So why can’t it, like the USA of old, use those resources to stand on its own feet and develop itself without depending on other people for its development?

Good question.

A study in contrasts

There are two social outcasts in our office, the untouchables of office society. One makes the coffee, washes the cups and cleans the main building. The other cleans the smaller buildings and does the garden. Both are subjected to the arrogance of secretaries and clerks who rudely instruct them to buy food and drinks from the kiosks outside, with never a please or thank you.

If I was one such person I would have a chip on my shoulder. I would resent the card that life has drawn for me, putting me at the bottom of the pile, with no chance of getting higher, to be spoken down to, and abused, by all and sundry. I would do my job but would resent the fact that I have no money for the fancy clothes worn by the people who boss me around. I would not get out of bed with a spring in my step.

Such is the attitude of the coffee maker. In fact it’s worse than that. He does his job with an absolute minimum of dedication. As often as not he is very late. He regularly “forgets” to make coffee for those working in the annex. He forgets to order new coffee when his supply is running out. He has a particularly irritating attitude to washing up: he will wait until all mugs are dirty, and will then wash them all at once and leave them to dry for many hours.

When he has the chance he will engage any member of staff in one of his complaints about life. He stands in the large verandah and catches people as they enter or leave the main office. I have no idea what he says but he has, as they say, attitude. He scowls and raises his voice in anger. His arms thrash around to make the point. Each day there appears to be a new grievance which must be shared with some hapless bystander.

I was the object of his derision on one occasion. I had been on a visit to the head office in the USA. I had returned with a company mug which I passed on to my deputy as she was employed by the same firm. The coffee maker came into my office in his usual graceless way. “Where,” he said, “is my present?”

The other, the gardener, is different. Very different. He is small and old. His face is crumpled and reflects a life of hardship. But he has recognized that his role is to serve, and he’s determined to do so better than anyone else. He is never late. He never speaks to anyone – just puts his head down and conscientiously cleans the floors every day. At any one time in the first two hours of the office day, you can be pretty sure where he will be and what he will be doing. He takes pride in his little routine. After the floors, then it is his time to do the garden – his pride and joy. He must cut the grass, trim the hedges, water the plants in the dry season, spray insecticide from time to time and generally keep it neat and tidy. One of his little projects is to try and get grass to grow in the muddy car park area. The change is scarcely perceptible, but change there is.

I witnessed the most amazing example of his work ethic two days ago. There had been the typical stormy wind that presages a rain storm, and the kapok tree across the street had decided that this was the time to release its stuff. So these balls of fluff, the size of tennis balls, blew across the street and settled on our property. There was so much of it that it was almost as if the land was covered in snow, or rather a huge flock of tiny sheep were grazing on our lawns. For the gardener this was a challenge. He gets out a bucket and starts to pick up the kapok in what seems like a fruitless task, particularly because there’s still more floating in. It starts to rain, but does he stop? No, blue overall becoming ever darker as it is soaked by the rain, he stoops over the lawn to collect the fluff, not pausing for a second. Within the hour, the rain has stopped and the sun has come out, and there’s not a single piece of kapok visible.

During the elections last year, when the management decided they needed to have the residential addresses of all staff, it emerged that he was sleeping in a cupboard in the office compound. Such was his lack of self esteem that it never crossed his mind that he should have anything better. Some quick action secured him a tiny room behind one of the posh houses nearby.

Returning from a recent trip I gave everyone a little souvenir plate from the city I had been visiting. They went down well. I asked the gardener to come into my office.

“Here,” I said, “this is a small souvenir which I brought for you,” and gave it to him.

“What do you want me to do with it?” he said, “do you want me to wash it?”

Why, he was clearly thinking, would he want to give it to me? Is this a trick? People don’t give me presents. That's when the penny dropped: he had no way of processing the information that I had actually given it to him.

“No,” I said. “That is for you. To keep. I hope you like it.”

And with that he grinned, and left (unless my eyes deceived me) with a definite skip in his elderly step.

Flying high or low: who cares?

Flying high or low: who cares?

Because the local commercial airlines have a very dodgy track record, there’s only one which we are formally allowed to use – and it is part owned by Brussels Airlines. It flies between Kinshasa and Lubumbashi: that’s all.

For all other routes we have to use the UN system which is supposedly designed (though one sometimes marvels at its propensity for chaos . . .) to facilitate movement between UN bases: not for the convenience or comfort of development workers. Nevertheless, since it is largely funded by direct grants from, among others, the US and Britain, they cannot say no to requests from us to use their services. What they can say no to is to carrying non-essential staff when UN personnel need a seat. So the term “booking” has come to be used rather loosely. Yes, you’ve booked a place, but that means little if a UN person needs it. Just wait until the next flight, or maybe the one after that . . . And during the flights, some of which, with the numerous changes and circuitous routes can take all day, you get nothing more than water. The flights are operated by a strange galaxy of nations. Georgia had one route (which I think has now gone to Mexico), South Africa another, Canada a third. These operators bring out a plane or two, fly them around and then – oh sorry, we’ve got to take it for a service, so there will be no flights for a week or two.

The chorus of complaints that this system has caused, together with the total lack of customer service, a demand for something a bit more like a commercial service. The World Food Programme decided that enough was enough, so they launched their own service. Just as in the mainstream UN flights, the routes are operated by different national carriers, and just in the same way they are subject to the vagaries of servicing. In one flight I took, we were told that the weight limit had to be very strictly observed (to the extent that the passengers were weighed alongside their baggage) “as the plane was only half way through its service and if the load was too heavy it wouldn’t be able to take off”.

But there’s one big difference: unlike the UN service which is free, you actually buy a ticket. It’s a bit less than commercial tickets for the same distance, but it means that you have a confirmed place. And to underline the commercial nature of the transaction they give you a tiny cup of juice and a few biscuits during the flight. Mind you, not anyone can get on these flights. They have a very strict policy of only allowing registered staff of development agencies and implementing agencies to use the service: short term consultants and joy riders are completely forbidden.

But this place is, in truth a village. Before long you soon get to know the air crews and to understand that they too are human. They have needs, just like the rest of us. And they have faith – as you must to fly the skies of the Congo. And so when some crew members who are Muslims objected to flying on 26^th October because it is Eid-al-Adha, it was decided that there should be no flights at all that day, in their honour. Not just by Muslim crews, but all crews. Quick as a flash, the Catholics came back: if so, we are not going to fly on 1^st November: that is All Saints Day.

And thus it is: the village is happy. Any religious holiday will be observed by all. Why not? Once more the UN is setting an example in fair labour practice for all the world to copy.

(An aside: after a study of the poverty line in the DRC the UN decreed that the minimum wage for any employee was to be $600 a month. Thus cleaners in UN establishments get approximately six times the wages as anyone doing the same work in the private sector, something nearer that of a bank clerk).

Back to air travel. No one really minds that they cannot fly during those days unless they are stuck in some godforsaken hole at the back of beyond (which, to be fair, many of them will be), because what’s the point of doing today what you can put off until tomorrow?