Africa Reflections

Antecedents of Empire - The Search for the Nile

2012-01-19T18:19:00.000-08:00

For those who love adventure and history. This one is for you.

Explorersof the Nile – The Triumph and Tragedy of a Great Victorian Adventure

By Tim Jeal , Yale University Press, New Haven, 2011

Although well over fifty books have been written about theEuropean search for the source of the Nile River, beginning with the bestselling accounts of the intrepid wanderers themselves in the 1800s, Tim Jealhas added a real treasure to that trove. While it seems that nothing in the historical literary world isdefinitive, Explorers of the Nile,currently has the last word. And a different word it is. Neal has done aprodigious amount of research. He hunted down the papers, letters, first draftsof books, including the expunged passages having to do with sex, and articles written by the explorers, theirfamilies, their patrons and publishers. He found archives stashed in attics, backrooms, town halls and, ofcourse, in collections owned by libraries, museums, the Royal GeographicSociety and the government. He filtered through this enormous amount of verbiageaptly tagging prejudices and misinformation in order to arrive at some newunderstandings about the characters and actions of the key men involved. Because of the self serving nature of earlierpublished material and the pettiness and back stabbing that characterizedpersonal accounts, Jeal’s new look at these men and their times is especiallyilluminating.

The book focuses on the big names: Livingstone, Burton,Speke, Grant, Stanley and Baker (and Madame). They were individuals of indomitable spirit. Men and a woman who refusedto succumb to the travails of Africa. They suffered unimaginable physicalstress – disease, infection, wounds, malnutrition – all compounded byisolation, mental fatigue and the constant threat of violence that morphed intoreal conflict time and again. Yet theysoldiered on. Only one of the great explorers, Dr. Livingstone, died in thefield. The others managed to survive,mostly attributed to brute force of will. Even so, Jeal points out theirfoibles as well as strengths. Consequently, these icons come across as realhumans consumed, as we all are, with the big and the small.

Jeal tracks their voyages in the book. Although there are a few maps, I dug out amore detailed map of East Africa to better trace their footsteps. Jeal’sretelling of their travels uses extensive quotations from their journals. No doubt he has this correct. But the value of this new look goes beyonddescriptions of the difficulties encountered to provide a solid overview of theregion, of why the Arab slave trade was so disruptive, of why the explorers hadto rely on these men whose slaving activities they deplored and importantly ofwhy and how British patrons, politicians and the public viewed their exploits. Jealtoo gives long overdue credit to the African men – guides, headmen,interpreters, servants and porters who made the safaris reality.

Jeal’s new look burnishes the soiled reputation of JohnHanning Speke, the first European to see the source of the Nile where it exitsLake Victoria. (As an aside, the Britishcolonial era monument placed at the site stating that Speke was the “first man”to see the source of the Nile was dismantled shortly after independenceaccompanied by the thought that African men had seen the sight forcenturies.) Readers of previous explorerbooks will remember that Burton, who refused to accompany Speke on his northwardtrek to discover Lake Victoria, impugned Speke’s character and denied hisclaim. Since Speke died in a huntingaccident shortly after his return to England, he could never defend himselfagainst Burton’s spurious allegations. But Jeal does. His study of both Speke’s and Burton’s correspondence andjournals prove that Speke was maligned. Similarly Jeal rehabilitates thereputation of Samuel and Florence Baker which had been tarnished by theircriticism of John Petherick, the British agent in southern Sudan who failed tosupport them as ordered. Petherick,however, was a connected aristocrat whereas the Bakers (not even married at thetime) were lower class. Indeed one ofthe values of Jeal’s book is that he deals forthrightly with class issues –something that was, of course, avoided in the nineteenth century.

After elucidating the discoveries of the various parts ofthe Nile basin, the book takes a hard look at what that meant for subsequent developments in theregion. Jeal notes that the British imperial necessity tosecure the upper Nile played out to the detriment both of Uganda and Sudan withdisastrous consequences for their peoples a hundred years later. Arbitrary borders were the crux of theproblem. He posits that the inclusion ofNilotic tribes in a modern Ugandan state preordained the conflict under Oboteand Amin that devastated the nation. Similarly, the inclusion of Equatoria into a larger Sudan and then halfmeasured development of the south under British suzerainty precipitated thechaos of the Sudanese civil war. He suggests– and would be the first to admit that retrospect is a fine platform – that hadmore Afro centric policies been pursued that much of this conflict could havebeen avoided.

In sum, this is an excellent book. It retells the stories ina new light and provides insight into the motives of all concerned. Importantlyit portrays events in the light of their times, but with the benefit ofretrospective from our era. It’sstrongly recommended.

Review of The Book of Secrets

2012-01-19T18:12:00.000-08:00

This is book that folks looking for good fiction about East Africa ought to read.

TheBook of Secrets by M.G. Vassanji,Picador, NY 1994

This is a superb novel by M.G. Vassanji that is set in Kenyaand Tanzania beginning just before World War I. The basic plot revolves around a diary kept by colonial administratorAlfred Corbin in the small (fictitious) Indian trading town of Kikono locatedat the foot of the Taita Hills along a track that would become the road andrailroad between Voi and Taveta. No oneknew what Corbin recorded so assiduously in his diary, but they presumed itincluded information on the townsfolk as well as the mysteries of imperialpower. In any case, the diary firstappears, then disappears and is re-found. It provides the skeleton for thestory to hang on.

The story really is one of relationships. The re-discoverer of the book of secrets wasa retired Goan school teacher in Dar Es Salaam in the nineteen sixties. As narrator he then retraces life as it wasin Kikono before the great war when Corbin assumed his duties and wasquizzically observed by the townsfolk who the author called Shamsis (which isan actual Islamic sect), but who seemed to me to be Ismailis, traders wellknown in East Africa. Corbin’s concerns for an unconventional girl and whetheror not he fathered her child is the basic mystery that is unpeeled in variousfashions during the course of the story.

The Great War disrupted the town. Corbin was withdrawn. Hisdiary was stolen. People from the townand their descendents moved to Moshi, Dar and Europe, yet their connections toone another and to the essential mystery remained vague even as some unraveledand others faded.

The Book of Secretsis a wonderfully told tale. Descriptions are vivid. The landscapes, the towns,cities and historical events are accurately portrayed, but the characters areespecially memorable. They are exactlythe sort of people that would inhabit this world.

Obviously, I enjoyed this book. The East Africa setting isrealistic (including the Cozy Café in Dar that I patronized in 1966). Besidesbeing a good story, the book is a valuable social history, particularly withregard to the changes experienced by Asian communities in East Africa. Read it!

Swimming Through Life

2012-01-19T18:08:00.000-08:00

Following is a review of an interesting book.

Swimming Through Life by Eric Krystall, self published by ekrystall@africaonline.co.ke, 2011

This book is the autobiography of the life and times of EricKrystall, a social anthropologist and development expert noted especially for familyplanning and anti-AIDS efforts in Kenya.

Krystall led an interesting life. Born a Jew in South Africain 1928, he became an anti-apartheid activist when in college in the lateforties. Self exiled to the UnitedKingdom for more studies at the London School of Economics, he remained engagedin such efforts as well as burgeoning African independence movements. He married an American and re-located to theU.S. for graduate studies at the University of Michigan. For a research projecthe moved into a Detroit ghetto and interviewed black women about their familyexpectations. This led to involvement incivil rights campaigns, which intensified with subsequent academic assignmentsat traditionally black colleges, Tuskegee Institute in Alabama and Shaw inRaleigh, NC. In this phase of life (thelate sixties) Krystall provided cross cultural training for several groups ofKenya bound PCVs (including mine).

Anxious to get back to Africa, in the early 70s Krystalltook an assignment with FAO to develop family planning projects in Kenya. Except for a brief sojourn at FAOheadquarters in Rome, he has been in Kenya since responsible for a series offamily oriented projects – family planning, rural communications,anti-corruption and AIDS education. Throughout, he proved himself – certainly by his own admission, afterall this is an autobiography – to be capable, effective, innovative andsensitive to Kenyan bureaucratic culture. No doubt he was.

Krystall is an unabashed name dropper and he drops hundredsin this book. It is astonishing that heremembered so many folks, but each anecdote is complete with the names ofpeople involved. Some Krystall remembered fondly, others he skeweredunmercifully. He kept his knife sharpened especially for fuzzy headedgovernment or UN bureaucrats who did not understand or appreciate how thedevelopment process functioned. In thatregard he was ever faithful to the ideas of local input and sustainability. Helamented the predilections of donors, especially the UN family and USAID, tofund and support the development flavor of the year, then to drop it abruptlyand move on to something new. Similarly he documented the self-interest andcorruption that plagued the Kenyan side. Indeed Krystall’s insights and critiques of the development process andhis successes and failures (of which he admits a few) should be mandatoryreading for development personnel - both international and Kenyan.

There are some interesting Peace Corps comments. First, Krystall claimed to have been amongthe students on the steps of the University of Michigan administration buildingwhen Senator Kennedy revealed his plan for international service. Later Krystall was drafted by several RPCVsfrom Tanzania who put together an organization to do PC training in themid-sixties. Among the groups trained was mine for Kenya in the summer of 1968.Krystall was responsible for cross cultural training. I remember the language and technicaltraining much more vividly than anything cross cultural. Although he got the North Dakota locationcorrect, he mistakenly reported we were on an Indian reservation. Although we did a “live-in” on Standing Rockreservation, our training site was at a defunct job corps facility just outsideBismarck. Krystall later told of tryingto get more black Americans into the Peace Corps. A project that had limited success, in partbecause Kyrstall alleged - in a bit of hyperbole - that potential volunteers required twelve references and no policerecord. He stated ”few blacks,especially black men, grew up in the south without one.” Krystall also asserted that “Peace Corpsadministration… was located in the State Department.” That statement is just wrong. These errors and exaggerations about issues Iknew something about, compel questions about what else in this book issimilarly affected.

My nit-picks aside, Krystall’s narrative of his life readswell. The recounting of his youth andcoming of age as a Jew in apartheid era South Africa shows how he came to beliberal, progressive and an activist for change. He reveled in playing asimilar role in the American civil rights movement, but truly found his callingas a development expert in Kenya. In addition to broader topics, Krystall keepsthe reader informed of his family, friends, loves, religious and politicalviews and activities. In sum it is a revealing portrait of a man who has longcome to terms with himself and his life.

Monsters Indeed

2011-09-06T16:56:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of a new and useful book about the Congo.

Dancing in the Glory of Monsters – The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa

by Jason K. Stearns, Public Affairs, NY, 2011

This intriguing book lives up to its odd title. Stearns writes a journalistic history of recent events in the Congo via the mechanism of personal interviews with people who played a role in, or observed, the events that transpired. Given that many such people wanted (or needed) to cover their tracks, the honesty of the revelations is astonishing.

Stearns’ thesis is that to effect any change in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, one must first understand the dynamics of the morass.The narrative is not necessarily chronological, but rather follows individuals and their impact. He starts with the spill-over of the Rwandan genocide into the Congo with the influx of Hutu refugees fleeing the takeover by the Rwandan Patriotic Army. This leads into an excellent discussion of the historical presence of Kinyarwanda speaking peoples (both Hutu and Tutsi) in Congo – the 19th century Banyamulenge migrants, the early 20th century importation of agricultural laborers, concomitant spontaneous movements of farmers and pastoralists out of crowded Rwanda and finally the presence of an educated Tutsi elite claiming refuge in Kivu cities.

Having set the stage for ethnic violence both between Hutu and Tutsi, but just as importantly between Rwandans writ large and Congolese ethnic groups, Stearns proceeds to lay out the animosities and machinations that under gird conflict that has encompassed the eastern region for years. Clearly, however, it was the new Tutsi government in Kigali’s effort to eliminate the genocidaire threat and to force the return of a million refugees that inflamed Kivu and sent the DRC into the vortex of war. Stearns studies the war, the massacres, the abuses, and the changing objectives through the eyes of participants – rebel commanders, Zairian/Congolese politicians, ADFL leaders, Rwandan string pullers, as well as victims.

The book then tracks in detail Laurent Kabila’s presidency and his turn away from his Rwandan and Ugandan sponsors, and then the second war. Kabila’s undoing was certainly due in part to his own idiosyncrasies –that are well described by some from his inner circle- but also due to his inheritance from Mobutu of a completely chaotic state and political system. Stearns notes, “This has left a bitter Congolese paradox: a state that is everywhere and oppressive but that is defunct and dysfunctional.”

Indeed Stearns’ insight into the corruption and the inner non-workings of both the Mobutu and Kabila regimes helps explain the mess. Also useful are chapters on the quest – by almost everyone – to profit from the DRC’s mineral resources.

The book moves on then to study more recent contenders, current president Joseph Kabila who succeeded his father and those who contested against him: Jean Pierre Bemba, who has roots in the Mobutu regime and the newer set of RDC rebel leaders in Kivu. Again the reader is provided with solid commentary about how these men operated.

I thought the passages that revealed the character, history and assassination of Laurent Kabila to be especially interesting. Although certainly a troglodyte, it is his legacy that the Congo now wrestles with as efforts continue to restore stability to Kivu. Despite a thorough investigation into the problems, the bottom line question of “Can the Congo emerge from morass?” remains unanswered. The nation has no unselfish visionary leadership. Thus, ethnic animosity and violence continues to plague the east, resources are exploited for personal gain and conniving politicians strive to demean each other in an eternal quest for power.

This is an excellent study of contemporary Congo. Additionally, it is an easy read. Truly, those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it. The Congo has been stuck doing that for decades.

One Hand Does Not Catch a Buffalo - 50 year of amazing Peace Corps stories

2011-06-12T16:38:00.000-07:00

Following is my review of One Hand Does Not Catch A Buffalo – 50 years of amazing Peace Corps stories, edited by Aaron Barlow, Travelers’ Tales, Solas House, Inc., Palo Alto

Just in time for the Peace Corps fiftieth anniversary, a superb collection of anecdotes, reminisces, recollections and heartfelt stories of the Peace Corps experience in Africa. Sixty former volunteers (disclaimer - myself included) contributed essays about their memories of Africa to this book. We write about how we got there: waiting on the letter, odd training in preparation, struggling with language; our motivations: escape from home, exploring the bigger world, draft dodging, saving the world, adventure; what we did: teaching, engineering, agricultural extension, health work, community development, very little; the memorable people we met: chiefs and elders, strong village women, inquisitive friendly children, colleagues and friends made. The book details lots of our confusing and enlightening cross cultural encounters beginning with the fact of being a stranger in a strange land bereft of the anchors of American civilization, yet ever willing to try, test and learn about our new surroundings. Perhaps understandably there are several anecdotes focused on gastronomical distress, even more detailing the travails of local transportation and a couple dealing with snakes, lions and elephants.

Undeniably PCVs encountered a different and, for most - at least in retrospect, a magical place where time was often suspended, even as those societies were marching inevitably forward into the modern world. We were part of that process. We saw contrasts and understood changes, yet the resilience of the cultures we were immersed in and their embedded values, made change wrenching. The poverty of Africa overwhelmed us, but the optimistic spirit of its people and our shared humanity heartened us. They shared their hope for a better future and we could only trust that their expectations would bear fruit.

Despite the opportunity, this collection is not a self pat on the back about jobs well done. In fact, there is very little in it about the work accomplished. It is not about the “how,” but about “who.” Furthermore it is not about our impact on them, but of theirs on us. We all came away changed.

I never could figure out where the intriguing title of the book came from, but this is the first of several volumes in this anniversary year organized on a geographical basis, i.e. volumes on Latin America, Asia and Eastern Europe will follow.
Anyone who served in Africa as a PCV will immediately embrace these essays. Although each one is unique, collectively they represent our experience. Buy it, settle down and relive your past!

Also let me call attention to www.americandiplomacy.org . Look in the index for essays on “how the peace corps experience changed me.” Several dozen folks (again me included) write on this topic. I would be willing to flag other such sites, so if you know of one, please let me know.

The Impact of the Peace Corps on me

2011-03-25T16:26:00.000-07:00

Following is a piece I wrote for Americandiplomacy.org on the impact of the Peace Corps upon the occasion of the Peace Corps' 50th anniversary. I was a volunteer in Kenya from 1968-70.

I grew up in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, then matriculated at the University of the South, a small liberal arts college, in Sewanee, Tennessee. Life in the south was comfortable, but in those years the region was struggling with racial issues. I yearned to see a bigger world beyond, meet a different set of people, find out more about myself and my role in life. One summer I signed on to a church work camp in Tanzania. That experience convinced me to apply to the Peace Corps. Although I truly wanted to go, I also thought that an African experience would be preferable to a Vietnam sojourn. So when my colleagues went into the military or home to run the family business, I flew to Bismarck, North Dakota for Swahili training. Immediately my world changed - not only with immersion in an exotic language, but also surrounded by fellow trainees from diverse backgrounds. We shared idealism and a disdain for conventionalism, but were apprehensive about what the next years in Kenya would bring. Two months later, with more than a smattering of Swahili under our belts and growing confidence in our technical expertise, off we went.

I had passed through Nairobi two years earlier so it did not surprise me, but the beauty of Kenya did have an impact – sweeping vistas, huge lakes, hulking mountains, verdant rangeland and millions of small farms. The people too, as I would soon come to know, provided that new window on the world. It was true that the world of rural Kenya was indeed smaller than that of mine at home. But contrasts were striking. How people approached family, work, education, time, responsibilities and religion differed. And as I began to understand their values, I also understood mine better too. We volunteers have hundreds of cross-cultural stories about communications that went awry or that struck a solid note of shared humanity. For example, one of my counterparts came to me in tears of grief to report his mother had died and that he had to return home (with a loan- read gift). I sympathized and complied. Two months later: more grief and “my mother has died” (and the need for another loan). I asked about his previously dead mother. He assured me that mother was my “father’s other wife, this was the mother who bore me.” So in sadness, I learned about Luo family relationships.

My assignment was to build a rural water system that would provide clean piped water to 1500 small farms. We built a dam, a head works and laid a hundred miles of pipe to communal watering points. Nothing was as exhilarating as to hear the water rushing into the tanks. I am proud to say that the system functions well today – forty years later. It’s impact on health and education of girls (who previously had to fetch water, but after piped water could go to school) was immense. It was the type of grassroots development that works.

My two years in Kenya changed me. I matured, I became more tolerant, more understanding that differences provided opportunities. I developed management and leadership skills and became committed to economic and social change in Africa. Also, I met a Peace Corps teacher that I later married. At the end of my service, however, I still had the travel bug – so three colleagues and I bought an old Land Rover and drove to England. Ultimately, I went to graduate school in international affairs, joined the Foreign Service and spent the next forty years working in Africa or on African issues in Washington. I credit my Peace Corps time as the inspiration for my vocation.

Tracing Obama's Roots

2011-03-01T09:14:00.000-08:00

Folloing is my reivew of The Obamas – An Untold Story of an African Family by Peter Firstbrook, Crown Publishers, NY, 2010.

Despite the obvious intent to capitalize on President Obama’s fame, this is an extraordinary book that weaves together three strands of history: the saga of the Luo tribe’s culture and history detailing their centuries old movement from origins along the Nile River into present day western Kenya, the history of contemporary Kenya from the mid-19th century to date, and the family lore and recollections of Obama’s relatives and forbearers. Combined these themes tell a captivating story – a story that sheds light on Kenya and Luo relationships, both within the Luo community and vis-a-vis the European or Kikuyu power structure, as well as on Obama’s family.

The Luo chronicle is intriguing and traced back 800 years to origins along the Nile in today’s southern Sudan. From there the ancestors of the group that would evolve into today’s Luo tribe moved southward, establishing settlements near Pakwach in Uganda just north of Lake Albert. Both pushed by those behind and pulled by open territory ahead, over generations the Luo moved eastward across Uganda finally arriving in Kenya about 1550. A leader named Ramogi Ajwang settled a hill top named Got Ramogi near Lake Victoria in western Kenya. Several clans of Luos, including Obama’s line, date their arrival in Kenya from this epoch. Obama’s 10th great grandfather Owiny was among them. Subsequent generations include Onyango Mobam, a man born with a curved back, from whom the name Obama is thought to have originated.

Interwoven with the genealogy and oral history of the past are descriptions of Luo traditions and culture. Luo deemed themselves to be warriors of repute and competent hunters. But in addition to hunting and fishing they also kept cattle and farmed. Luo were polygamous, so keeping track of one’s place in the family could be confusing. Where one lived in a compound was based on gender and seniority. Men lived alone and wives in order separately in progressively smaller houses. Daily tasks were apportioned among boys and girls, adolescents and adults in time honored fashion. Six front teeth of men were knocked out as a rite of passage from childhood to adulthood. Marriage protocols were strict and funerals a source of solace and celebration. Social life revolved around interactions with family and friends.

About this time in the book, the author begins interspersing Kenyan history as seen from the Luo and African perspective. Explorers trudged through the region first. They were followed in the late 19th century by a series of terrible calamities – drought and pestilence, both human and animal, destroyed the economy and killed tens of thousands of people. White men showed up again, this time to stay. First they came building the railroad to Kisumu. Government administrators and tax collectors followed. Missionaries also spread out through Nyanza, preaching the gospel and starting schools. The modern world began to interfere with the traditional one. Accommodations had to be made and the melded current culture began to emerge. Christianity, for example, took root. In the early 20th century Luo men were conscripted into the carrier corps to support the World War I effort in East Africa. They came home changed men, but found few new opportunities. That cycle repeated itself in World War II, but this time winds of change were blowing stronger. Mau Mau, which did not impact much on Luoland, erupted and the evolution towards independence, which did involve Luos, energized an emerging African political class. Subsequently, their divisions – essentially the tribal gulf between Kikuyu and Luo – would constitute the framework for the trials and tribulations of Obama, Sr.

The strand of Obama’s ancestors picks up with more detail with his 3rd great grandfather Opiyo who left the theretofore family homestead at K’ogelo in Alego for Kendu Bay on the south side of Winam Gulf. There a son born in 1864 was named Obama. In time Obama’s son Hussein Onyango (the President’s grandfather ) was born in 1895. He was a rebel, a proud man of strong and strict character. He defied his family and adopted European ways, education and clothing, but he also defied European culture by rejecting Christianity and converting to Islam. He was outspoken, so ran afoul of traditional elders. He led an eventful life, participated in two world wars, became a cook for Europeans and therefore part of the moneyed African class. He was a stickler for cleanliness and orderliness. Ultimately, apparently unfairly accused of anti-government plotting during the Mau Mau emergency he was imprisoned and broken by torture. He had at least five wives. His son Barack Obama, Sr. was born to his third wife Habiba Akuma in 1936. However, she and he quarreled and separated, so Onyango’s fifth wife Sarah (still alive) raised Barack Sr. and his sisters.

Obama Sr. too was a rebel. He was arrogant and intellectual. He disdained most around him as inferior. His big mouth and later penchant for booze would be his undoing time after time. A brilliant student he managed to wrangle a scholarship to America, to the University of Hawaii. Although already married back in Kenya, in Hawaii Obama courted and married Stanley Ann Dunham. Their child Barack, Jr. was born on August 4, 1961. Barack Sr., however, was admitted to Harvard for graduate school and left this family behind. Even though he may have visited them once or twice from Boston, the only real record of his return to Hawaii was in 1971 when Barack Jr. was ten years old. By that time Ann had divorced him.

Barack Sr. returned to Kenya (with a second American wife Ruth Nidesand) and found a job with the Central Bank. As one of the new elite, he was well plugged in to burgeoning politics and the developing patronage system. He seemed to have it made. He linked up with fellow Luo Tom Mboya and other young intellectuals. Sadly, in 1969 Barack encountered his friend Mboya on the street just moments before the latter was shot. Subsequently, without his patron, Obama’s loose talk and criticism of superiors, especially when drunk, resulted in his dismissal from the bank. He held other positions, but the end was usually another termination. Yet, his friends found Obama to be charming, loyal and engaging, even as they recognized his dark side. A notoriously poor driver, coming home from a bar in 1982 Obama veered off the road and hit a tree. He was declared dead at the scene. There was no autopsy and many continue to believe that he was a victim of Kikuyu machinations as were Luo leaders Mboya and Argwings-Kodhek before him (and Ouko afterwards).

Except for dozens of references to him, Barack Obama Jr. does not play much of a role in this book. His three visits to Kenya (the first in 1985 and two subsequently as senator) are described, as is his almost god like stature in the eyes of Kenyans, Luos especially. Author Firstbrook notes that almost every child born in Luoland in January 2009 was named Barack or Michelle – a fact that will cause no little confusion when those kids reach primary school.

In summary, I found this book to be an excellent read. It puts a lot of history and lore into perspective. For those who know Kenya, especially Nyanza Province (I served there as a PCV in the late 60s) it is doubly fascinating as it helps explain or reinforce knowledge of what was going on around us.

God Sleeps in Rwanda

2011-02-12T10:00:00.000-08:00

Folloing is my review of God Sleeps in Rwanda , a memoir by Joseph Sebarenzi

Joseph Sebarenzi’s memoir of growing up in Rwanda, fleeing to Zaire for schooling, going back to Rwanda , but fleeing again as the situation heated up, and finally returning again after the genocide and entering politics is an engrossing tale of one man’s life. As a Tutsi he and his family felt threatened and were periodically by Hutu hardliners. Although bright, Joseph ran afoul of schooling quotas that prevented Tutsi children from higher schooling. Thus he was sent to distant relatives across the border on Idjwi Island in Zaire. There too he was not only a minority, but a foreigner to boot. He perseverd and got his education, got married, settled in Kigali, but fled again after the RPA invasion in 1990 when resident Tutsi were harassed and intimidated by the government for supposed allegiance to the invaders.

Sebarenzi was not in Rwanda during the genocide. Nonetheless, he recounts the horror of it, knowing full well that dozens of his family and friends were being killed. He returned afterward to find his worst fears realized. Employed by USAID Sebarenzi recounts meeting the mayor of his commune, the man who had led the genocide in his home area, in a prison. Despite knowing this individual was complicit in his family’s deaths, they acknowledged each other and Joseph gave him some money, “for food”. Thus begin themes of understanding, grappling with forgiveness and reconciliation.

Encouraged by fellow Tutsi survivors, Joseph agreed to enter Parliament under the Liberal Party aegis. There through an initially unfathomably series of events – most having to do with machinations by the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Movement government intent to put a naïve, compliant MP from an ineffectual party in the speaker’s chair , he emerged as speaker of the house. The book chronicles Sebarenzi’s growth in the job: his conviction that Parliament ought to be a co-equal partner in government with the executive and his efforts to assert Parliamentary authority. Sebarenzi recounts efforts to communicate with President Bizimungu and Vice-President Paul Kagame and airs frustration with the ensuing futility. Ultimately he found himself hemmed in by Kagame and those around him who dealt surreptitiously with opposition such as that which Sebarenzi posed. Fearing for his life, Sebarenzi fled again through Uganda to the U.S.

Speaker Sebarenzi‘s last chapter deals with forgiveness and reconciliation; the need for acknowledgement, apology, restorative justice, empathy, reparation and forgiveness in dealing with the past, but also for openness, accountability and democracy for dealing with the present and for laying the new foundation for a society that would ensure that history does not repeat itself.
Sebarenzi’s story of growing up Tutsi in Rwanda, his experiences and losses during the genocide, is one of many, but no less interesting because of that. His memoir is unique on account of his subsequent service as speaker and the obstacles he encountered there. It is a cautionary tale, genocide is over, and the new disposition is firm on ensuring that it not reoccur, but the authoritarianism, division and exclusion the current government pursues risks, in fact, a return to volatility and unrest that will simmer for years to come.

Kudos for Dikembe Mutombo

2011-02-12T09:53:00.000-08:00

Following is a speech I gave at the January 25, 2011 awards banquet of Athletes for a Better World. That organization honored Dikembe Mutombo with the Wooden Cup for his humanitarian work, especially the hospital he built, in his home country of the Congo.

Good Evening, Bon Soir, Hamjambo, Mbote

I have just greeted you in four of Africa’s thousands of languages. The Africa that Dikembe Mutombo represents is diverse. There are thousands of languages, thousands of vibrant cultures, thousands of different traditions scattered across the vast continent. The variety of differences and the contrasts are astounding. Some nomadic pastoralists herd cattle, camels and goats as they have done for centuries, many millions of Africans subsist on the production of their small farms, but others grow cash crops like coffee, tea or cocoa and sell it to the world’s market. Many more millions now live in cities where they eek a living from road side stands or the lucky ones have wage employment in the modern sector. Roughly speaking about half of Africans are Muslim and the other half Christian. Yet where ever Africans are, or however they worship, Africans retain profound links to their families and communities.

Values, such as those that undergird Athletes for A Better World, are indeed universal. Thus, Americans and Africans have many values in common, but how we emphasize them may differ.

Africans place a special value on family. In America we think of our families as Mom and Dad and the kids. We have grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins some of whom perhaps we rarely see. So our universe of relatives – especially those we interact with frequently – is fairly small. In contrast African families are huge. Mom and Dad usually have about seven or eight children and there may be another eight or more step- brothers and sisters. Children are celebrated. In the Central African Republic, for example, on the national day when awards are handed out to politicians, diplomats and generals, one of the most celebrated distinctions is that of “mama decoree” given to mothers who have successfully raised at least eight children to adulthood.

Usually an African family lives in a village and since large families have been present for generations in the same place, there are literally hundreds, if not thousands of nearby kin. Family members look out for each other. No one lacks for advice, or shelter or food or help when needed with crops or cattle. These days when more and more children go to primary school, families rally to provide school fees, especially for those who go on to high school and beyond.

Africans respect their elders, folks who have gained experience by living out their lives. Their status is high and their wisdom applauded.

Being in a family entails obligations. Just as American kids have – or should have – some regular chores, Africans kids do too. Boys look after the cows or goats, girls fetch water and mind younger siblings. There are many other tasks. Living in a family where everyone has to contribute enstills a strong sense of responsibility to others. And as a child’s horizons expand to the larger community around him, this sense of responsibility also expands.

It is a two way street. The family and community expects a continued sense of involvement and support from those individuals it has nurtured and who have gone on to bigger things. They become role models not just for family, but for their community and in Mutombo’s case for an entire nation, if not a continent, of youths. In turn individuals who have registered success in life, also feel the obligation to give back. This completes the circle of strong family and community values.

We see clearly that Dikembe Mutombo has given back and that he plans to continue to do so.

Most governments in Africa, including that of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, have not provided sufficient or adequate medical services to their peoples. Continent wide – infant mortality is high, life expectancy is low. Prenatal care is non-existent and mothers and infants suffer accordingly. Poor sanitation, contaminated water, and malnutrition compound all maladies. Children succumb to diseases like measles, malaria and dysentery. Tuberculosis, pneumonia and now AIDS afflict older folks. In many areas it is not that the population is underserved by modern medical establishments, it is simply that they are not served at all. Thus, wherever a church mission, an individual or a private foundation steps forward to fill the void, the impact on the community is miraculous. All of a sudden there is care, medicine, and expertise.

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the political class, that is the men and today a few women, who have risen to power and status are often referred to as “big men.” It’s a phenomen not unique to the Congo, after their election to Parliament my Kenyan and Ugandan friends would pat their big bellies and proudly state, “I am eating.”

Although the term “big men” has some derogatory meaning embedded in it – just as our term for political “fat cats” does, it does reflect the reality that these individuals do have the opportunity to improve life in their communities. Of course, many have done that.

Mutombo at 7 feet 2 inches is obviously a big man physically, but he has a big heart too. And he arrives on the scene as a big man without derogatory inferences. His giving is from the heart, his giving is in accordance with the values of family and community that are intrinsic to him.

It is entirely proper that a values oriented organization like Athletes for a Better World honor Dikembe MuTOMbo’s contribution and engagement in seeking to make a better world.

Thank you.

The Clouds Beneath the Sun - a book review

2011-01-10T12:19:00.000-08:00

This is my review of The Clouds Beneath the Sun, by Mackenzie Ford, Doubleday, NY, 2009.

This novel is set in Kenya in 1961. Although fiction, the author clearly draws upon the famous Leaky family for inspiration. The fictional Deacons are all noted paleontologists . Philandering patriarch Jock is recently dead, but wife Eleanor carries on afterward and runs the dig in the Kihara Gorge (read Olduvai) with an iron fist. One son, Jack flies his own plane and is involved in the politics of the emerging nation. Another son, Christopher, as well as other characters filter in and out of the story.

The plot circles around a beautiful newly minted PhD, Natalie Nelson, who, carrying quite a bit of her own emotional baggage, joins the excavation. She witnesses events surrounding the murder of a colleague and is subsequently drawn into a twisting drama as she decides whether or not to testify. Because the alleged murder is Maasai, in whose territory the Kihara Gorge lies, in testifying she might put the whole excavation site and its valuable finds at great risk. The story is compounded by a love interest and fraught with jealousies – both personal and professional.

I found a great number of nits to pick in this otherwise fairly well paced novel. First the author sets the book in 1961, well before independence, but then goes on to mention on several occasions contact with the American or Dutch embassies or the British High Commission. Flatly put there were no such diplomatic establishments prior to independence.

Secondly animals; the author cites listening to the chimpanzees in the middle of the Serengeti (none live there), the snorts of “water” buffalo (Africa’s buffaloes are cape buffalo), lions mating in groups (doubtful, I have only seen them in pairs), and a preposterous scene wherein Europeans try to save wildebeests who are crossing the Mara river in the thousands by lassoing them and hauling them back to shore (unbelievable).

Thirdly airports; the author asserts that Kilimanjaro is the closest airport (except it did not exist in 1961). He also uses Nairobi International (really known then as Embakasi) as the strip from which Jack flies. Private aircraft on internal flights would have come and gone from Wilson Airport. The author also alludes to a number of private jets parked at Nairobi International . It turned out later that he needed this fiction for the plot, but it is doubtful if there were really such aircraft around in 1961 – remember, it was just the beginning of the jet age for commercial aircraft.

I could go on, but will conclude by commenting on the beautiful photograph on the jacket of the book. It is one of a couple sitting in camp chairs with the majesty of Kilimanjaro behind them. Wonderful, except for the fact that unless it is printed backwards, the picture was taken from Tanzania. Kibo peak is on the left and Mwenzi on the right. You cannot get that perspective from the Kenyan side.

Enough already! Despite my fault finding (I enjoyed looking for them), the book was okay. I do not especially like romances and there was certainly a lot of breast heaving introspection in this one, but there was enough of a Kenyan setting, a murder mystery, trial shenanigans and links to politics to keep my attention. I did not like the ending.

Waiting for the Mango Rains

2010-12-05T17:35:00.000-08:00

Following is my review of Waiting for the Mango Rains, by Jon C. White, publisher unknown, available from Amazon.com

First a disclaimer, I knew Jon when he was a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Central African Republic in the 1970s and I was a junior officer at the U.S. embassy. Obviously, he drew from his experiences in promoting fish culture in writing this novel. Although like all good novels it is set realistically in, in this case, the turbulent history of the CAR during the epoch when megalomaniac president Jean Bedel Bokassa was elevating himself to become emperor, the plot and characters in the novel are, of course, fictional.

The author sets the scene when his protagonist Nick D’Amato accepts a position to go to the Central African Republic to take up responsibilities for USAID as a fisheries extension agent. Nick confronts Africa in all its wooliness. He is scammed at the airport upon arrival and briefly jailed. He is welcomed by a jaundiced American diplomatic community who are caught up in their sybaritic life style. (Even though this portrait adds to the story, as an aside, I cannot help but wondering if Jon really saw us in such a negative light.) While waiting in the capital and organizing his kit, Nick gets glimmers that all is not what it appears to be – with his assignment and within the nation more broadly. Anxious to maintain his power, in addition to the secret police, Bokassa has resorted to intimidation and control of the populace via the dark powers of juju men and mystical marabous. Of course, Nick will encounter such witchcraft.

But first, Nick does move to M’baiki, about 60 miles south of Bangui in the edge of the great Congo basin forest. There he begins the job he was assigned, the rehabilitation of a fish station. Ponds need to be re-built, stocked and extension work begun. (The reader will learn much about the technical aspects of such operations.) Nick gradually becomes involved with the local community – his foreman, a cook, the nearby French priest, market mamas – and along the way he meets a beautiful local lady and falls in love. As he becomes more enmeshed in the community, he becomes estranged and ignored by the few French residents and U.S. embassy personnel. (In short, Nick went “local”.) The plot continues to twist throughout with sinister machinations of the sorcerers. Nick and his family are targeted and risk becoming victimized as the political temperature of the nation heats up. The story builds up nice tension, before an acceptable denouement.

Author Jon White has done a commendable job in realistically describing what life is like in a small African town. He portrays encounters with Central Africans sympathetically, in accurate fashion and from both sides – their puzzlement and misperception of outsiders as well as Nick’s lack of understanding of the forces that motivate them and their lives. Over, time, of course, Nick gains greater insight along with the recognition that he is what he is and can never become what he is not. This is a lesson that most Peace Corps Volunteers learn and appreciate.

Appeasing the Spirits - Across the Cultural Divide in Kenya

2010-10-27T16:50:00.000-07:00

Following is a piece I wrote for the Foreign Service Journal, October 2010. I was the U.S. Consul in Mombasa at the time of the event described.

At the consulate in Mombasa, Kenya in the early 1980s part of our regular maintenance on housing involved pumping out the septic tanks. Paul Mwana, my general services expert, arranged to have the city team composed of Digo tribesmen, the only ones who did this work, do the job. Most houses had large tanks for sewage storage that were accessed through a slab in the parking area. The task went well until the team arrived at the house occupied by the Lt. Commander supervising naval construction and his family. Upon recognizing the house, the septic men adamantly refused to proceed. Paul reported back with some dismay, but both of us knew the cause of their refusal.

The house in question was just across the street from mine. It was a pleasant villa on spacious beautifully planted grounds. Yet, a year or so earlier when I was looking for houses to rent in a tight market, it was readily available. It turned out on account of a tragedy.

The house had been owned and occupied by an older Asian couple. Apparently, two killers arrived at the house early one evening. They found only the cook at home, so slashed him with machetes murdering him. They waited and when Madame returned from her bridge game, they killed her. They waited even longer until the man of the house returned towards midnight and they killed him. The killers stuffed at least the first two bodies into the septic tank.

Since the perpetrators of the crimes were obviously not there just to rob the premises (they had ample opportunity to search and sack the house after the first death) it was assumed that the murders were a contract hit. Furthermore, police supposed that motive arose because the old man was allegedly involved in various commercial transactions, some of which were shady deals related to gem stones. (At the time rubies and tsavorite were mined and marketed illegally.) Perhaps some deal went awry or a large sum of money was thought to be available.

One of the killers was later apprehended and confessed to the crime. However, he never implicated whoever might have ordered it done. The case remains unresolved.

The specter of the triple murder kept the house empty before the Navy family arrived and was, of course, the reason for the refusal to pump out the septic tank. Once I learned of the murders and before I signed a lease, I contacted the Navy couple to apprise them of the house’s history. They said to go ahead and rent it. I did and they were quite happy there.

Paul proposed a solution to the septic pumping quandary. He suggested that we employ a Digo traditional medicine man to perform a purification ceremony that would placate the spirits of the dead. He assured me that once properly accomplished; the workers would undertake the task of pumping the tank. I concurred, so he found the right “practitioner” and negotiated a fee for his service, plus a goat and a chicken for sacrifice.

It was an odd ceremony. With the workers in attendance before the open septic tank in the sunlit parking area flanked by blooming red, white and purple hibiscus and bougainvillea, the “doctor” chanted, invoked his authority and called on the spirits to depart. He sacrificed the goat and chicken (later eaten) and sprinkled blood. Once the proper deeds were done, the site purified and the spirits appeased, the tank was subsequently cleaned.

I decided that we could not detail the services performed, or the goat, on the invoice for reimbursement as that would certainly raise eyebrows in the embassy’s financial office, so we called the transaction “special cleansing services.”

History and Hogwash in the Congo

2010-10-18T10:18:00.000-07:00

A review of The Great African War – Congo and Regional Geopolitics, 1996-2006 by Filip Reyntjens, Cambridge University Press, 2009.

It is hard to get a handle on this book. It provides a decent chronology of events – of the wars and the politics in the greater Congo region - during the years it covers. Most all of that information was drawn from the public record. The book is replete with footnotes citing this or that news story, UN papers, NGO treatises or subsequent academic studies. Ergo, the overall thrust of the work is - as noted above - a decent history. However, the interpretation of events, especially the impetus behind them and the motivations of the actors involved, be they governments, political parties or individuals is where the analysis begins to come apart.

Author Belgian academic Filip Reyntjens is well qualified to write this history. He lived in and worked on Congolese, Rwandan and Burundian issues for years. Yet his anti-Rwandan bias jumps out. Throughout he portrays the then-and-current Rwanda Patriotic Movement government as a gang of wily calculating evil persons led by the devil incarnate Paul Kagame. Reyntjens’ exuberance in condemning the regime in Kigali tracks the view espoused in other European academic circles. It has a racist tinge to it along the lines that Africans should not be competent enough to make their own decisions and mistakes. Secondly, an underlying revelation comes in a footnote late in the book wherein Reyntjens admits that from 1995 onwards, he was denied permission to enter Rwanda. I suppose that his lack of impartiality in relating what transpired is his way of getting back.

An even more grievous bias (at least from my point of view) is Reyntjens’ strong anti-American conviction. He accuses the U.S. of masterminding the first part of the 1997-98 war, of providing advice, guidance, intelligence, men and materiel to the RPA/ADFL effort. Simply stated that is hogwash. Reyntjens’ buttressing footnotes cite third and fourth hand sources suggesting that America was behind the anti-Mobutu effort. (Perhaps on account of wishful thinking on the part of sources and Reyntjens collectively. They all seem to love conspiracy theories. ) Even though this assertion is made early on in the chronology of war, there is no follow on proof, or even further allegation. Apparently just as vaporously as the American interest was in directing the conflict, it disappeared; never to have been involved in subsequent issues of refugee massacres, repatriations, maneuvering or king making with regard to internal Congolese politics. Nonetheless, Reyntjens sticks to his thesis blaming America (by supporting Kabila)for “durably destabilizing the entire region.” While I might be open to the proposition that the U.S. by reacting or not to individual events as they unfolded sent signals that played a part in the various outcomes – outcomes that were, of course, unknown before they occurred - but I categorically reject the notion that some carefully calculated long term policy conspiracy was afoot. Interestingly, Reyntjens even quotes two distinguished former Assistant Secretaries of State for African Affairs (Messrs. Cohen and Crocker) to the effect that the U.S. would not be capable of such shenanigans, but he goes ahead anyway and asserts it as fact.

I am further personally offended as Reyntjens’ used out of context quotations from my memoir (In the Aftermath of Genocide: the U.S. Role in Rwanda) to support his thesis, even going to the extent of calling me a “liar” regarding America’s role. How would he know better what the U.S. knew or did? Reyntjens also scoffs at statements made by Assistant Secretary Oakley, USAID administrator Brian Attwood, his deputy Dick McCall and Ambassador for War Crimes David Sheffer. Typical of these sorts of allegations that the U.S. blatantly covered-up misdeeds was one when I attributed the murder of Spanish MSF personnel in Ruhengeri in 1997 to Hutu insurgents. A finding that I have seen no evidence to refute. Reyntjens stated that years later an RPA turncoat (back to Hutu power) said that the RPA did the crime. Also, that version was accepted by a Spanish court in 2008 (a court notorious for seeking to indict RPA personnel for war crimes.) Why not state that a difference of view existed rather than excoriate one conviction?

My animosity aside, let’s get back to the book. Reyntjens imputes a lot of motives to various actors, but does not seem to have any real insight into their internal calculus, especially with regard to the RPM, but also with respect to Kabila himself. Reyntjens repeatedly cited then Vice-President Paul Kagame’s July 1997 interview with the Washington Post as most revealing of motives and intentions (which it was), but other inside scoop is simply missing. Instead the reader is overwhelmed with a narrative buttressed by documents produced by those with an axe to grind - Hutu exiles, human rights groups (such as Amnesty International that among its valid reporting were a series of diatribes actually written by Hutu power advocates) and would- be policy wonks. Reyntjens put his spin on such documents to make his case. For example in one instance, he seized on unattributed sources citing off hand remarks by a Rwandan official to the effect that it had “solved the Zaire problem” as evidence of a policy of hegemony in the region. While there is ample evidence that Rwanda did want to dominate the sub-region in order to protect - and later to enrich – itself, Reyntjens’ use of unqualified footnotes gives the impression that more valid documentation on events actually exists than is the case. In another gratuitous case, he footnoted the “possible” existence of a US plot to assassinate Kablia. What is the agenda here?

I found the most interesting part of the book to be the chapters on Congolese internal politics and conflict in Kivu in the years leading up to the transitional government. This is one of the first detailed accounts of such events, so stands – so far - as a valid chronology.

Again my reservations notwithstanding, this tome has relevance to the history of the Great Lakes region and the long series of conflicts that have troubled it. I would caution readers to note the biases flagged, not to accept Reyntjens as the final word, but to balance their education on this turmoil by seeking out other accounts. Let’s not fall into the trap of history that Napoleon feared when he said that history is a set of lies agreed upon.

Looking for Lovedu

2010-10-02T07:15:00.000-07:00

A book review by me of Looking for Lovedu – Days and Nights in Africa by Ann Jones, Alfred A. Knoff, New York, 2001.

The strange title of this travel book is explained early. Lovedu is a small kingdom in what is now South Africa ruled presently and historically by a queen endowed with diplomatic prowess and rainmaking powers. An overland journey from the U.K. to South Africa to seek out this queen is the (somewhat contrived) motivation for the book. The saga traces the route of author Ann Jones and her traveling companions, first young Brit Kelvin Muggleton and later Caro and Celia, who bash across Africa.

The first part of the trip was accomplished by Muggleton and Jones alone across the Sahara, the Sahel, along the west coast and then traversing the Congo basin to Kenya. Anecdotes of being on the road are, of course, the grist of the story with a special focus on the theme of women’s roles and their lack of political or economic power in the societies that the intrepid travelers briefly brushed in their headlong rush southward. The rush too became part of a gender conflict as the story pitted the reflective author who sought to slowly absorb the continent against headstrong Muggleton who, consumed with vehicle tasks, just wanted to get there. This drama played out predictably as the two repeatedly clashed. However, because of their joint commitment to the safari, they had to find ways to stay together, and to move ahead, especially when confronted with enormous mud holes in (then) Zaire.

This partnership lasted only as long as Nairobi. There, after a respite Jones enlisted an Aussie, Caro, and a Kenyan, Celia, to continue with her. Although the gender issue disappeared, philosophical differences of how to travel remained. Nonetheless, the ladies managed to voyage south, ultimately to meet with the mysterious queen. By then author Jones had sorted out her complex feelings about Africa and gender roles on the continent, but she found some solace in achieving her goal.

All things considered this is a pretty standard travelogue. Anecdotes of encounters are sandwiched in among pithy historical sketches of the countries visited. The travelers had many encounters with grasping officials, poor roads, sand in the Sahara and mud in Zaire. Yet they enjoyed warm hospitality in countless villages and missions along the way. Jones blamed western exploitation of Africa – slavery, colonialism, neo-colonialism and the bad habits Africa’s contemporary elite learned from former masters – for the woeful state of the continent. But throughout she also applauded the virtues of African society – patience, palaver, decorum and social coherence.

Note from reviewer: I read travel-in-Africa books because I too have driven the continent from Cape to Tangiers. The poor roads I experienced in the Congo in 1970 have obviously gotten a bit worse, but the other aspects of travel – brief but sometimes memorable encounters with people – remain the same. On a long journey like this, the trip becomes the thing and experiences mount up. It is, as Jones found out, vital to have convivial companions. Travelers have a marvelous window on Africa, but not the in-depth immersion in culture that time in a specific place allows. Put the two together, and you’ll be wiser for it.

Footsteps

2010-08-27T17:12:00.000-07:00

This is a book review of Footsteps, written by Kirsten Johnson, published by Plain View Press, Austin, TX 2009.

RPCV Johnson drew extensively on her early 1980s tour as a Harambee school teacher in the Meru area in writing this novel. A novel it is indeed, but the story revolves around and is clearly designed to illuminate very real issues for African women – girls education, circumcision, early marriage, too many children too fast, loveless marriages, the clash of tradition and modernism, work or stay in the boma, AIDS, wife inheritance, and the list goes on. In fact, it is remarkable that most of these issues are dealt with in the book.

The protagonists are two sisters, Kanini and Gatiria, raised in a traditional homestead on the dry plains east of Mount Kenya. The family has very little interaction with the outside world, but that world progressively creeps in often destroying the harmony (real or imagined) that eons of tradition have established. The first hurdle is that of female circumcision that Kanini reluctantly undergoes. The process, the ceremony, the value and the result are described as the girls ponder the issue and share their views. In this, as in almost everything that follows, Kanini is tradition bound whereas Gatiria is the modern girl/woman who defies her parents and her community on almost every score.

Readers follow the two through subsequent trials and tribulations with their family, husbands, colleagues, community and the wider world beyond. The setting is impeccably drawn, descriptions apt and conversations generally vivid and credible. Johnson indeed captures the mundane reality of hardscrabble life, grinding poverty and the tenacity of rural inhabitants. Her portraits of people and places – a doddering grandmother, co-wives, an autocratic father, their family compounds, ramshackle primary schools, bustling market towns, stupefying matatu rides – are excellent. She delves into the Tharaka/Meru culture and provides solid background for understanding the issues as seen by her Kenyan characters. She credits wisdom when due, but does not disguise ignorance – the conviction, for example, that AIDS was brought to Kenya by American sailors – because, in fact that belief retarded local action in the face of the calamity. Although there is certainly an underlying conviction (even a crusade) on the author’s part that traditions that hold women down ought to be modified, yet she tries to be evenhanded in at least understanding why such practices exist. Without doubt, she pays homage to the value of friendship, especially between women, because ultimately that is the coping mechanism that makes life bearable.

For those who know Kenya and the struggles that Kenyans, especially women, encounter on a regular basis, this book will remind you of the difficulties they face. For those who want to learn more about why Africa sometimes seems mired in the past and only slowly moving forward, this book elucidates some of the reasons.

Airlift to America

2010-07-01T07:37:00.000-07:00

Following is my review of Airlift to America – How Barack Obama, Sr., John F. Kennedy, Tom Mboya, and 800 East African Students Changed Their World and Ours by Tom Shachtman, St. Martin’s Press, NY, 2009.

There is a lot of history in this book that chronicles the times and story of an irregular, spontaneous, ad hoc, but still carefully organized process that steered hundreds of Kenyans and other East Africans to the United States for college studies. Those students, who included – as the title carefully notes – Barack Obama, Sr. constituted a wave of Africans that swept into a variety of U.S. campuses in the early civil rights era in the U.S. and the pre-independence years of their home nations. These men and women made their marks, both in the U.S. where although befuddled by racist attitudes, they became exemplary scholars and - on predominately white campuses - opened doors for black Americans. Upon returning to Africa, their impact was even greater as they truly became the leaders of their nascent states –politicians, educators, economists, bankers, businessmen and activists of many varieties.

The process was championed by Tom Mboya, a visionary who correctly reckoned that Kenya sorely needed many, many more numerous educated cadres to compliment the few elites who received overseas scholarships from the colonial government. Rather than opt for Soviet entreaties, he chose America. In the late fifties and early sixties, hundreds of Kenyans were applying directly to and being accepted by American colleges and universities, mostly second or third tier institutions including historically black colleges and small Protestant liberal arts schools. Tuition was generally waived and on-campus jobs promised, yet the hurdle of raising a thousand dollars for air fare was daunting. Mboya’s dream was to provide the transportation; hence the airlift. To this end he enlisted American activists including Bill Scheinman, Frank Montero, Cora Weiss and others supported by concerned celebrities Harry Belafonte, Jackie Robinson and Sydney Portier. With strong support from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and eventually Senator John F. Kennedy, the idea began to bloom.

The organization they created was the African American Students Foundation (AASF) which pulled together some previous individual efforts (Robinson’s for example) into a more coherent whole whereby Mboya and colleagues in Nairobi would select students for the charter flights which AASF would fund. AASF also took on counseling responsibilities for the students once in the U.S. Helping them adjust, providing small sums of spending money, organizing summer jobs, assisting in transfers, etc. AASF also undertook to contact thousands more schools successfully to urge sponsorship of additional African students.

Transportation money was a hurdle for students, but it was also an obstacle for AASF. The big foundations and the Department of State shunned the organization judging it to be too much of a shoestring operation and without “adequate” criteria for student selection. Nonetheless, AASF persevered, politicked and raised what they could for airlifts beginning in 1959. In 1960 in the months before the American political conventions, Tom Mboya met with candidate Senator Kennedy. Mboya convinced him to use over $100,000 of Kennedy family foundation monies to fund the airlift. When word of this leaked out, sensing its political value, Vice President Nixon pressured the recalcitrant State Department also to offer funding, but too late. AASF judged the Kennedy money to be real and State’s offer entangled with strings. After the election airlift funding did shift to the government. However, some of the philosophy of AASF’s student self-motivation principles, its wider diversity and focus on student support services were also incorporated into the State Department program run by mainline foundations and contractors.

If this summary is all this book was about then enough said, but it is much more. It is a well researched primer on the evolution of American political thinking about Africa , about the role of Africa in the 1960 election, about how the airlift angle rebounded much to Kennedy’s credit in energizing black voters, of how this issue led to meetings and dialogue between Kennedy and King and subsequently to educating Kennedy, theretofore not focused, to recognition that progress on civil rights was key to America’s future.

On the Kenyan side, there is reflection on Mboya’s career and his prospects, on how he fit in, or did not, into the emerging Kenyan political scene.

Throughout the book is sprinkled with anecdotes from hundreds of the airlifted students – who they were, where they studied, what they remembered and what they subsequently became or did. Indeed it is a very impressive list that in addition to Obama, includes Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai, Kenyan Vice President George Saitoti and dozens of others. There is also an interesting analysis of the impact that African students had on the rather insular communities where they landed. Even as they learned, they taught Americans about the outside world.

I found several small errors of fact. The most surprising in a book of this nature was the statement that Jomo Kenyatta was “educated in the USSR as well as in America.” Although it is technically accurate to say that he studied in the USSR, he was only there for less than a year (1932-1933). Kenyatta attended university and received his degrees in the U.K., where he lived from the early 1930s until after WWII. There is no record of him coming to America until he was President.

This book is recommended reading for Kenyan aficionados.

The Rebels' Hour

2010-05-29T17:30:00.000-07:00

Following is my review of The Rebels’ Hour by Lieve Joris, Grove Press, NY, 2008.

This novel about the Congo traces the life of a fictional main character, Assani Zikiya, a Munyamulenge, i.e. a Congolese Tutsi, during the very recent turbulent times in the Congo. The device of telling real history via a composite character, rather than an accurate biography of the man on whom Assani is based, permitted the author to humanize the story as well as to provide broader background on the various conflicts and, most importantly, to comment wryly on real events, problems and people. In sum, through this novel a reader can learn contemporary history and gain insight into the brutality and reality of war and politics in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Without a father, disowned by uncles, Assani grew up a self-reliant loner herding his cows on the high pastures of South Kivu, an area to which his Rwandan Tutsi ancestors had moved a hundred years earlier. A bright lad, he got some schooling, even moving on to university studies in Butare, Rwanda just after the genocide. There the call came. He was needed to return to Congo, to protect the Banyamulenge people, to combat genocidaires and to join the effort to oust Mobutu. Assani became a soldier. Ascetic by nature, he found his métier. He was a good leader, a strict disciplinarian, and ever conscious of the bigger picture. Through his eyes and exploits readers see and better understand the overlapping circles of violence, hatred, politics, tribalism and ambitions that under grid the catastrophe of the modern Congo.

Because of his competence Assani moved upwards in rank and responsibility. After victory, he joined Mzee Kabila in Kinshasa, but fled when the new president turned against the Tutsi. Assani joined the second rebellion and fought for the rebels in the east. After the peace, he returned to Kinshasa and again was caught up in the roiling uncertainty of politics and corruption. Assani became a hard man, but he retained a conscience. He pondered the morality of the times and was especially repulsed by tribalism, of which he was also a victim. As his story progresses Assani repeatedly has to choose – go along or get out – knowing that either choice could be fatal.

As mentioned above this book in novel form is history with a perspective. I suspect that the author herself is represented by at least one, and probably two, of the women characters to whom Assani confides during the course of his journeys.

Apparently the author Lieve Joris, a Belgian journalist, went to the Congo to be a journalist, but decided that this form of reporting better suited the story she wanted to tell. The result is a powerful book, one of the best on the Congo.

James Martin - Opening Africa

2010-05-20T06:21:00.000-07:00

This is my review of James Martin – Opening Africa: from finding Obama’s tribe to founding Nairobi, written by Philo and M.J. Pullicino, MPI Publishing, Great Britain, 2008.

This is kind of an odd but nonetheless interesting little book. The original manuscript was written some years ago by Philo Pullicino, a Maltese national, who served during the pre-independence and early independence years in the British colonial service in Zanzibar and Uganda. Pullicino went on to a distinguished career as an international civil servant and Maltese diplomat. He wrote this reflection about a fellow Maltese after his retirement. Philo’s manuscript was revised and edited by his son M.J. after his father’s death. Obviously, the references to Obama – including that in the title – were added in order to enhance the attractiveness of the work.

The story related is an intriguing one. It traces the life of James Martin, a Maltese seaman, who landed in Zanzibar in the 1870s. Although illiterate, Martin mastered languages easily and possessed an even-natured temperament. Although not being “pure” European and thus sort of a second class subject, he began to make his mark in East Africa as a caravan organizer. He began trekking with James Thompson in the 1880s and with him opened a new overland route through Maasai, Kikuyu and Kalenjin lands (present day Kenya) to Lake Victoria. It was on this first safari that Thompson and Martin (dubbed Martini by his Swahili porters) encountered Luo tribesmen (Obama’s tribe) near Lake Victoria. Subsequently over the next twenty years, Martin was to organize and lead perhaps a hundred trading and supply safaris to Uganda from the coast. Indeed, he was probably the most experienced man ever in that regard.

Naturally, Martin was employed by the railroad to prepare construction depots as the enterprise moved up country. Reportedly it was Martin who selected the site and built the first camp that became Nairobi. Later Martin signed on with the Imperial British East Africa Company and the colonial service. He was the District Officer at Eldama Ravine for some years; then was posted to Entebbe. After the Great War, in which he served, he found East Africa changed with little place for an illiterate Maltese, no matter how competent. Thus he retired to Portugal, his wife’s home and disappeared from the pages of history.

Author Pullicino, who also served in Entebbe years later, was intrigued by the snippets of tales about his fellow countryman. His investigations resulted in this book. Pullicino, however, was not a critic. He had nothing bad to say about Martin. He found all of his attributes – even tempered, able to deal harmoniously with avaricious tribal chiefs and racist superiors – to be admirable. In fact, Pullicino had little bad to say about anything. He always put an understanding and positive spin on people, circumstances and events. Given the reality of times, that gets to be a bit tedious. Also, Pullicino’s memory of geography is suspect as he moves some tribes (Kikuyu in southern Sudan?), flamingoes (Lake Naivasha?) and towns (Mumias at the base of Mt. Elgon?) around, but I forgive him those lapses. More irritating was the obvious Obama hook that son M.J. added after the fact. Most readers will recognize that for what it is, but if that helped sales, okay.

This book is an easy read and it does educate readers about James Martin, an overlooked, but important figure in the opening of Kenya and Uganda to the wider world.

Dreams in a Time of War

2010-05-20T06:15:00.000-07:00

This is my review of Dreams in a Time of War – A Childhood Memoir by Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Pantheon Books, NY, 2010

This memoir by Kenya’s most famous author is exactly what it purports to be: a recounting of childhood in Limuru, just outside of Nairobi. Indeed the times – World War II followed by the Mau Mau emergency – were a time of war in Ngugi’s Kikuyu home. The uncertainty of far off, and not so far off, events impacted upon rural society. Matching that were the changes wrought by modernization – the railroad, education, colonialism, religious controversy, wage employment and burgeoning political awareness.

These were the times Ngugi recalls, and who better to do it than him. Kenya’s changes and history as seen through the eyes of a child and adolescent are redolent with innocence and, like all childhoods, a reminiscence for things past. Ngugi tells about this family, his mother Wanjiku, the third wife of his father Thiong’o wa Nducu, his other mothers, the three other wives, his immediate brothers and sisters, plus scads of step siblings, then grandparents, cousins and other relations. All in this constellation had influence on him. He portrays a rich family life, albeit with an erratic patriarchal father.

Folks around Limuru were mostly farmers, although wage laborers worked at the Bata shoe factory and many picked tea on neighboring European plantations. Ngugi’s half brother went off to war. Italian POWs built the escarpment road. The government seized more African land to settle British soldiers. Later, another brother fled to the forest to join Mau Mau. Atrocities, especially colonial over-reactions, mass executions and interrogations terrorized the inhabitants. The inner Kikuyu rift, which divided pro-missionary, pro-government individuals from Kikuyu nationalists, became a life and death equation during the emergency and wreaked havoc on stable society. Throughout, young Ngugi was finding his way, particularly by dedicating himself to school. Determined to be the very best, he modestly tells of his successes. Readers see him grow from a child with a child’s perspective to become more aware of the greater world around him.

I did not know what to expect from this book, but what I found was an excellent history of the times as seen from a very narrow perspective. There is a small bit of a plot line as troubles come and go, but that is an extra bonus to the chronicle. I learned much about traditional Kikuyu life and how rural people lived. Of course, being Ngugi’s work, it is well written and contains thoughtful reflections, pithy observations and good quotations. Speaking of the dichotomy between fact and fiction, despair and hope, Ngugi notes, “Perhaps it is myth as much as fact that keeps dreams alive even in times of war.”

Obviously everyone’s childhood shapes them. Ngugi’s did him. He grew up to be independent, thoughtful and observant, incidentally with material for several good books.

Readers with some knowledge of Kenya will readily relate to events and the society described, but others too will find this an intriguing entry into another time and place. Reading is recommended.

Baking Cakes in Kigali

2010-05-20T06:12:00.000-07:00

Book review by me of Baking Cakes in Kigali by Gaile Parkin, Delacorte Press, NY, 2009.

This is a feel-good novel. Politically correct, it won’t offend anyone. Virtues of understanding, tolerance and compassion permeate the story, but still there is a plot inhabited by vivid characters.

The tale is set in contemporary Rwanda. With that as a backdrop part of unfolding the story has to do with post-genocide times – how people remember or not, how they interact or not, and how they get on with their lives, or not. Naturally Rwanda drew outsiders – volunteers, financial experts, professors, development gurus and others – who help to flesh out the community that Parkin creates. At the center of the novel is Angel Tungaraza, a Tanzanian whose husband is a visiting professor at the technical institute. Angel bakes and extravagantly decorates cakes to earn extra money. Thus, in addition to looking after her five orphaned grandchildren, cakes give Angel the opportunity to meet and get to know other characters in the story. She is an extraordinarily generous soul with a gift for drawing people out over a cup of tea. Along the way almost every topic comes under scrutiny: genocide – who are survivors and how do they cope; the roles – helpful , cynical or otherwise of foreigners; cultural differences – white vs. black or Asian, Rwandans vs. other Africans; traditional values contrasted to modern ways; AIDS - face it or hide it; female circumcision, street children, love, women’s rights, marriage…and the list goes on.

It is a gossipy book. There is lots of dialogue, but author Parkin has a good ear for how people really speak, especially Africans who, for example, use the word “late” in place of dead or died. There is a smattering of correct usage of Kinyarwanda, a bit of French and more Swahili. Kigali is authentically portrayed and Rwanda’s leaders vaguely referred to, but the plot focuses on the more mundane, but no less important aspects of life. Cakes are baked for mile-stones: birthdays, christenings, homecomings, engagements, reunions and weddings.

Author Parkin does a remarkable job of cutting to the quick and portraying the issues with perspective, humor and insight. She pokes gentle fun at human foibles. Readers will learn much about contemporary Africans – how they see themselves and how they see us. Ultimately Angel and all her friends come to a better understanding of themselves, each other and the world they inhabit.

The Teeth May Smile But The Heart Does Not Forget - Murder and Memory in Uganda

2010-02-22T06:22:00.000-08:00

Following is my review of the subject book written by Andrew Rice; published by Henry Holt & Co. New York, 2009.

This complex story uses the death of a prominent Ugandan chief at the hands of Idi Amin’s henchmen in 1972 as a mechanism to explore current Ugandan history along with the larger issue of justice. What is justice and who can obtain it or not and how? Further, why has Uganda seemingly chosen to avoid careful reckoning for atrocities that occurred over the past forty years? The answers are deeply embedded in Ugandan society, in the violence that successively swept across the nation and in the politics of power, then and now.

Journalist Andrew Rice spent several years in Uganda tracking down such issues and interviewing dozens of people at length, including victims, perpetrators, politicians, judges, lawyers, peasants and observers. The result is this extraordinary book that truly delves into the soul of Uganda and reveals passions of tribalism, religion, and politics. Rice holds up a mirror in which Ugandans can see themselves clearly (and certainly uncomfortably), but it is one that allows outsiders too to contemplate issues of guilt, complicity and accountability. It is a wrenching read.

The book investigates the death of Eliphaz Laki, a Munyanokle from Mbarara region who became a chief, i.e. mid-level government official, in the post-independence era. As was/is true of virtually all Ugandans, Laki’s success arose from his own virtues, but was also tied to family, friendship and tribal affiliations. Like many of his brethren Laki became involved in politics. An Anglican he was a supporter of Obote’s UPC, however, as a government official he retained his post following Amin’s 1971 coup d’etat. Things got complicated because Laki became surreptitiously involved with a young firebrand named Yoweri Museveni (today’s president). After Museveni’s aborted attack against the Simba Barracks at Mbarara in 1972, Laki was apparently ratted out. His name went on a list. He was seized from his office taken secretly to a remote ranch and shot. His body disappeared. His fate – a mysterious but certain death – was unfortunately common during the purges and atrocities of Amin’s suzerainty.

Thirty years later, Laki’s son, Duncan, intensified his quest to find his father’s body and to bring his killers to justice. Through a stroke of luck, Duncan was able to identify the actual killers, but that was not enough, he also sought wider truth; from them, but also from their superiors. The trail led to Major Yusuf Gowon, then deputy commander of the Simba Barracks, who later as a general became Amin’s Chief of Staff. But Amin’s northerners knew little about the western region where the complexities – ethnic, religious, party, personal - of Banyankole machinations defied outside comprehension. Who betrayed Laki to Amin’s regime and why?

Author Rice did a very successful job of rummaging through the history and the memories of Uganda’s last forty years. He ably recounted the reality including the climate of terror and suspicion as well as other events that marked Amin’s misrule, but he also understood the paradigm of impunity and spoils for the victors. As an outsider Rice was not automatically prejudiced to one perspective over another and he did present alternative views. Although there ultimately was a murder trial and truth was revealed, the law took its stubborn course against the backdrop of contemporary politics. Results were inconclusive both about the murder itself and also on the wider issue of justice. What is it and who is entitled to it? What does Uganda do next?

The title “The Teeth May Smile but the Heart Does not Forget” is a Kinyankole proverb whose meaning is obvious, but which assumes a greater significance when viewed against the layered strata of truth, untruth, reconciliation, hatred and justice in today’s Uganda.

On a personal note, I found this book as interesting as any I have read lately. Certainly those who know something about Uganda will find it fascinating as well. However, even readers without such background will get caught up in the superbly written, well paced story and will emerge with a better understanding of Uganda and of broader issues of morality and justice in today’s confusing world.

Poverty and Promise

2010-01-31T10:45:00.000-08:00

This is a book review of Poverty and Promise: One Volunteer’s Experience of Kenya, written by Cindi Brown, published by Just One Voice, Surprise, AZ, 2008.

This is a heartfelt memoir of Cindi’s eight months as a volunteer assigned to the Tropical Institute of Community Health and Development (TICH) in Kisumu, Kenya. Kenya truly was an eye opener for Ms. Brown. In mid-life she left a comfortable regime at home and signed on with Volunteers in Service Overseas (I was not aware that the organization took non-U.K. citizens) for a two year stint in Kenya. She was assigned as a communications, public relations specialist to TICH, an indigenous organization that is achieving great success in bringing better health to communities in western Kenya through grassroots education and organization of health workers. Throughout the book, Ms. Brown mostly lauded, rarely criticized the institute and its personnel. Yet she found plenty of issues to write about, especially cultural differences such as how meetings were organized and conducted (beginning with prayer), a narrow focus on tasks, burdensome bureaucracy, and even in a relatively well functioning school, lack of daily urgency.

However, it was chiefly outside the institute that Ms. Brown found Africa. Kisumu was a bustling, teeming city where a mzungu lady walking around drew attention – some friendly and curious, other intimidating and threatening. Glue sniffing street children, bodacious booda booda (bicycle taxi) drivers, and those believing that she could/would solve their problems constantly called to her, sought attention, money or advice. Early on Cindi met and befriended Walter, less of a conman than most, whose heart was in the right place, i.e. trying to alleviate the plight of abandoned children. With him, Tonny and staffers from TICH, Cindi went into to slums and the rural areas to see and experience first hand the terrible poverty – no water or sanitation, plenty of disease, inadequate shelter, lack of clothing, no schooling, etc. – that was the plight of the poor. She attended funerals of those who died of AIDS and witnessed the horror that malady has visited upon Kenyans.

In a rather odd inclusion in the book, Ms. Brown detailed health ravages of a half dozen stricken individuals she visited in the Provincial (Russian) Hospital. They were all in various stages of dying from mostly preventable diseases or wounds that if properly treated early on would have posed few problems. I suppose the purpose of this section was to convince the reader that much of the issue of poverty related to the inability of a developing society to provide basic services to its citizens.

In contrast to the darker side of poverty, Ms. Brown found promise in the optimism of the people, their steadfastness and their faith. She viewed the work of TICH as enabling communities through grass roots training to conquer their own problems as well as its secondary mission of training community activists at the university level and above.

Juxtaposed amidst the daily grind of Kisumu, Ms. Brown added travelogue vignettes: one of a trip to Goma, Congo (which she found to be terribly corrupt and dangerous) for a graduation ceremony for a group of students from TICH; another chapter told of a coastal sojourn as a budget traveler in Mombasa, Malindi, Lamu and Zanzibar.

On a personal side Ms. Brown wore her feelings on her sleeve. She wrote candidly about what she saw and felt. She felt exposed and vulnerable as an outsider in Kisumu, but found some solace with new friends and especially with her Sikh landlady, a woman who also felt alone in the sea of Luo humanity. Finally, a mugging brought all these insecurities to fruition convincing Cindi to leave. Later by writing the book and dedicating the proceeds to TICH, she assuaged the guilt incurred by not completing her two year stint.

Volunteers who experienced many similar cultural encounters and those who know Kisumu will find that this book resonates strongly, but others too who understand poverty and are looking for ways to conquer it will find the book interesting.

Poverty and Promise reads a bit like the diaries and letters it was drawn from, but that was expected. Spellings of some Swahili and Luo words (askari and erokamano) are wrong, but Arizona editors were probably not conversant in those languages.

I Remember a Gift

2010-01-31T10:38:00.000-08:00

Following is an expanded version of this vingette, an earlier copy of which was posted on this site a couple of years ago. This version was published in the January 2010 edition of the Foreign Service Journal.

I remember a gift. In 1986 as deputy director in the Office of East African Affairs. I was making a tour of U.S. embassies in the parish. I was in Djibouti, a small desert country at the southern mouth of the Red Sea. Neighboring Ethiopia and Somalia, then at relative peace, had been warring for years. That conflict had been compounded by drought and famine. As a result many thousands of ethnic Somali tribesmen from the Ogaden Region of Ethiopia had sought refuge in Djibouti. They were confined to United Nations run camps located in the arid hinterland of one of the most desolate nations in Africa.

A dusty, hot half-day’s drive from the capital, I visited one of the camps, which grouped several thousand refugees who had lived there for months; essentially on a moonscape. This refugee camp was a bleak and seemingly hopeless place. Yet, the elders of the camp committee greeted me graciously and guided me on a tour of their squalid domain. We wove in and out little lanes between the stick huts. Green plastic sheeting provided cover from the sun. Bags of U.S. donated maize and tins of vegetable oil were stacked in the food distribution warehouse. A one-tent school was operating. It had little more than a blackboard, but children sat in rapt attention as their teacher lectured, then they recited back. Outside the small clinic the day’s clients – pregnant women, wailing babies and those worn with the ills of the region - waited patiently. Inside, several refugee nurses dispensed what care they could. They proudly proclaimed that childhood immunizations were up to date. Flies buzzed incessantly.

Elders bemoaned their plight: their suffering from war and famine, their flight from their homes, especially their loss of goats and camels. They noted youths were bored in the nothingness of the camp and all were stymied by the inability to look ahead. They were compelled to live day-by-day. Of course, they asked for America’s help, especially in rectifying conditions in Ethiopia so that they might be able to go home.

However, the camp committee was most anxious that I see their newly acquired well, water pump – provided by a grant from the U.S. government - and garden. We walked up a rock-strewn ravine past the cemetery where several new graves provided mute testimony to the ravages of disease and malnutrition. Beyond, nestled on the slope of the valley in a region where not a single blade of vegetation was visible for miles, was a small patch of green. The elders showed me how boys carried water from the new well to the plots where they had managed to coax several scraggly tomato plants and other vegetables from the hard earth. The chief pointed with pride to the first water melon, about the size of a small soccer ball. He then had it picked. He presented it to me with great ceremony and thanks for America’s concern and assistance. I was overwhelmed. The camp’s children were desperate for this sort of nourishment, yet it was given unhesitating to a stranger – to someone who obviously had no need for it. Yet, I had to accept. This was a gift from the heart. I managed to utter thanks and a few words of encouragement. We then shared the bits of melon.

In the years since, I have always been struck how people with so little and with such great needs could give so easily. Yet we with so much, find it hard to give a little.

Killing Neighbors - Webs of Violence in Rwanda

2009-12-26T08:15:00.000-08:00

A book review of Killing Neighbors – Webs of Violence in Rwanda, By Lee Ann Fujii. Published by Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY, 2009.

This is a scholarly tome that investigates individual motives behind the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Professor Fujii started with the premise that ethnic hatred, ethnic fear, or both, were key to enticing individuals to participate in the killings. Although she noted and elaborated on the facts that the overall climate that fostered genocide repeatedly stressed such themes, Ms. Fujii did not find those motivations operating at the individual level. Instead she discovered a complex web of motivations that varied from individual to individual.

The methodology of the research was to interview dozens of people from two separate hillsides (communities); one in the north where the civil war that preceded the genocide was fought and the other in the central zone that saw no violence until the genocide began. Many of those interviewed were prisoners who had plead guilty and were incarcerated for genocide activities. Presumably they spoke the truth because they nothing to hide. Others interviewed were family members of killers as well as survivors.

First there were differentiations by Hutu killers between Tutsi they knew, i.e. friends and neighbors, and those who were not known. Hutu killing mobs were always that - mobs. They were invariably groups that acted in concert where the power of collectiveness was overwhelming. Professor Fujii recorded no instances where one individual killed another. To the contrary when one-on-one encounters were described, respondents said that they warned the potential victim of danger.

Dr. Fujii found that familial and social ties were instrumental in compelling participation in killing groups. Individuals were usually brought in by local authorities or relatives, but some were recruited by peers. Some joined willingly, others were shamed into participation or intimidated into joining. Few envisaged booty and little was realized. Mostly Fujii concluded it was group dynamics that stoked the fires of genocide and kept them burning. Individuals who would not (and did not) act on their own became swept up in the group objective of elimination of the Tutsi.

Overall the book makes an important contribution into understanding genocide in Rwanda, but does it shed light on tribal violence elsewhere, in Kenya for example? Professor Fujii makes no extrapolation to that effect, but I will. First I would argue that the overall climate conducive to tribal violence in Kenya was similar, i.e. a perception of wrongs (in Kenya mostly having to do with land and other favoritisms) on the part of certain tribes with regard to others, plus the fear that such wrongs would only increase. A key difference was that the Kenyan national authorities were essentially seen as those in the wrong (the Kikuyu), thus the state did not advocate “ethnic cleansing.” Nonetheless, Kenyans, I believe, harbored a stronger sense of ethnic fear than did Rwandans and I suspect that was a motivation for participation in violence. However, the phenomenon of group dynamics was probably very much the same. Once enlisted in a mob, individual morals dropped aside and churches were burned, houses torched, people beaten and families chased from their homes and farms.

Overall, the scary conclusion from this study is that we, and our societies, live a lot closer to edge than we might suppose. We do not operate much from atavistic hatreds, but instead in response to current political events. It behooves us therefore to choose leaders that eschew tribal, ethnic, racial or religious differentiation in favor of inclusiveness. We must do so in order that our multifaceted societies can prosper.

An Expensive Education

2009-10-30T07:13:00.000-07:00

Book review of a novel by Nick McDonell, Atlantic Monthly Press, NY, 2009.

The action in this novel unrolls in East Africa and Cambridge, Massachusetts. It is kind of an odd amalgam, but the story moves on in a satisfactory fashion and keeps the reader engaged.

Misperception, trust and betrayal are the core issues investigated. The tale begins with an armed attack on a Somali village that the protagonist, a newly minted CIA officer, seems to have unwontedly instigated. Following is a series of intrigues as he and others try to unravel the mystery of the motives for the massacre and who did it. Other characters include a Harvard academic, a brilliant Somali student - who happens to have had relatives in the village – his society coed girl friend, a jaundiced CIA chief and a panoply of various hangers-on. Although some characters have substance to them, most are fairly shallow as befits the speedy pace of the story. I thought the hero was a bit too perfect. His basic flaw was naiveté.

On the one hand the novel is a spy thriller, but on another it is a satirical portrayal of Harvard – its politics, student life, clubs and old boy networks. As such the book appeals to Harvard insiders, but these aspects of it leave the rest of us a bit perplexed. The East African scenario appealed to me and by and large I found descriptions accurate. Author McDonell noted in a forward that he distorted tribes and geography, which he indeed did; shrinking distances and using wrong names for people of this or that tribe. I doubt, however, that many readers will catch these discrepancies. In one instance, however, he relates an incident in Nairobi and later refers to it as having occurred in Khartoum. Maybe he was just trying to see if we were alert?

Don’t read this book for political insight into the complex politics of terrorism, Somalia or Kenya. Nor should you believe that it accurately reflects how the CIA operates. Yet with those disclaimers, it remains a good yarn.

Wildflower - An Extraordinary Life and Untimely Death in Africa

2009-10-30T07:07:00.000-07:00

Book review of a biography by Mark Seal,Random House, NY, 2009.

The sub-title pretty well says it all; another vibrant, activist, female conservationist murdered by parties unknown - presumably because she thwarted their economic/political interests. Film maker and conservationist Joan Root’s story is a sad one from beginning to end and the maudlin aspects of it are drawn out by author Seal. Her life story has soap operatic aspects which Seal milked for all they’re worth.

Without doubt Ms. Root’s untimely demise – she was murdered in her bedroom by contract killers in early 2006 – provides the premise and the denouement for the biography that Seal assembled. Recounted in detail, Seal described Joan as a gentle shy soul who searched for meaning and mission in life. Initially she found both in marriage to Alan Root. An indispensable partner she collaborated with him in the production of a long list of wildlife films that patiently and conscientiously detailed animals and events. Films included studies of lions, hippos, termites, gorillas, hornbills in a baobab tree, a balloon over Kilimanjaro and a dry season. The list goes on, but Joan was the producer, the organizer and the muse that kindled Alan’s filmmaking genius. The two won worldwide renown.

Despite their professional collaboration, after some years, Alan’s wandering eye led him to another woman. Abandonment – which was never total as the two continued to work together for a time and communicated for years afterwards - sent Joan into a downward spiral. She only rallied when she found a new mission: saving Lake Naivasha from the scourge of fish and animal poaching and pollution from Kenya’s burgeoning flower industry. Joan’s 88 acre estate on the lake was threatened by interlopers and fish poachers in the 1990s and 2000s as the population of the area exploded on account of the rapid expansion of the flower industry. Although the hot houses and intensely cultivated fields flushed chemical runoff into the lake, it was really the quintupled human population that pressured the lake. Excrement from pit latrines found its way into the water table, but non-employed young men (women were preferred by the flower growers for their more delicate fingers) found outlets in seining illegally for the smallest fish, poaching wild animals that traditionally visited the lake and in crime. The European estates that ringed the lake were trespassed upon and targeted.

Joan’s efforts to halt these threats to “her” lake (and property) drew her into a whirlpool of conspiracy and quasi-legal violence designed to reduce illegal activities. Clearly (in retrospect) Joan was in over her head. Instead of managing the process she became swept up in it. Ultimately as it all rotted around her, she became its victim. Should that have happened? Of course not, author Seal and Joan’s friends all offer testimony to that effect. The nobleness of her cause notwithstanding, left unanswered and unaddressed is whether mzungus like Joan should try to save Kenya from itself?

The book is an entertaining read, even though the outcome is known before the first chapter. No one has anything bad to say about Joan, but her letters and diaries reveal a bit more of her inner thoughts. I found lots of repetition about her character, but little insight into how she really functioned. She obviously did not handle men very well. Alan first and then vigilante chief David Chege walked all over her.

Author Mark Seal is a journalist and the book is, in fact, an expansion of an article written for Vanity Fair. It reads like that. It is laudatory, uncritical and designed to elicit maximum sympathy. Despite accolades to a fact checker in the acknowledgements, the reputable checker missed the evolution of Tanganyika. The book says that it is now divided into Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi…tsk, tsk.

It’s Our Turn to Eat: The Story of a Kenyan Whistle-Blower

2009-07-29T16:47:00.000-07:00

A review of a book by Michela Wrong. Published by Harper, NY 2009.

If you only read one book about Kenya this year; this should be it. Author Michela Wrong has written the definitive exposé on how Kenya’s political elite have skewed their country’s political, economic and social system via tribalism and corruption so that it operates to their benefit, but to the detriment of the nation and the wanaichi. To flesh out this tale of greed, Wrong uses the saga of John Githongo, a respected journalist and NGO operative, who – because of his respectable credentials - was recruited into becoming Kenya’s anti-corruption czar following the election of Mwai Kibaki in 2002. Imbued with a zealous sense of purpose Githongo strove to cleanse the Augean stable mess left by the previous Moi and even Kenyatta administrations. He found, however, that no matter how noble the rhetoric, embedded practices were impervious to reform. Instead of correcting matters, the new cadre close to President Kibaki – including, as Githongo reluctantly concluded, the president himself– persisted in clever organized looting of the state. The justification for this was tribal, after years of exile while Moi reigned, it was again time for the Kikuyus “to eat.”

Even while following the story of one man’s enthusiasm and disillusionment, the author carefully dissects the Kenya polity. She notes, “The various forms of graft cannot be separated from the people’s vision of existence as a merciless contest, in which only ethnic preference offers hope of survival.” This leads to a comprehensive discussion of tribalism in particular how it is not an atavistic force arising from centuries of tribal struggle, but rather a manifestation of modernization. Colonialism, education, Christianity, urbanization, the cash economy – in fact all the elements of recent times brought Kenya’s various tribes into face-to-face competition. Whoever controlled power and the apparatus of the state were able to reward their “community” at the expense of everyone else. Thus common identity - rather than merit - became (and still is) the means of personal advancement. Up to a point, of course, looking after kith and kin is not pernicious, but Kenyans have never drawn a good line. Helping your cousins is one thing, but expanding beyond that to blatant theft coupled with denigration and stereotyping of others on account of their tribe has led to inimical politics, which have resulted in repeated rounds of tribal violence – with perhaps more to come.

Ms. Wrong made the point that urbanization in many ways de-tribalized Kenyans. Ethnic customs, language, etc. all succumbed to the polyglot mix of the cities, broader education and the impact of western culture. Kids, for example, did not speak tribal mother tongues or English or Swahili, but created “Sheng” for common communication. Identities were being forged more as “poor” or “affluent” rather than Luo or Kikuyu. Unfortunately, those evolutions were swept away in the political violence of 2007 where tribe became the sole criterion. In the aftermath of that violence, it is doubtful if Kenyans can regain the social cohesion that they previously enjoyed.

Some of the worst manifestations of tribalism and unbridled presidential power have been the scandals of Goldberg (under Moi) and Anglo Leasing (under Kibaki), in which hundreds of millions of dollars were blithely stolen from government coffers by those charged to manage resources properly for the people, i.e. the office of the president, the chief of the civil service, members of government and the judiciary. It was this latter scandal that Githongo uncovered. Most distressing for him was the fact that people he knew and trusted; lied, schemed and connived to cover up their shenanigans. When finally confronted with facts (Githongo secretly recorded conversations and ran a network of informers), they plead that it was all for the benefit of the Kikuyu “community,” in effect, it was their turn to eat. Indeed, something was very rotten in Kenya. Githongo fled for fear of his life.

The international donor community did not escape Wrong’s righteousness. The World Bank was singled out for marked failure to link new lending to reform, thus convincing Kenyans leaders that there were no real consequences for even spectacular corruption. Wrong found one hero in British High Commissioner (ambassador) Edward Clay who argued forcefully in public, and against the policy of his own government, that donors ought to hold Kenya accountable for proper management of all its resources.

Ultimately, Githongo’s story just sort of wound down, with no clear cut victory for the good guys. But the impact of the book did not stop there. Although part of the book has been serialized in the Nation, it is not available for purchase in Kenya. Booksellers apparently fear the wrath of the named. Even so, It’s Our Turn to Eat is a hot commodity. Copies are being imported privately, even apparently by USAID. Githongo’s recordings are available on the web where many Kenyans are listening. Ms. Wrong recently told a Washington audience that she had not sensationalized events, but reported even handedly. While she agreed that Githongo might better have told his own story, he was not ready when she was. He cooperated fully. Finally, as is mentioned in the book, Githongo’s daring set an example for other watchdogs and has certainly raised the bar for public scrutiny of elected officials. Evidently, thieves are more careful now, but the underlying structure of Kenyan politics which bred the system of tribal patronage and corruption has not changed. The struggle for seekers of change, fairness, truth and accountability has not ended.

Reviewed by Robert Gribbin, July 2009

Why Africa Matters

2009-06-30T10:42:00.000-07:00

This is a talk I gave at the Foreign Service Institute on June 29, 2009.

Africa is far away, little known and little connected to America or to the world, so why does it matter? Why should we be concerned with it, study it, learn its languages or be assigned there? These are good questions that merit thoughtful response.

This morning I will lay out some realities that under grid American concerns for Africa and why it behooves us to pay attention to Africa.

First, some background.

Ancestry

I can see from this group that some here have African ancestry, just as others have European or Asian. America today really is an ethnic melting pot. We are multi-ethnic, multi-hued, multi-lingual and multi-cultural. An increasing number of Americans are recent immigrants, including many from Africa. Our reality is that we are a nation formed by the peoples of the world. We have roots everywhere. This is one of our strong claims to global leadership and the responsibilities that engenders.

Culture

Often we Americans incorporate culture from other societies and when we don’t perhaps we need to learn from others’ cultural values. African culture is endowed with many positive values. I would put a sense of family at the top of the list. African families look after each other. There are lots of reciprocal obligations. Wage earners house, feed, educate and find jobs for relatives. Children are prized, in part because they represent the social security system for their parents. Africans respect their elders, include them in expanded households and care for them in old age.

President Obama learned about his Kenyan family when in his twenties. As you remember he was raised by his mother and maternal grandparents, but when he went to Kenya for the first time, he discovered he was a member of a large expanded family – grandparents, half- siblings, aunts, uncles and cousins galore. Certainly, they expect a lot from him now that he is truly a “big man.”

Africans can teach us about a slower pace of life – those of you who were Peace Corps Volunteers certainly understand this value. Africans take many minutes just to greet one and another before getting around to the business at hand. There is little rush. When things happen, they do.

Africans know how to live within their means. Perhaps this is a function of poverty – when you do not have much – you get by. But it also represents recognition that materialism is not the wherewithal of society.

Africans are connected to the land and to the cycles of the seasons. An overwhelming percentage of folks are farmers and those who aren’t are only one generation from the farm. This connectedness to nature gives Africans insight into many contemporary environmental issues.

Africans are fanatic about education. They recognize it as a way forward. Families make great sacrifices to send their children to school. And the kids reciprocate and devote themselves to their studies.

Although a certain sense of fatalism permeates African society, the counterpart to that is optimism. Africans are almost always convinced – even against potent evidence to the contrary – that things will get better. I find this an endearing quality.

Even though we think we understand cultural differences, let me tell a story that demonstrates the voids. In the Central African Republic I spoke with an American missionary from the Summer Linguistic Institute, an organization that translates the Bible into native languages around the world. I asked him how the project regarding the BaAka pygmies was going. He said not so well. The linguists often started in a new language with Bible stories such as Joseph and the coat of many colors. But they found that story did not resonate with the BaAka who had no concept of coveting nor of clothes. Similarly with David and Goliath – the BaAka were non-violent so did not relate to conflict either.

I was a peace corps volunteer in Kenya in 1969 when Americans landed on the moon. This achievement was viewed with skepticism by the young Luo tribesmen with whom I worked. Although they readily accepted that Americans could build a space ship – after all they built jet airplanes – proof of being on the moon was missing. I discovered that the needed proof revolved around the nature of and meeting with God. According to Luo religious beliefs God lived on the moon and if the astronauts had not met him – and there were no reports to that effect - then, had the trip really occurred?

History

With the exception of slavery America’s connections to Africa were fairly minimal before the mid-20th century. We do need to acknowledge that slavery as practiced for about four hundred years, both by the west and the east, with Africans as the victims was a terrible scourge that disrupted and destroyed societies throughout the continent. On the heels of slavery came colonialism, a practice that warped social, economic and political development. Thankfully, the U.S. was not a colonial power.

America secured the coast of what is now Liberia in 1820 where freed slaves and free blacks were settled from the United States. Although not a colony as such, the U.S. kept a watchful paternal eye on Liberia from that point forward. In 1836 a U.S. consulate was opened in Zanzibar. Although Europe, especially Great Britain, was much captivated by sagas of exploration in the mid-nineteenth century, it was the New York Post newspaper that employed adventurer Henry Morton Stanley to rescue Dr. David Livingston. He did so in 1871, thus enhancing Livingston’s erstwhile sainthood and earning Stanley himself everlasting fame.

Abyssinia came to America’s attention in the 1930s when that traditionally independent kingdom was brutally annexed by Mussolini. Young Emperor Halie Selassie’s appeals to the League of Nations sparked interest in Africa; interest in self-determination that foreshadowed the independence struggles that were to come a generation later. Yet at this time for most Americans Africa equated to Tarzan, King Solomon’s Mines, The African Queen and other popular literature that portrayed Africans in subservient or racist terms.

During World War Two, Africa became a crucial supplier of raw materials for the allied effort such as rubber for tires, pyrethrum for insecticide, sisal for ropes and even uranium for the first atomic bombs.

The wave of independence that began in Ghana and Guinea in the late 1950s and swept most of the continent by the mid-sixties caused a new look at the Africa. In the midst of the debacle in the Congo in 1961, President Kennedy recognized that African nationalism was not necessarily anti-Americanism or pro-communism. We established diplomatic relations with virtually every nation upon the achievement of independence and, with USAID, the Peace Corps and other policies sought to build new relationships. Yet the Cold War intruded into Africa as U.S. policy was shaped by fears of Soviet or Chinese influence. Africa’s response to the world contest was to opt out. The Organization of African Unity was created in 1963 for mutual support among African states with one objective being precisely to forge a neutral path between the east and the west.

With this background in mind, let’s fast forward and ask - Where is Africa Today?

Most of Africa is doing quite okay. Nations are vaguely democratic, politically stable, socially at peace and making satisfactory economic progress. A number of wars have ended in recent years and there is reason for cautious optimism that other conflicts might be subsiding.

Economics

Africa has always been an exporter – of people and of commodities – slaves, ivory, coffee, coco, peanuts, palm oil, pineapples, mangoes, sisal, mangrove poles and more recently fresh cut flowers for European markets. Africa also sends minerals to world markets– copper, gold, diamonds, uranium, bauxite, iron ore and more recently coltan used in your cell phones. Oil has become the motor of economies in Nigeria, Angola, Equatorial Guinea, Chad, Gabon, Republic of the Congo and Sudan. Lesser amounts are found elsewhere. Africa now accounts for about 20 percent of U.S. imports and the figure continues to rise.

Oil is both a blessing and a curse. Obviously it provides sorely needed revenues, but sadly much oil derived income has been stolen or squandered. Rather than the breadbasket of the past, Nigeria today, for example, is a net importer of food. Additionally, Nigeria is awash with money and has become one of the most corrupt nations on the planet. The leadership of Chad has diverted oil revenues into armaments. In neighboring Sudan, oil monies fueled massacres in Darfur. Issues of control of Sudan’s oil fields risks reigniting the southern war as well. Equatorial Guinea, long ruled by a family of bizarre autocrats, remains one of the continent’s egregious abusers of human rights.

Elsewhere , even though the modern sectors of economies show diversity – more manufacturing, textile production, expanded tourism and even high tech call centers -bad economic policies, small markets, inadequate transportation assets and poor industrial infrastructure plus lots of debt conspire to retard progress. Population growth often outpaces economic growth. Thus, even statistically, it is very tough to get ahead.

The vast majority of Africans comprise some of the bottom billion – those citizens of the world mired in poverty who largely practice subsistence agriculture or increasingly make-do in the vast shanty towns of the third world’s teeming cities. For them the prospects are not very promising. The challenge is to find ways to promote development at the grassroots.

Africa’s economies matter because the U.S. is connected directly to them via trade and aid. A rising tide floats all ships. More prosperity there rebounds to everyone’s benefit.

Humanitarian

Africa is a continent of man made disasters. Political conflict, bandits, piracy, war and civil war coupled with natural catastrophe especially drought, but now also AIDS, periodically wreak havoc on people across the continent. While the impact of slavery and colonial forced labor has receded, modern versions of man made horrors emerged in Liberia, Rwanda, Congo, Somalia, Sudan and Zimbabwe. Such suffering touches the conscience of America. Images of refugees, starving children, AIDS victims and frightened survivors tug at our heartstrings. To our credit we respond generously. Over two billion dollars a year flows through both public and private channels to those in need.

Unfortunately, although needs and locations change, humanitarian resources will be required in Africa for the foreseeable future. I know America will continue to respond generously.

Multilateral Politics

Even though colonialism is finished and the Cold War is over, some of their legacies persist in the international arena. African states hold 53 of the United Nations 194 seats. This gives Africa good leverage in international councils. Even though most African states are pro-western on an individual basis, collectively they adhere to shop worn non-aligned, anti-west formulas largely developed a generation ago by Cuba, India, Egypt, Indonesia and Yugoslavia. U.S. efforts to crack this outdated “unity” will be part of your diplomatic assignment.

African states sometimes are and have the potential to be solid partners in helping to advance America’s global agenda, be it nuclear non-proliferation, human rights, democracy or free trade.

Security

Security issues loom high on lists of concerns in Africa. Obviously security is prerequisite for domestic harmony, economic growth and political evolution, all of which are in our interest. Yet the threats to peace are many. Most threats are home grown as is the case in Nigeria, Zimbabwe or Sudan relating to who is going to control the political/economic pie. While the U.S. does not want to dictate outcomes per se, we do seek an end to internal conflict and cross border violence. To this end we cajole, negotiate and strive to convince all concerned to sort out difficulties in a peaceful fashion. In addition to moral suasion, our latest big stick is AFRICOM, the utility of which is diminished in this regard because we state upfront that the U.S. is never going to war in Africa.

International peacekeeping has been a growth industry in Africa. By informal count there are now UN Peace Keeping Operations in Sudan, Congo, Chad, Central African Republic, Eritrea and Ethiopia. There are remnants of operations in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Burundi. An African Union operation is also underway in Somalia. Obviously, it is in our interest to support international peacekeeping efforts and to involve as many Africans nations as possible in keeping the peace in Africa.

Perpetrators of international terrorism have struck repeatedly in Africa killing Americans in Khartoum, Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. They have attacked locals and foreigners elsewhere and plotted virtually everywhere. Reining in terrorism is an intelligence rather than a military function and one to which increasing resources are being devoted by both the United States and African governments.

Piracy and hostage taking for profit plague the Somali coast and the Niger delta. Oil bunkering, that is large scale theft, also troubles oil production in the Gulf of Guinea.

Columbian and Nigerian drug cartels appear to have taken control of the nation of Guinea Bissau. This exemplifies the risk that poorly governed corrupt or un-governed states pose to the rest of the world.

Environment

Africa boasts some of the planet’s most pristine regions, for example the vast forests of the Congo basin, huge fresh water lakes and mighty rivers, snow clad peaks and game filled plains. Yet most of the continent is dry – the Sahara and Kalahari deserts take up about a third of the land area. Water is the key – often missing commodity – across much of the continent. Climate change that brings more drought and with it expanded local conflict for arable land will further devastate already fragile regions.

Should Africa be allowed to rape her lands for profit? Or worse, let foreigners do it?

The issues at stake are how to strike the balance, to preserve that which needs preserving and to exploit in a responsible fashion that which can be productively used.

U.S. priorities

Assistant Secretary Johnnie Carson identified four American priorities in Africa during his recent confirmation hearing. They are: democracy; conflict mitigation; economic growth and combating global threats.

Let’s look at them in turn.

Africa does have an improving democratic track record. 12 of 48 Sub-Saharan nations are listed by Freedom House as fully free and 23 as partially free. But there is a lot of work to be done, especially in instituting a rule of law and fostering more institutional independence from powerful national executives. Who controls power and how it is exercised and who can take power legitimately or otherwise, are elements in assessing the status of democracy in any given nation.

The U.S. has been on the front lines of promoting democracy. We’ve supported civil society, helped finance and monitor elections and encouraged a sense of accountability. When I was ambassador in the Central African Republic in 1992, we were deeply involved in facilitating free and fair elections. However, about a week before the voting while I was eating breakfast on the veranda, I spotted a big snake in the frangipangi tree nearby. I retreated inside and notified my staff. At lunch the gardeners proudly presented the 8 foot long carcass of a black mamba. By late afternoon word was circulating around town that President Kolingba was irritated with the coming elections and U.S. advocacy of them; consequently he used his magic to send a snake to kill the U.S. ambassador, but the ambassador’s magic was stronger. He defeated Kolingba, so the elections would go ahead and Kolingba would lose.

In those elections Kolingba, the incumbent president, came in fourth, then tried to manipulate the results after the fact. However, the system in place proved resilient and his attempt to thwart the popular will was rebuffed. Later in the same nation, Parliament having been trained in responsibilities by a National Endowment for Democracy team, summoned the Prime Minister for a reckoning. Rather than comply, he resigned. Members of Parliament repeatedly thanked me for teaching them how to operate their own system.

We should not under estimate the impact in Africa of President Obama’s election. Clearly, being a son of Africa, he was the popular favorite, but beyond that his victory was seen as evidence that change, real change is possible via the ballot box. I was in Chad last November where there was great rejoicing, especially amongst students – plus and goat and gazelle delivered to the embassy as gifts to the new president. Yet the dictatorial government there was reluctant to let the students march in celebration lest their enthusiasm for Obama’s victory morph into demands for local change.

Later the Obama lesson was taken to heart by voters in Ghana who themselves voted out an incumbent party. Additionally, emboldened by Obama’s example, Kenyans are adamant that the debacle of their flawed 2007 election won’t be repeated.

This is the way democracy policy is supposed to work.

Nigeria’s election of 2007 was another matter. The vote was a fraud from the beginning. Thousands of precincts that reported tallies never opened. Elsewhere the national result was rigged. Yet some local races were legitimate, but only in Nigeria could candidate run on the theme that he was less corrupt than his opponent. At the national level outgoing president Obasanjo’s anointed successor Yar’Adua prevailed. His taking of the office might have avoided a military coup d’etat or widespread communal violence, but he was certainly not freely and fairly elected. But the U.S. – fearing negative consequences for oil production and retrenchment from Nigeria’s positive regional role – opted to mildly criticize the election and to quietly accept the result. Similarly, we have let broader interests predominate in flawed democratic processes in Kenya and Zimbabwe.

Conflict mitigation. Conflict is the big bugaboo in Africa. Although focusing on it is worthwhile and noble, solving the problems of Somalia, Sudan and Congo is not unilaterally possible and anything but easy. Last week’s conference on Sudan is a case in point. It provided a valuable reaffirmation that the Comprehensive Peace Agreement is the solution to the Southern war, but gave little direction in dealing anew with Darfur. Rather, there has been a public washing of American laundry on whether or not genocide continues to be practiced.

I note with consternation that reports of U.S. shipments of munitions to pro-government forces in Somalia do not seem to accord with a posture of dialogue as the policy of choice in dealing with conflict.

Furthermore, I posit that AFRICOM is no help in these situations and should not be. Conflicts are political African issues that must be hammered out by Africans, certainly with support, encouragement, even mediation by outsiders, but without military intervention, especially from the United States.

Economic Growth. Renewed American focus on economic growth is welcome. Even though some of our numbers look good, the reality is that we ought to do much more and in a much more effective fashion. Sadly, we have viable assistance programs in less than half of the African nations. USAID needs reinvigoration and new direction. The myriad of U.S.G. activities need to be better coordinated. Impediments to agricultural trade need rethinking.

Global scourges – AIDS and malaria, climate change, food insecurity, narcotics, maritime insecurity and terrorism are all on the U.S. agenda. Several of these issues respond to money, where we have been very forthcoming, others require political, economic and security commitments that are not yet in sight.

In summary, Africa does matter to the United States. We have obligations, responsibilities and opportunities. Some are obviously directly in our self interest, others more altruistic in nature. However, we are all on this planet together and as it gets smaller and more densely populated, the dominoes fall faster and the butterfly effect registers sooner. What happens in Africa does impact on our well being in America. We need to be cognizant of that and to be proactive in assuring the best possible outcomes.

That is where you come in. As U.S. diplomats on the front lines in Africa or focusing on African issues in Washington you will have the task to formulate how the rubber meets the road, how we implement and sustain our policies and objectives. In short, how we make Africa matter to us and us to Africa.

Good luck.

The Meinertzhagen Mystery – The Life and Legend of a Colossal Fraud

2009-05-13T12:41:00.000-07:00

Review of an expose by Brian Garfield, Potomac Books, Washington, DC 2007.

In this exhaustively researched tome, author Garfield provides evidence that Richard Meinertzhagen, Kenyan colonial official, hunter, East African WWI intelligence chief, soldier, Zionist, spy, ornithologist, diarist and well connected British gentlemen, was a fraud. Indeed faced with the documentation and discussion, readers will probably conclude that Meinertzhagen (MINE-ert-ZAHG’n) faked many escapades for which he became famous. However, he did so successfully; he was even Ian Flemming’s model for agent 007, James Bond. The reality is that Meinertzhagen was a scoundrel, a man who ensured that he wrote his own press and who freely borrowed the accomplishments of others. Even so, he was also an engaging and entertaining companion (he often provided shock value in either words or purported deeds). He counted many distinguished and high placed personalities who were fellow members of Britain’s ruling aristocracy as friends and acquaintances.

Let’s look back at the record. Meinertzhagen’s embellishments began in Kenya. As a colonial official and a military officer, he claimed responsibilities – being in charge of this or that fort, for example, that never existed - or heroic accomplishments that were anything but heroic. His early reputation as a fearless warrior arose from a 1905 massacre of Nandi leaders, including the Laibon. Meinertzhagen recounted that in the midst of a round of peace talks, the Kenyans treacherously attached their interlocutors, especially Meinertzhagen. In turn the colonial officers responded and killed 23 of the Nandis. This account was supported by other Europeans present. However, careful investigation by Garfield indicated that Meinertzhagen’s story covered up the brutal massacre of the Nandi delegation by maxim guns as they arrived at the appointed site - even before they sat down to talk.

As East African theater intelligence chief during World War I, Meinertzhagen constantly took credit for operations not his own. He earned some legitimate credit for forcefully criticizing the inept British generalship, especially at Tanga, but there again he claimed to have exchanged pistol fire personally with German General von Lettow-Vorbeck – an event that never happened. Later on an undercover operation, he claimed to have murdered a German officer and eaten the dead man’s still warm dinner. Time and again in his diaries – that were substantially re-written by himself in later years – Meinertzhagen makes himself look good. (Meinertzhagen’s Kenya Diary: 1902-1906 was republished in 1983.) Author Garfield shows that there is never corroborating evidence in any official documents or others’ accounts of the same time periods.

Meinertzhagen’s greatest (fictitious) accomplishment occurred later in the war. When attached in a relatively junior position to General Allenby’s force in Palestine, Meinertzhagen took sole credit for the daring drop of a haversack filled with false documents for the Turks to find. The documents were intended to (and probably did ) mislead the enemy as to the true intentions of the British forces. While some sort of ruse like this apparently did occur, it was planned and executed by others – not Meinertzhagen; yet he claimed and received credit for the exploit for years.

Although other events were more sensational – including the death of his wife under mysterious circumstances and a missed opportunity to assassinate Hitler – Meinertzhagen, who was an accomplished ornithologist, went to great lengths to steal bird specimens from museums and to falsify accounts of their range in his own scholarly articles. The upshot is that he individually undermined much of the legitimate ornithology of the early 20th century.

Why did he do all this? Of course, no one knows. Apparently he was driven to polish his image so as to gain fame and respect. Nonetheless, Meinertzhagen gradually fell out of favor. Winston Churchill disowned him early on, but the cocoon of privilege protected Meinertzhagen through out his life and he was never really called to answer for the extent of his fabrications and frauds. At the end he was just deemed to be an odd eccentric.

The unraveling of the fictions took years. In sorting through them, author Garfield proved to be as tenacious in debunking them as Meinertzhagen had been in creating them. Consequently, the book is an interesting study showing that while history ought to be based on corroborated empirical data, it often isn’t.

A Guide to the Birds of East Africa

2009-05-13T12:34:00.000-07:00

Review of a novel by Nicholas Drayson; Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 2008

Although it sounds like a guide book, in reality this work is a novel. It is a delightfully chatty comedy of manners replete with keen insight into Nairobians of various hues. The chief protagonist is shy, retiring Mr. Malik who engages in a contest of bird watching with boisterous, obnoxious Mr. Harry Khan for the right to ask a certain lady, Rose Mbikwa, to the annual hunt ball. As the story unfolds all is not quite as it initially seemed, the characters become more complex and overlays of plot, some with sinister implications, intrude.

Those who know Kenya will find the setting accurately described. Most institutions and places are called by their correct names, but those that aren’t are easily identified from their pseudo names. With the exception of attributing the naming of Lake Victoria to Dr. Livingstone rather than John Hanning Speke, author Nicholas Drayson’s historical asides ring true, but some are obviously invented such as the reasons why Maasai wear red. The ornithological information, of which there is a lot regarding bird species and their whereabouts also appears authentic to this amateur birdwatcher, but with doubts that one could find a flamingo on Lake Victoria. Even so it was great fun to recognize names and descriptions as the chase ensued.

Even though the birds provided a mechanism to move the plot forward, it was really the commentary – pithy observations about the times or the characters that made the story interesting. Drayson certainly had a knack for encapsulating personalities and pinning down mannerisms and dialogue in a fashion that kept the reader entertained.

There are no weighty issues in this novel, but it is entertaining (and fairly short). It will certainly appeal to those who know Kenya and especially those who have tried to sort out some of its birds.

P.S. On several occasions the novel mentions favorably a training program for guides run by the Nairobi Museum. Indeed that program has produced a number of very competent (and pleasant) local guides. On a recent trip to Kenya, Steven at Ziwani Camp and Julius at Siana Springs, aptly led us to new birds, including the rare Magpie Shrike found only in Kenya near Siana.

Book review - Africa's World War

2009-02-28T09:42:00.000-08:00

A book review by Amb. Robert Gribbin

Africa’s World War – Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of a Continental Catastrophe

By Gérard Prunier, Oxford University Press, NY, 2009

African scholar Prunier’s latest, Africa’s World War, purports to be the definitive study of the conflict arising from the Rwandan genocide that ultimately spread into the Congo twice as open warfare. That conflict still continues today in the Kivu provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. By and large Prunier got the narrative correct. The war began in 1996 with covert operations by the Rwandan Patriotic Army designed to dismantle the refugee camps and squash the threat of genocidaire insurgency. Then, fighting expanded under the aegis of the Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération (AFDL) and its odd leader Laurent Kabila with participation by forces from Uganda, Burundi and Angola that culminated in the overthrow of Mobutu in 1997. New president Kabila then turned on his masters thus igniting a second round of nationwide strife that flowered into a contest pitting Kigali and Kampala, and their rebel proxies, against Kinshasa supported by Zimbabwe, Angola and Sudan. Respective control of territory split the nation for years while internal machinations amongst all the players led to divisions and sub-divisions according to various motives and interests. The 1999 Lusaka Peace Agreement paved the way for a return to normalcy – withdrawal of foreign forces, containment of militia, UN peacekeeping operations, internal Congolese dialogue and ultimately elections. All of which, in some fashion or other, occurred during the last ten years. But Congo today still suffers the effects of warfare. Skirmishing with Hutu genocidaire elements continues as does confrontation with various Mai Mai groups. Hundreds of thousands of persons remain displaced while perhaps millions have died, largely not from bullets, but from the collapse of social and economic infrastructure, i.e. medical services, farming, markets, transportation, schools, etc.

Prunier’s detailed recitation of events provides some insight into political personalities and the motives that he imputes to them. His grasp of the situation, however, is muted by the reality that many of his facts are simply wrong. In one section of the book Prunier ruminates about how African leaders successfully hoodwinked western governments and how easy that was given the indifference of such governments to the crisis. Yet he himself seems to accept every comment or observation by Africans (usually cited as confidential sources) as fundamental truth, whereas he discounts on the commentary either on the record or off from westerners as tainted spin.

My major squabble with Prunier’s “facts” has to do with his portrayal of American activities and motives. I was the U.S. ambassador in Kigali from 1996-1999 and can speak authoritatively (and I have in my book In the Aftermath of Genocide: The U.S. Role in Rwanda). Simply put, Prunier spins out, and thus perpetuates, a series of lies and misrepresentations. He seems drawn to the idea that the United States mounted a large covert military operation (using black misfits recruited by the CIA) to support Rwandan fighting in Congo in 1998 and 1999. Of course, Prunier apparently believes that I was complicit in, if not the author, of such black ops. Even so, he managed to misspell my name in the several citations in his book and footnotes.

Prunier cites as proof: the presence of black English speaking soldiers in Kivu, their base at a former Peace Corps site near Bukavu, two bodies of dead soldiers handed over to American officials in Uganda, and airdrops by USAF C-130s to re-supply rebel AFDL forces in Congo. All of this is pure fabrication. None of it occurred. Prunier also asserts that the small $3 million U.S. de-mining program in Rwanda was simply cover for supplying the RPA with military wherewithal for the war effort, and that dozens of U.S. Air Force flights carried in the goods. Again, fiction! Although a few military flights did land in Rwanda during my three year tenure, their cargoes were high level visitors, humanitarian goods and surplus items – a C5A for example brought lots of recycled computers, office equipment and medical supplies for civilian entities. As for the de-miners, they did what they were supposed to, i.e. de-mine. Similarly, Prunier joined other conclusion-jumpers in assuming that the small joint training exercises (less than a dozen US troops) conducted with Rwandan forces were aimed at preparing for or sustaining conflict in the Congo. To the contrary, that was not the objective and furthermore as soon as the Congo imbroglio began, to demonstrate our dismay we cancelled such activities as well as planning for a quite large package of non-lethal military communication and transportation items.

Among other assertions of American complicity in the Congo war was a statement that my deputy the late Peter Whaley met with Laurent Kabila “thirty or forty times.” Peter was indeed our initial channel for communicating with Kabila, with whom he met only about a dozen times. The purpose of such communication was to restrain the rebel war effort, not to advise on political or strategic tactics as Prunier implies. Prunier’s exaggeration, however, underlies his thesis that the United States, feeling guilty on account of inaction to halt the genocide, afterwards sided blindly with Rwanda both in that government’s internal transgressions, but especially in its invasion of Congo and the ouster of Mobutu, whom, Prunier says, we had finally gotten tired of. (I concede elements of truth regarding sympathy for the new regime in Kigali, as well as the belief that change was needed in the Congo, but orientation should not be confused with actions. We provided no substantive support for Rwanda, AFDL rebels or others engaged in conflict in the Congo. We constantly sought a halt to the fighting and indeed sought accountability for human rights abuses that occurred during the violence. ) In attributing and analyzing nefarious U.S. motives, Prunier offers little evidence other than “confidential sources” to buttress his opinion. On the one hand, he seems to fall unfortunately into the French academic camp that simply assumes that the U.S. is all-knowing, all-powerful and all-managing of events in Africa (for example, he states that Rwanda adhered to the Lusaka withdrawal agreement only because the new Bush administration cold-shouldered President Kagame); while on the other hand, Prunier attributes U.S. policy and missteps to indifference to the fate of the continent. He wants it both ways when it suits his argument.

In light of the grave transgressions of fact with regard to the United States, and those are the issues that I know the accurate side of, I cannot help but wonder how badly skewed Prunier’s other information is. He relates lots of juicy details of meetings, encounters, massacres, troop movements, etc. but are they accurate? One must doubt. In conclusion, this book could and should be an important contribution to the history of the Congo crisis in all its complexities. There is some good stuff in it and an excellent bibliography, but its fatal flaws require that “truth” always be annotated with an asterisk.

Watched

2009-02-28T09:34:00.000-08:00

A short story

The connection was scratchy, but the voice was clear, “I’ve been watching you, you know.”

“Yes,” I replied with more bravado than I felt. “I know. Should I be afraid?”

He chuckled, “No, don’t fear us. I needed to find out if I could trust you.”

“Trust me?” I queried. “You were on the verge of being arrested. Why does scaring me help you trust me.”

He laughed again. “I watch out for them even more than I watched you. Your movements, your contacts indicate that you are not one of them, or part of their apparatus. Even if you did not know it, they are not watching you, or listening. So now, we can safely meet.” He paused. “I am a democrat and a freedom fighter.”

This guy was careful I thought, much more than most dissidents I encountered in this dusty African capital on the southern fringe of the Sahara where I plied my trade as political officer at the U.S. embassy. The James Bond aspects of his approach were odd, but opposition figures did have much to be suspicious about. The reach of the president’s secret police was astonishing; and their tactics brutal. Critics of His Excellency disappeared into the jails, or more frequently these days before even getting to jail, with disturbing frequency.

“Okay,” I agreed, “but it will have to be my way.”

Two days later in the late afternoon I sat waiting at a small table on the terrace at the Golf Club. Because of the heat and the fact that the course was mostly windblown sand and dirt, the club did not attract many players. A few hard core drinkers, however, were well into their beers. A tall very black African approached. “It’s me,” he said, “Call me Jean Claude.”

I suggested a walk, so we strolled out the first fairway, found a bench and talked as the sun turned fiery red and sank into the Chari River. Jean Claude told me he represented southerners, the black Africans of the nation, who had been its educated class, its first administrators and provided the first president. In later years, all the progress and leadership provided by the south was swept away by desert warriors and their brutal rule. Now was the time Jean Claude asserted to reclaim their birth right. He acknowledged some southern participation in government. “Stooges,” he called them. But they too, he alleged could be brought into his movement. He sketched out a vision of political power based on mobilizing the southern majority to act as a coherent whole, break the stranglehold of the capital and assert regional autonomy. Once done, the south could strengthen its own institutions and evolve into its own independent state. He saw the process as one paralleling the evolution of southern Sudan, but without the need for a nasty war.

I heard him out and asked about the oil. His solution to that was revenue sharing. “All the president wants is money; money to buy arms and feather the nests of his cohorts. We will use the money to better the lives of our people.” Jean Claude closed with the pitch that I knew was coming. He wanted Americans to know of the struggle. He wanted our support – moral, if not material. Mostly he wanted assurances that we would restrain the government from using U.S. trained anti-terrorism forces or equipment against southern patriots. I said I took note of his ambitions and promised I would not betray his confidence, but that I could not promise either support or that the embassy could dictate how to employ the anti-terrorism troops. We agreed to stay in touch.

Jean Claude slipped out the gate of the golf club. I ordered and nursed a beer while thinking it over.

“Patron,” the club manager interrupted my thoughts, “please, don’t bring that man here again. It could go bad for me.”

“Why?” I responded.

“He’s a political ghost. He is the first president’s grandson.”

In following months the political temperature went up. Broadsides appeared vilifying the regime, editorials in the quasi-free press got tougher, new web sites appeared, especially one called action sud that blatantly called for southern autonomy. There was talk of tribal oathing, creating action cells, lots of agitation in southern towns. Southern politicians in the capital too began to adopt a more militant stance. Throughout I kept in regular contact with “Jean Claude;” mostly by phone, but and we met occasionally. He stayed out of the limelight, but seemed to be the motor of the movement. I heard that the security police were after him. I did note that anti-terrorism troops were deployed to two southern towns.

National legislative elections were approaching. They offered the opportunity for some success for southern power. I told Jean Claude of Stalin’s observation that it does not matter who votes, what matters is who counts the votes. He nodded grimly, but assured me that party poll watchers and international observers would be vigilant.

Lo and behold! The elections were okay. Southern power parties swept their home region and held a near majority in Parliament. Jean Claude’s first phase succeeded.

I tried to call to congratulate him, but could not get him on the line. After several days of futile efforts, finally, he called back. “I’m done,” he rasped wispily. “Finished.”

“No,” I rejoined, “Every thing is going well. Your plans are working. You cannot quit now.”

“No, my fate is death.” He coughed. “I have SIDA and the infection has spread. Victory is now up to others.”

A week later he died.

Too Close to the Sun

2009-02-03T12:42:00.000-08:00

A book review of

Too Close to the Sun – The life and times of Denys Finch Hatton

By Sara Wheeler, Random House, London 2007.

Several books have been written about the tempestuous relationship between Karen Blixen and Denys Finch Hatton, especially Baroness Blixen’s own account in her marvelous memoir Out of Africa. In her version Tania (Karen) provides her perspective and romanticizes the relationship of two differing souls who connect in great passion. Author Wheeler is much less ethereal and more practical in arriving at a more realistic appraisal of the relationship. Her assessment tracks a careful evaluation of Denys’ life from childhood, through school and university and then into the wider world beyond.

Finch Hatton was indeed endowed with a unique personality. He was affable, gregarious and intelligent – but not a scholar. He was well connected, rich, and extremely good company. Yet his defining characteristic, and perhaps his fatal flaw, was that everybody liked him. He never seemed to have alienated anyone; cuckolded husbands included. Because life – women, money, opportunities – came so easy to him, Denys did not really find purpose in life until his forties. And by then – unbeknownst to him – he was almost done.

Finch Hatton stumbled upon Kenya early in life and despite several efforts to change venue, it stuck. He invested in land and other businesses before finding his métier as a white hunter and conservationist. Certainly, twice serving as guide to the Prince of Wales, Denys was a celebrity in his own right. It was a spotlight he was often subjected to. By and large he handled it well. Relationships came and went, but with Tania, Denys struck something new – a deeper melding of souls, one that transcended into a spiritual plane. Yet the tragedy of such love was that it could not last.

Several aspects of this intriguing tale stuck me as especially meritorious. First, the author periodically pulled back from the story of Finch Hatton to reset the world stage. Indeed that stage changed dramatically prior to World War I as Britain experienced a social revolution that marked the demise of the landed aristocracy. World War I itself sealed the transformation of Finch Hatton’s world. Although he participated fully in the war effort; first in East Africa and then in Mesopotamia, Denys (obviously) survived, but virtually every male friend of his youth died in the conflict. What a staggering loss.

The book was well researched and is beautifully written. Although I pride myself on vocabulary, author Wheeler repeatedly came up with words: “prolepic,” “ashlar,” “cyclamen,” “lubricious” and more that I had to look up either for definition or for proper usage. I enjoyed that additional challenge.

Too Close to the Sun is a marvelous read. For aficionados of colonial Kenya, books don’t get any better than this.

Obama's Country

2009-01-17T08:59:00.000-08:00

Commentary by Bob Gribbin

Kenya is abuzz with Obama. Remember that Kenya declared a national holiday upon receiving news of his election. Obama’s picture is painted on matatus, tee shirts, coffee mugs, and printed on kangas worn by market women. Dozens of newborn babies are now named Obama. Maasai beadwork features his image as well as the stars and stripes from the “O” of campaign posters. Matatus bear the names “Obama Express,” “Fastest Obama.” Senator beers are ordered by asking for an “Obama.” Obama’s books are jumping off the shelves. Indeed on flights in and out, I saw a dozen Kenyans avidly reading his tomes. The airwaves resound to Obama songs. Even Obama numbers have been incorporated into the dance performances by Maasai morans at tourist lodges.

Kenyans see Barrack Obama as one of their own. Many claim him as a “Kenyan” on account of his father’s nationality. Others see him as an “American” with clear Kenyan antecedents. But all agree that he makes them proud; proud to be Kenyan and proud to see in him the realization of dreams; certainly his aspirations, but also theirs. “If Obama can rise to be president of the U.S., then I too can prosper.”

During a recent visit to Kenya, I engaged wanainchi in discussions of then-president elect Obama. Most were delighted to share their views. First, they were uniformly ecstatic for him; that he had made it. A black American elected president – and a Kenyan no less! How the world has changed and how perceptions of the U.S. as a country where racial tensions held back blacks had to be re-thought? It also reaffirmed faith in democracy. Change could come if the people want it.

Secondly, what did this mean for them? By his example Obama proved that dreams could come true – by hard work and application. This inspired everyone to hope that their lives could improve and that their children could aspire to greatness.

Thirdly, what did this mean for Kenya? Most interlocutors assumed that because of his Kenyan roots, ties with America would obviously improve. Already, they had. A wealth of good feelings prevails. Additional hopes ranged from much greater economic aid to a flood of American tourists anxious to see Obama’s rural ancestral home. Kenyans noted that President Kibaki has already promised to improve infrastructure in Nyanza to include better roads, new hotels and upgrading Kisumu airport to international status. One wise observer said that even if no American largess materialized, those sorts of improvements – especially an airport that would allow western Kenya to access world flower, fish and produce markets - would be valuable. Others asked frankly if I thought American tourists would flock to Nyanza. I answered diplomatically that Kenya was wise to market the Obama connection, but that the game parks would remain the tourist draw, with perhaps Nyanza as a side trip. In that regard it was essential that game park infrastructure, especially roads, were restored to a higher standard. (Note: game park roads in, and to and from the Mara are poor).

Several thoughtful discussants verged into the impact of the U.S. election on Kenyan politics. These Kenyans were chagrinned that the U.S. had a Luo president before Kenyan did, but went on to observe that a hard fought election followed by an honest accurate count was a powerful demonstration of democracy at work; especially of the incumbent old guard gracefully giving way to change. This lesson was not lost on Kenyans and would certainly be taken into account during the next election. One man told me that Obama’s election was popular because there were no local consequences. One did not have to look over one’s shoulder when offering political commentary about Obama, Bush or McCain. American politics offered a safe way to obliquely comment on Kenyan developments.

Finally, Kenyans struck a theme that with Obama’s election America’s image in the world would change. They expressed the hope that the U.S. would shed its role as a unilateral actor and instead seek greater cooperation and coordination with the nations of the planet.

In conclusion, Kenyans rejoice in Obama’s elections seeing in it the fruition of many hopes and the conviction that a better world awaits.

---------------------------

Even as Obamamania unrolls apace, Kenya in 2009 is ragged. Traffic is absolutely terrible in Nairobi and Mombasa so much so that many stores and businesses have abandoned the city centers. Everyone it seems has bought a car. Yet crowds mob the sidewalks. Work is underway to bring the last section of the Mombasa highway up to a respectable standard, but even then it will remain a two lane road complete with speed bumps in all the little settlements that have sprung up along the route. Hundreds of slow moving trucks vie for space with cars driving 80 mph or better. On account of traffic it takes 6 or 7 hours to drive the 300 miles. Other roads (Voi-Taveta, Narok-Mara, Nakuru-Mau Summit) have deteriorated into catastrophic rock beds.

Unemployment is high. Both Kenya’s internal political violence of 2008 and the world wide recession are taking a toll on the economy. Tourism has been especially hard hit. Thousands of employees have been laid off because foreign visitors just are not coming. We saw few overseas visitors at the coast where in high season it ought to have been jammed. Similarly for game lodges; they were only about a third full and many of those present were residents taking advantage of cheap rates. Nonetheless the policy both by government and the tourist industry to sock it to outsiders remained in full force. Overseas visitors pay $40 per day just to be in a game park. Lodge rates go at $250-$350 per person whereas residents get the same package for only $100.

To top it all off, last season’s short rains did not materialize thus continuing the longer term drought. Pastures are down to stubble and crops are withering in the fields.

Yet, lest I be too critical, Kenya’s strength resides in her people. They are warm, outgoing, hospitable, articulate and full of life. In spite of their difficulties, Kenyans retain an optimistic outlook. They assume that matters will improve, that the rains will come, that politics will untangle, that jobs will be found and that life will be okay.

Agathe's Obligation

2008-10-20T07:42:00.000-07:00

A short story

It was just after dawn, but the morning was already hot and dry. There would not be much sweating today, Agathe thought to herself, I’ll just bake in the oven. She adjusted her police cap on her short cropped curly hair, cut up to a flat top. She looked smart in uniform; a light blue shirt, dark skirt and sensible shoes. A MINURCAT arm band identified her as part of the United Nations peace keeping operation in Chad. Of medium height with a solid build, Agathe had already lost the svelteness of her girlhood, a time she remembered with fondness in the far away green hills of southern Rwanda.

Eastern Chad was a wind swept land, covered now after the rains with wispy grass. Scraggly trees dotted the plains up to the edges of the rocky hills. Agathe smiled as she looked out upon hundreds of acres of maturing millet planted by the refugees. Coming as she did from generations of farmers, she knew how gratifying it was to see food bursting from the land. A good harvest would provide a nutritional buffer above the World Food Program rations. Additionally, some earned cash would greatly improve morale and the fairly miserable quality of rural life.

Agathe was happily greeted by dozens of children as she walked through the refugee settlement. She picked up Arabic phrases, but some kids called out in French or even in English. The refugees here were Sudanese whose families and tribes had flowed easily across the nearby border until Janjaweed raiders destroyed their herds and homes causing them to seek succor in Chad and international protection. Protection was Agathe’s job. She was one of six Rwandans assigned to the peace keeping operation in Chad. She along with fifty other police personnel from African nations were scattered among the twenty or so refugee camps strung out along the dusty frontier. They were backed up by a 3,000 man military force.

Policing the camp was not so tough. It was not the urban, packed camp, seething with political and ethnic hatred that Agathe experienced as a teenager in Zaire. There was no sense of impending doom and no swaggering, often drunk, genocidaires to avoid. Yet there were issues – politics bubbled along. The evil government of Bashir and his Janaweed thugs were thoroughly despised. Internal politics manifested themselves in the quest for extra ration cards, prominence on camp committees and thus access to international aid or NGO jobs. There were police issues, too. Domestic violence and petty theft were the most common, but individual disputes too regularly needed refereeing. Although it was not as big an issue here, in the northern camps, efforts had to be made to keep Sudanese rebel groups from recruiting youngsters for their military operations.

Agathe’s duty was to be present at the health clinic, to assure that the several hundred refugees stayed in line (they almost always did) and waited their turn. Once she had calmed emotional agitation after a (natural) death and she had otherwise ensured other orderly funeral processions. The clinic was a good place to listen and Agathe was frequently approached with various complaints.

“Madame?” a young woman queried.

“Yes,” Agathe responded, “Good morning.”

The girl introduced herself as Fatima. She was slender, fine featured, dressed head to foot in the local style in an off-yellow wrap; her head carefully covered. She nervously gathered her courage and asked if they could have a private talk. Agathe assured her that confidences would be respected.

“My uncle,” Fatima said, “wants to take me for a wife and says he will force me if I do not agree. I am only seventeen. He said today was the day. He will come for me tonight. My father is dead, my brothers too young and my mother depends on the family. She cannot help me. I detest this man. Living with him would mean slavery and rape. Can you help me? Can you hide me?” She began to weep quietly.

Agathe felt the girl’s desperation, but as yet no crime had been committed. Local culture sanctioned arranged marriages that often had some element of coercion to them, especially between older men and younger women. “Tell me more about him,” she asked.

“Moussa,” Fatima replied, “serves on the camp committee. He is a big man here, but carefully hides his ties to the rebels. He compels youth to leave their families to join the rebel forces in the bush.”

“Ah ha, so he is a recruiter?”

“Yes, but he also demands money, a tax from camp residents to support the war. And now he wants me.”

Agathe mulled this over. As a policewoman she had learned not to be hasty. Fatima’s story rang true and Agathe knew from painful personal experience the power that men held in the camps. No one – policeman or woman, soldier, peace keeper or responsible adult - had been there to help her when she was savagely raped over several days by a genocidaire gang inside the refugee camp in Zaire. Rather than defeat her, that incident convinced her to be strong and ultimately to join the police. Perhaps this was her test. She concluded this abduction won’t happen in this camp on this day.

“We need a plan,” Agathe told Fatima. She asked for the location of her mother’s compound and the whereabouts of her uncle’s. They conspired. “Okay, then,” Agathe concluded, “we’ll be ready, do your part.” Agathe hurried away.

Darkness fell like clockwork. Several hours later a feeble moon shown down through the lingering haze casting a muted light on the sleeping camp. Movement and cries arose from Fatima’s compound arousing the neighbors. Shortly Moussa dragged the protesting girl through the fence into the pathway.

“Halt,” a voice rang out and four lights blazed into startled faces. “Police. Let the child go.”

Moussa explained that it was a family matter, an arranged marriage in fact. He insisted on his status as a member of the camp committee. When interview by Agathe’s police superiors, Fatima said she was being taken, she thought, as an unwilling recruit for rebel forces. She told of Moussa’s role in seizing other youths, said she was only seventeen and wanted to stay with her mother.

“Moussa,” the policeman concluded, “we’ve long had an eye out for you. You know recruiting is not allowed. The punishment for it is expulsion from the camp. You will go with us now and tomorrow will be conveyed to Sudan, never to return to this camp under threat of prison.”

Still sputtering his importance, Moussa was led away.

Agathe exchanged a knowing nod with Fatima, then followed her leader into the dark.

Book Review - A Thousand Hills

2008-10-17T03:51:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of A Thousand Hills : Rwanda’s Rebirth and the Man Who Dreamed It by Stephen Kinzer, published by John Wiley and Sons, Hoboken, NJ, 2008. I believe that I am well placed to comment on the book. I served as U.S. Ambassador to Rwanda from 1995 to 1999, knew President Kagame well and wrote a memoir, In the Aftermath of Genocide: The U.S. Role in Rwanda (iUniverse, 2005).

Author Stephen Kinzer, a journalist by profession, has written the latest book on Rwanda and one of the best studies ever of its enigmatic leader Paul Kagame. Kinzer uses Kagame’s life story as the structure for the book: flight from Rwanda as a small child, upbringing in Ugandan refugee camps, bitterness at being at “outsider,” signing on and rising to prominence in Uganda’s revolutionary army, plotting and executing an invasion of Rwanda, then taking over command of the Rwandan Patriotic Army and leading it to victory, halting the genocide and taking political power. Kinzer describes Kagame’s vision for a re-born, prosperous and hatred-free Rwanda and his dogged determination to pursue that goal. Finally, Kinzer notes that mostly due to his fierce will, Kagame’s vision is well on its way to achievement.

While sympathetic in tone, even sycophantic and apologetic at times, Kinzer did give space to Kagame’s critics and did show some of the great man’s warts. But overall, there is no hiding the fact that Kinzer admired Kagame’s military genius and his subsequent evolution into a substantive political leader and national president. Kinzer noted that without doubt, Rwanda’s post genocide success bears the unmistakable imprint of Paul Kagame.

The structure the book took was unusual. Kinzer used quoted transcripts of recent interviews with Kagame as commentary on historical events as they unfolded in the chronological narrative. That mechanism gave an interesting perspective – looking backwards – that helped explain occurrences, but also permitted revisionism. Hindsight is always clearer, especially as regards to motives. Perhaps because of that I have several qualms with the facts and the sequence of events as told in the book. I judge, for example that claims were overreaching to having devised a master strategy ahead of time for the first Zairian war leading to the removal of Mobutu. The evolution of conflict there was driven instead very much by the opportunities presented. No doubt Rwanda took good advantage of those opportunities, even in daring fashion, but the initial intervention was intended to empty the refugee camps, not to topple Mobutu. Secondly, I reject the notion that the USG informed any foreign intelligence services about Kagame’s departure from Ft. Leavenworth. I recall keeping his decision under wraps for several days. If someone put a lookout for him in Europe or Ethiopia, it was not the USG. American interests were best served by Kagame’s taking command of the RPF. Thirdly, I believe that the RPA/RPF leadership was quite collegial during its formative years and up to its first years in power. A committee of colonels did make many decisions collectively.

Back to the structure of the book, I found the juxtaposition of quotations to buttress the narrative disconcerting. There were no footnotes as such; instead there was an annex of page notes that did allow for some verification of who really said what, but often the citation was vague or from a “confidential conversation.” At least one (credited) exchange was lifted verbatim from my book and there appeared to be a lot of that in regard to other writings. A journalist’s technique, I suppose, as many news stories are structured in a similar fashion, i.e. report the story and use suitable quotations to prove it. But still, it did not strike me as the most credible way to get to the facts. I also thought that the final chapter invoking the high esteem of religiously motivated Americans for Kagame was pandering and under cut the more effective history presented earlier in the work.

My criticisms notwithstanding, A Thousand Hills does effectively tell the story of Rwanda, especially the story of Kagame and the Rwandan Patriotic Army. It is a gripping tale as the determination, perseverance and wisdom of the principal figures, chiefly Kagame himself, are carefully delineated. In short A Thousand Hills is a must read for those who want to better understand the complexities of Rwanda’s history and the basis for political and economic decisions being taken today. Finally, it has an excellent bibliography.

Eating Dirt

2008-10-09T08:14:00.000-07:00

A short story

“Look at this,” she chortled slapping the newspaper down before me. “They’re eating dirt and think it cures AIDS.”

Indeed the head line screamed in boldest type. “Miracle Cure in Masaka!”

Times in Uganda in the mid-eighties were desperate. AIDS or “slim” in the vernacular was cutting a terrible swath through the population. Recognition of the scourge and its cause – sexual promiscuity – was beginning to crawl out from under a rock. There was growing public exposure of the malady and some very frank talk by President Museveni and other officials about the need to change irrevocably sexual behavior. Yet a deep sense of shame afflicted those who contracted the killer. They hid away and died quietly. Obituaries always referred to the cause of death as a “short illness.” And in those days before retro-virals were available, the terminal illness was usually short.

I read through the news story quickly. An elderly woman in Masaka, about eighty miles south of the capital, was telling her neighbors that her daughter, who had become skinny, weak and ill – obvious signs of AIDS – had rallied when fed a concoction of clay from her back yard. The old lady claimed traditional medical prowess and told the paper that she had used herbs and potions, including clay, for years to treat maladies. This remedy, this miracle, the paper asserted, could reverse the tide of death. It added that supplicants were beating a path to Masaka in search of the cure.

Normally, I would have joined in the chortle and recognized that sensationalism was a standard tactic to sell more papers, but I had recently lost another friend to AIDS. I saw the story more as a reflection of the desperation we all faced as this uncountable evil swept through the land. The stories of those lost were legion. As an expatriate I had no Ugandan relatives, but friends and their families were sorely afflicted. An outdoorsman, I had joined the Mountain Club of Uganda, whose members were a nice mix of foreigners and young Ugandans; all of us rock climbers and hikers. Outings included weekend trips to nearby granite outcroppings or a hike in the countryside. We mounted an annual ten-day expedition to the Ruwenzori’s and shorter trips to summit Uganda’s lesser mountains Our Ugandan colleagues were Ugandan yuppies – students and recent graduates of Makerere University. They included several medical students and others who by dint of their brains and perseverance were destined to be the next elite generation. Yet one by one our Ugandan colleagues were dying. There was nothing to chortle about.

I called Paul later in the day to ask his view of the Masaka cure. Endowed with an irrepressibly gregarious personality, he’d always been a straight shooter, although often embellishing his remarks with a twist of humor or a touch of irony. “Sure,” he said, “maybe she’s found it. An answer has to be somewhere. So far, clay from Masaka looks as good as anything from American laboratories. But,” he suggested, “let’s not guess, let’s go check it out.”

Why not, I thought. I ran the idea past the ambassador. He thought it was nuts, but told me to go if I wanted.

We set off the next morning. It was a beautiful clear day with clouds building up over the Lake. The road wove through banana plantations and small farms, and then straightened out crossing wide plains as it neared the expanses of Lake Victoria. Paul pointed out the bridges and culverts that had been battlegrounds when Museveni’s irregulars captured the capital several years earlier. Only one rusted hulk of a tank gave evidence of that struggle. Evidence of the new struggle, however, was ever present. Coffin making – and road side display of wares – was a growth industry.

Paul asked directions in Masaka. Shortly dozens of parked cars and a crowd of folks indicated we had come to the now famous shrine. It had turned into a commercial operation. For a couple of hundred shillings one could dig a basket full of backyard clay. Another couple of hundred shillings bought a consultation on the proper mixtures and dosage. The carnival air notwithstanding, there was an ardent sense of expectation. The intensity reminded me of religious pilgrims, for example, at Lourdes. Indeed it was a pilgrimage. I spoke hesitantly to several persons. Paul interpreted into Luganda as necessary. “This is our only hope.” “I believe God has blessed this place.” “My son is dying, this will save him.”

“Why not,” Paul said as he too scooped up a supply. “African magic does work. The Bible teaches that Jesus made miracles, and,” he concluded, “the worst might be clogged bowels.”

We talked a lot about faith, magic and hope on the way home. My western science told me it was all hokum, but I had undoubtedly seen a tremendous display of conviction by those in the old lady’s yard. I conceded that it was a slim straw to grasp, but what if there was some undiscovered mineral with medical properties?

Later I bounced the topic off Dr. Laura Hodge, an American epidemiologist striving to discover the true nature of the virus and how it took hold. She agreed that some old wives tales were based on solid science, but dismissed the clay as “Wishful thinking. It might improve a person’s will to live, but is essentially without medicinal merit.”

After several days on the front page, the story ran its course. A month or so later, I heard that the old lady’s daughter died after a “short illness.”

Yet hope remained an irrepressible part of an Ugandan day. Even in light of such tragedy, people pressed on, put on their best face and went out each day with a smile.

Book Review - A Farm Called Kishinev

2008-10-09T08:08:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of A Farm Called Kishinev by Majorie Oludhe Macgoye. It was published by East African Educational Publishers, Nairobi, 2005.

Although presented in novel form, this book carefully recounts the efforts around the turn of the last century of the Zionist movement and the Imperial British government to create a Jewish settlement in what is today Kenya. The area in question was Uasin Gishu, the region surrounding Eldoret. At the time when the suggestion was under consideration, the Uasin Gishu plateau was deemed to be empty of African inhabitants and thus available for European settlement.

Arthur Marjore Macgoye, a muzungu who married into Kenya, did a superb job of research. She presents the facts, machinations and considerations - sometimes in excruciating detail - of those pushing or considering an East African option to Palestine. A commission was sent to the area, but despite its luke-warm endorsement, African was not chosen. Palestine remained the priority. As history shows there was no massive movement of European Jewry to Kenya.

From there the novel elaborates beyond the facts. Some Jews jumped a Zionist endorsement and immigrated. Their lives – arrival in Mombasa, travel to Londiani by rail, onward by ox cart, staking out a farm, becoming farmers, relations with nearby Nandi tribesmen and Boer farmers, the growth of Eldoret, and the internal challenges of remaining Jewish in a predominantly non-Jewish society – are the gist of the story. The trials and tribulations are recounted through the eyes of Benjamin, grandson of Isaac, the initial pioneer. By Benjamin’s time, Jewish families had truly become part of Kenya. This assimilation provides the opportunity for commentary on contemporary Kenyan society.

However, there is more. A second part of the book is a manuscript purportedly written by Isaac just before his death in 1943 and then finished by Benjamin that conjectures what Uasin Gishu would have been like if a Jewish homeland had been established in the region in 1898. The conjectures are an interesting bit of speculation.

A Farm Called Kishinev required dodged concentration because the narrative wandered around. Many details of the intricacies of Jewish culture escaped me, but I thought the Kenyan aspects to be accurate. This novel will appeal to those interested in Kenya’s history and in particular the role that the Jewish community played or might have played in Kenya’s development.

Rabbits

2008-09-22T05:36:00.000-07:00

A short story.

“Patron,” the day guard was at the door. “Patron, the lady from next door, la Chinoise, is here to see you. Mogi killed her rabbits.”

That’s how it began. The Chinese lady, best known to the town as the “Chinese concubine” occupied the river front house just next door. The story was that she had been a gift from the government of Taiwan to the mercurial despot who ruled this small African nation. He was reputed to be ladies man of great sexual appetite who was genuinely touched by Taiwan’s gesture. By my time, however, la Chinoise was apparently largely ignored by His Excellency. She tended her garden and. kept a hutch of rabbits. I had waved or nodded to her from my yard from time to time, but she never acknowledged a greeting.

But there she was, standing on my stoop shifting nervously from foot to foot. Behind her was a soldier, one of her gate guards, his AK-47 dangled carelessly from one shoulder. He raised a bloody rabbit for my inspection.

My first thought was that the dog was still loose. Saying, “Wait, I must get the dog,” I rushed around the corner of the house where I found Mogi cowering by the back steps. He had blood on his muzzle, but appeared to have sustained a head wound that was also bleeding. Probably not from a rabbit, I thought. I hooked his rope and with him secured, hurried back to the front door.

I invited Madame in. With a wave, she dismissed the soldier and tip-toed in. I settled her on the sofa. She was a small woman, attractive with small facial features and very concise movements. Although I am not a good judge of women’s ages, especially Orientals, she was older than me. I guessed mid-thirties. I apologized profusely for my dog’s actions. I promised to set matters right, fix the fence and ensure that he was always properly confined. I regretted that children on their way down to the river frequently teased the dog by banging on the fence, but I pledged that he was not truly mechant.

“Monsieur,” she replied, “You must help me.”

“Yes,” I rejoined, “I will make restitution. I‘ll pay for your losses. We can find some new rabbits.”

“Naturally,” she responded, “but you must help me go to America. I cannot stand this awful place, my house is a prison, and that man,” she whispered, “he ignores me, then beats and humiliates me.” She began to cry.

Whoa, what’s up here! If I thought that my dog’s killing the president’s girl friend’s rabbits would get Mogi executed or me tossed out of the country, entertaining this woman’s dreams of flight would be much more dangerous. But, intrigued I wanted to hear her story.

It came out in bits and pieces. Her name was Lin. She was from a poor family in Taipei. Her father was a tailor. Unable to stay in school, she became a shop girl, but one who loved to party. From time to time, she admitted having escorted rich, lonely businessmen. One day, one of those men, a prominent government official, offered her a tidy sum to go with him to Africa. He promised a good trip and lots of fun times. She agreed. Next thing she knew, she was in this humid backwater being introduced to a big black man. Told that she must stay with him, her Taiwanese patron left. Although she did not know the language, it was clear what was expected of her. “What else could I do,” she sobbed.

Lin recounted life at the presidential palace. At first she was a favorite, showered with presents and granted deference. She learned a bit of French. Matters soon changed. Another girl came and she was shunted aside, first in the palace, and then sent to the river house. She was still summoned to service the president from time to time. She said she once asked for her freedom, but he demurred, got angry and beat her, threatening, “You belong to me alone. You can never leave. I will kill you first.” And he nearly did. With no passport, no money, no friends and twenty-four hour guards, Lin explained she had no opportunity to escape. “But I have a sister in Chicago,” she hoped. “She will take me in.”

After this exchange I sent her home. I told her I would have to check with my ambassador. Meanwhile, she should send me her sister’s name and address. An envelope with that information was slipped through the fence that same night. Taped to the corner was a rough diamond, a potential gemstone of perhaps three carats

Objectively, she was a trafficked person and a victim of continued abuse. On the other hand moral turpitude seemed applicable. She all but admitted to being a prostitute. What to do? Her sister checked out. She was real, married to a marine, and ready to welcome and sponsor her sibling. The diamond would pay the way. Washington too liked the case, the rescue of a victim of sexual trafficking. The ambassador wasn’t so sure. He saw the downside of the president’s ire, should his prized Chinese trophy be spirited away. There was a downside for me too, should she leave, I would probably be fingered as her accomplice; expulsion loomed or worse given the unpredictable violent nature of the president and his thugs.

Finally, it was decided. We’d give her a refugee visa. It was up to me to figure how to get her out. I tossed it around with the clandestine guys. Clearly an exit strategy through the airport was out. That left road or river, both were viable, but road meant at least two days still in country. River was a thirty minute exit, but then a thousand miles to an international airport. Even though the woman had no intelligence value, the chief of station was intrigued; mostly it seemed by the sheer challenge of it. So, that is how it went down – a night pirogue to Zaire, missionary flight to Kisangani, connection to Kinshasa and on to New York.

Toting a box of rabbits, I carried the plan to Lin. She was scared, but readily agreed. I bid her good bye on the banks of the Oubangui one overcast night. She apologized for opening the fence, temping Mogi with a dead rabbit and cutting him. “It was my only way out.”

Book Review - Chief of Station, Congo

2008-09-09T02:35:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of Larry Devlin's memoir entitled Chief of Station, Congo, published by Public Affairs, NY, 2007.

For all Americans overseas who have been wrongly accused of being CIA agents, and who often wondered just what a CIA agent might do, this book provides the answer. It is a tell-all memoir by Larry Devlin, head of CIA operations in the Congo in the early 1960s.

Devlin unashamedly blows his own horn in recounting narrow escapes from drunken soldiers, armed burglars and blowhard ideologues. Perhaps some of these stories aren’t too embellished as the Congo was, in its early independent days, truly a wild and wooly place. Yet the heart of the memoir is a serious defense of – and an attempt to explain to contemporary readers – America’s cold war motivations, i.e. our conviction that Africa in general and the Congo in particular risked sliding irrevocably into the embrace of the Soviet Union. Such an eventuality would threaten the United States by loss of access to the Congo’s mineral wealth, including uranium, but more importantly would strengthen the Soviet Union’s standing world wide. Consequently if the Soviets rose, the U.S. would fall. Even though archaic by current standards and a bit foolish in hindsight, Devlin does accurately portray the intensity that policy makers – including presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy and CIA chief Dulles – felt about the global contest with Khrushchev.

With that as a backdrop, Devlin immerses the reader in the minutia of Congolese politics: President Kasavubu, his squabbles with enigmatic Patrice Lumumba, the danger posed by Katangan secessionist Tshombe, and the behind the scenes role of the Binza group, especially that of Joseph Desire Mobutu. Their machinations played out against a nation in turmoil unprepared for independence where a UN peacekeeping force was a recalcitrant western presence. Devlin used the power, i.e. money, of his position to recruit a number of influential agents. In retrospect this was not difficult as his agents - of course, names are fudged - shared the U.S. objective of keeping Lumumba and fellow “communists” out of power; plus the added benefit of putting themselves in. Devlin recounts how he and the ambassadors he reported to used their entrè and contacts to influence developments.

Devlin takes pains to note that he deliberately stonewalled an instruction to assassinate Lumumba, instead believing that isolating him politically was sufficiently effective. Secondly, he denied any role in planning or abetting Mobutu’s 1965 coup d’etat, even though he readily admitted using his relationship with Mobutu afterwards to forward U.S. goals.

This memoir is an interesting read, especially for those aficionados of Congolese history or of clandestine operations.

Where is Africa Going?

2008-09-03T02:33:00.000-07:00

Opinion by Robert E. Gribbin

I get asked this question a lot. My usual response is that some parts of Africa are doing quite well. They are vaguely democratic, politically stable, socially at peace and making satisfactory economic progress. A number of wars have ended in recent years. However, at the other end of the spectrum stands Zimbabwe, which is going to hell in a hand basket. Sudan is mired in never ending conflict; ditto for Somalia and the Congo. Yet that thumb nail sketch does not do justice to the successes and failures on the continent. This piece probably won’t either, but it is intended to provoke thought about the current situation, what might transpire in the next five years or so, and what the U.S. could be doing about it.

Overall

In looking critically at the last decade, one must conclude that Africa is better off. There is less conflict, more democratic governments and more wide-spread economic growth. More kids are in school, roads have improved, there is better water and sanitation, communications have evolved, for example independent FM radio stations cell phones are everywhere. The continental economic growth rate exceeded five percent in 2007 and is above six percent in 2008. Economies are better managed, private sectors freer and trade more widespread. African nations as a group are taking more responsibility for the continent, both in terms of regional security – peace keeping forces in Sudan, Somalia and Ivory Coast are African - and in terms of economic and social progress encompassed in the Millennium Development Goals to which they have subscribed. A few nations like Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, Namibia, Botswana, Mauritius, Mali and Rwanda have made dramatic economic progress and many others now have economic growth exceeding population growth.

American Interests

At the outset, let’s enumerate American priorities so we can keep them in mind as we dissect the issues. First, we recognize that it is not our sole responsibility to “rescue” Africa from its ills, but we do have an obligation to help. Furthermore we have interests in Africa that we want to protect

I would sum up our interests as follows:
-- access to oil (Africa currently supplies about 20 percent of our imports. This should rise to over 25 % within five years.)
-- containment of international blights – terrorism, drugs, trafficking in persons, illegal migration, AIDS, malaria.
-- reduction of conflict (Africa currently has four active wars – Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia/Eritrea, and Congo. Plus hot spots in Chad, CAR, Ivory Coast, Uganda and Zimbabwe.)
-- humanitarian aid to the vulnerable (usually victims of conflict, natural disaster or pervasive poverty).
-- trade and investment opportunities (American know-how and capital ought to be competitive).
-- African support in international fora (In UN institutions, Africa often holds the swing votes, but casts them in unhelpful ways).

Global Issues

First global issues hit Africa hard. Climate change that results in unpredictable weather, especially drought, generates enormous problems for the several dozen nations of the Sahael, southern and eastern Africa that fall into the crescent of dryness that circles the center of Africa. With poor rains food production becomes more seasonally precarious. Obvious life for a hundred million subsistence farmers becomes more uncertain as well. Some will starve. Many will be less well nourished. Since the west is committed to helping to alleviate food deficits, the west will be expected to pony up hundreds of millions more tons of food – and that when our production costs are sky rocketing. One bright spot in the nutritional picture is the innovation of a peanut butter condensed milk concoction, which when fed to malnourished children turns them into healthy active youngsters within weeks.

Climate change will exacerbate the existing tendency for urban migration. Millions more people will move to towns and cities seeking alternatives to hard scrabble farms. Pastoralists too will move with their animals into areas erstwhile inhabited by farmers thus exacerbating conflict over land and water. Such tensions already under pin the Darfur crisis and have been felt across the Sahael for decades.

Water is a key resource in Africa; not only in the dry lands but elsewhere when used for irrigation, hydropower and most importantly for better health. Improved management of water and the provision of potable water is the essential environmental/health issue for the continent.

Sustained high fuel costs could cripple the modern sectors of Africa’s economy. These are the sectors that market cash crops, organize small to medium businesses and create jobs. They are, in fact, the sectors where broad national economic growth occurs, but instead of turning a profit, entrepreneurs risk finding themselves looking at deficits. For example, many bus and truck companies will fail and among other victims will be the burgeoning number of private airlines.

National treasuries will run up extra debt. Normally they have to foot the bills for regular governmental operations, but since most are overcommitted to existing bare bones operations, higher costs will result in increased debt. Thus in five to ten years, the world community will certainly need to re-engage in another round of massive debt relief for Africa. Meanwhile, any excess capacity in national budgets that might have been used for economic development will simply have disappeared along with the anticipated projects. Government generated growth will stall.

Yet there are always silver linings and unintended consequences. Higher fuel costs will have marginally less impact on subsistence farmers, so life at the bottom of the pyramid won’t get much worse. Similarly, higher fuel costs should slow the (often illegal) exploitation of timber along the western coast and in the Congo basin. Higher oil costs are speeding up development of more effective solar and wind energy alternatives. Since all of Africa is blessed with sunshine and wind in abundance, improved technology will have positive consequences.

On the other hand oil producing nations will accrue windfall profits. While all this black ink will look good from afar, few of these nations have done credible jobs in using wealth for the benefit of their citizens. Even though with greatly enhanced revenues there will probably be a better stream of government resources trickling down, the scope of corruption these societies are likely to experience boggles the mind.

A Little List

Let’s look at several countries and speculate how they might fare in coming years.

West Africa

First, Liberia. The reality is that Liberia has surprisingly emerged from several decades of strife. At the moment it has an effective president in Ellen Sirleaf Johnson as well as the attention and support of the donor community. Liberians are breathing sighs of relief, but their nation remains on life support. Should either of the supporting pillars be knocked away, the slide back to degradation and violence will be quick. Part of the solution in Liberia (as is true for all nations of the continent) lies in institutional development. The nation needs a viable constitution, a functioning judicial system and an effective police force. It does not need more warlords, or even much of an army (which in some fashion or another caused most past woes). It needs a better educated public (much of Liberia’s human capital remains in exile), better health systems, improved roads, a resurgence of rubber planting and effective exploitation of iron and timber. For the time being the U.S. is invested heavily in Liberia’s future, but should Liberia’s leadership change or progress deteriorate, American commitment might well waiver.

Ghana earns strong economic and political marks for achievements of the past two decades. It seems to have a broad based viable economic and political system, but Ghana’s trading economy will be hard hit by higher fuel prices. Because much of the stability is due to the effective stewardship of President John Kufor, the test for Ghana will be a successful transition to the next generation of leaders.

Sahaelean nations – Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger – have done surprisingly well over the past several decades. They were most impacted by the terrible droughts and famines of the seventies and eighties and yet have survived and thrived. So perhaps, my consternation about climate change is overstated. For the most part – except for uranium in Niger – these are agriculturally based economies where issues of arable land and water/rain availability are crucial.

Nigeria is Africa’s largest, most populous, richest and most politically complex country. Money has made all the difference. Nigeria is a vibrant energetic place where schemes legal and illegal are the staff of daily life. Once a major food producer, Nigeria now uses its oil wealth to import food. That sort of describes how the economy has shifted away from self sufficiency to living off the fat of black gold. Nigerians’ sense of entitlement is strong. Direct oil related business is good, indirect oil financed business – banking, real estate, trading goods – is also good. Finally, all government revenues both at the federal and state level are oil generated and very good for whoever has the political clout to access them. Oil is both a blessing and a curse. Unfortunately the blessing has not been well used; in particular little economic or social development has occurred in oil producing states. This has engendered ongoing anti-government, anti-oil company violence that shows no signs of dissipating. Lagos, probably Africa’s largest urban melting pot seethes with poverty and crime, some of the latter now tied to international drug trafficking. Even in the northern regions that once benefited from southern wealth, factories lie abandoned on account of the collapse of the national electrical grid and rail system. Many ask where did the money go?

Naturally oil under pins politics where religion and tribalism also count. Heretofore, Nigeria has shifted the presidency (both via election and coup d’etat) between Yorubaland in the west and the Islamic north. Iboland in the east had its one unsuccessful president in the beginning, but since the mid-sixties civil war has been excluded from national sweepstakes. Current chief of state Yar’Adua came to power via a fraudulent election in 2007, but once ensconced in power has proven to be fairly effective. Should he not live out his term(s), it is unlikely that ineffective Vice President Goodluck Johnson would be permitted to succeed him. A military takeover, pending election (probably fraudulent) of another northern president would be likely. Meanwhile, economic chaos in overdrive will keep Nigeria from reaching its potential.

Conflict in Central Africa

Chad located smack dab in the center of the continent is the meeting place for every woe. Its history of civil strife pits southerners against northerners, blacks versus Arabs, pastoralists versus farmers, tribe against tribe and even internal violence within tribes. Zaghawa chief of state Idress Deby rode Sudanese support and French acquiescence to power ten years ago. Failing in health, he is now pressed from all sides: his Zaghawa brothers believe he has not sufficiently supported the Zaghawa component of the neighboring Darfurian rebels, the government of Sudan who believes he is supporting them, indigenous Arab tribesmen who want their turn at the trough, majority southerners who want the newly found oil resources from the south used in the south. All this against the back drop of spreading drought and the presence of over half a million Sudanese refugees. Meanwhile Qaddafi continues to meddle, but the French monitor and step in from time to time to preserve the status quo. Could it get worse? Yes, and it probably will as Dafurian issues will continue to overflow and will compound and complicate this troubled hot spot.

Is there hope for the Sudan? Only cockeyed optimists see matters falling into place. This will require full observance of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the southern peace treaty that provides for power sharing between the north and south. Secondly, provisions regarding the future of the oil province of Abyei must be adhered to (this means letting the province join the south); third, separation of the south (that will undoubtedly be chosen by southern voters via referendum scheduled for 2011) must be permitted. Fourth, the government in Khartoum must begin to deal responsibly with Darfurian rebels and the international community. Finally, the onus is also on Darfurian rebel leaders to forego internal bickering, posturing and war lording and truly seek peace – a stance that they have thus far eschewed. Achievement of this rosy scenario probably means a change of regime in Khartoum. The problem there is that the current leadership of hard liners is well dug in. There will be no democratic evolution and any sort of a palace coup would just be a change of faces.

The prognosis for Sudan is bleak, but the looming separation of the south is key. Should that happen with only a little violence, rather than a return to full scale warfare, then the Sudan will probably begin a breakup into component parts – an independent south, an autonomous west and a rump state in Khartoum. Because the Bashir regime in Khartoum has much to lose when/if the nation divides, it will be predictably violent and very dangerous vis a vis its opponents, both internal and external, i.e. those nations, including the U.S., that are pressing for evolution.

Change, but not dramatic change will come to several central African states. Long term Presidents Bongo of Gabon and Biya of Cameroon will pass on, but the leadership of each nation is likely to find suitable replacements. Tiny Equatorial Guinea that sits on an enormous pool of oil will create dozens of billionaires (from the President’s family) but violent repression that is the hallmark of politics there will not change. Finally, the Central African Republic will remain politically unstable and economically deprived no matter who comes to power.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is currently hailed by some as a success story, a nation that is retreating from the abyss of total chaos. True, with UN help the Congolese government of Joseph Kabila achieved elected legitimacy. Plus, a new constitution decentralizing government was adopted and relative peace prevails throughout much of the land. The Kivu provinces in the east, however, remain quagmires of violence, mistrust and tribal antagonisms. More than half a million citizens are internally displaced and even then threatened daily by a mish mash of a genocidaires, Mai Mai, vigilante forces and Tutsi militias – not to mention the newly reconstituted national army. To the extent the east is being held together it is by virtue of the UN peacekeeping operation. Elsewhere in this vast nation, the writ of government rarely writes. Education and health systems are rudimentary, there are few roads and no functioning judicial systems. As in years past, corruption remains the motor of politics and business. Exploitation of natural resources – diamonds, copper, cobalt, coltan, rubber, timber – continues apace. The faces of the exploiters have changed over the years from white to black, and now include Rwandans, Ugandans and Zimbabweans, but their disrespect for legal convention remains steadfast.

I suspect a more viable peace will gradually emerge in the Kivus. As that occurs, external attention to the Congo will again wane and the nation will be left to struggle with its overwhelming problems. The devolution of authority to the provinces holds some hope for more accountable government locally, but the success of this venture has yet to be registered. So far, regional parliaments have just brought the practice of corruption closer to home. Without the UN’s money, expertise and MONUC’s (the UN Peacekeeping Force) transportation assets, Congo is not likely have another “free and fair” election.

East Africa Rebounding

In the fourteen years since genocide, Rwanda has rebounded nicely. Today the nation enjoys peace, social stability, ostensible democracy and growing economic prosperity. Given where it has been, Rwanda is indeed a success. Yet, issues remain. It is still a very poor overcrowded nation with no land to spare for younger generations. These folks will have to be absorbed into the economy in ways other than subsistence farming. More unsettling is the fact that political power rests in the hands of a small oligarchy that has foregone opportunities to widen the participatory envelope. Instead they have closed it. Even though this group headed by President Paul Kagame certainly means well and is operating with the nation’s best interests in mind, the fact remains that it is a minority, albeit with the veneer of majority endorsement. That being said, although hard hit by higher fuel prices (Rwanda is the only African state two borders from the sea) Rwanda will do well over the medium term. Over the longer term, however, some mechanisms to foster greater political inclusion and to permit wider latitude for dissent will need to be devised in order to keep the nation on a positive path.

Despite all its woes, neighboring Burundi appears to have found that path. The end of civil war brought multi-party, multi-ethnic democracy to Burundi in 2005. This was a true social revolution as power realistically transferred to the majority Hutu group, but with protections and inclusions for the Tutsi minority. While welcoming this dramatic change, the international community has paid mostly lip service to it. Hoped for support has not materialized. The peace divided has been low. For the most part Burundi is being left to forge its own way. So far, Burundians are doing well. One note for the future is that as was the case in Congo and Liberia, Burundi’s last election was conducted with considerable assistance from the UN. Such help is not likely to be available in the future.

Other nations in East Africa have been doing their own elections for a while. Tanzania has the best record in having changed presidents now three times. Enlightened policies have revived its once moribund economy as well.

Kenya’s 2008 elections were properly done. Challenger Odinga probably won, but a cadre around the loser, President Kibaki, hijacked the results. The resulting crisis tore the tribal fabric of Kenya asunder. Days of violence resulted in hundreds dead and tens of thousands chased from their homes. Civil war loomed. Fortunately, heads were knocked together and a compromise cobbled out of the debacle. In a decidedly African manner, the protagonists joined together in a unity government. Political squabbling returned to the halls of Parliament and the cabinet room rather than being fought out in the streets. This boded well for resumption of economic activity. Kenya will adhere to this compromise political structure with two big men on top – President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga - pending a revised constitution that implants an independent neutral electoral commission. During the next scheduled election Kenyans and the world will insist that shenanigans be absent.

Uganda under President Yoweri Museveni’s leadership since 1986 achieved status as a dynamic, forward looking, and progressive nation. However, as he has gotten older Museveni has become inflexible, especially with regard to the termination of his stewardship, but his time will come. Uganda has matured from the bloodletting and divisive politics of the Obote and Amin eras and is poised to make a transition from Museveni to an elected successor. This risks being a noisy, even nasty process, but should occur in accordance with the constitution.

Southern Africa Imbroglios

Further south in Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe has proven himself incapable of seeing that his time has come and gone. Now nothing more than a vindictive irascible old man, Mugabe’s cling to power is both his choice and that ordained by a vicious set of thugs determined to keep ZANU-FP on top - and their fortunes with it. Consequences for the people of Zimbabwe be damned. And they are damned, damned to needless poverty and hardship in a land that once flowed with prosperity. It could again, but will now await God’s decision on Mugabe’s earthly tenure. Sadly, a military coup will most likely follow bringing more of the same misery.

South Africa lays claim to predominance in southern Africa and rightly so. Compared to other states it is an economic giant. South Africa’s economic might will continue. It’s economy is diverse and as some sectors flourish – mining for example – others commercial farming for example, might stagnate, but a balance will ensue.

President Mbeki has been reluctant to use South Africa’s political prominence in positive ways. He has not demonstrated leadership in confronting Mugabe – despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of Zimbabweans illegally migrated to South Africa to escape hopelessness at home. Mbeki’s rejection of universally accepted truths about how AIDS spreads caused consternation about his reasoning abilities. Although claiming a mantle of liberation and thus new approaches to problems, in international institutions South Africa rarely deviates from tired third world formulas dating from the cold war era designed to thwart and antagonize rather than to solve problems. Thus, the west does not find South Africa and the African states it influences reasonable interlocutors on the issues of the day ranging from human rights to nuclear proliferation.

Mbeki will pass the baton to the next ANC president, Jacob Zuma in 2009. Zuma is a bit more modern, but it remains to be seen if he has the moxie to be a real regional leader. Observers more attuned to internal South African issues than I judge that keeping the multi-racial/tribal political and economic coalition intact will become increasingly difficult in future years. The consensus that fostered post-apartheid South Africa is fraying as under pressures from all sides. The honeymoon is definitely over and harder, more divisive issues – sharing wealth, land tenure, job creation, tribalism, immigrants, government intrusion into business, etc. – will be the grist of politics in years to come.

Always Trouble in the Horn

The Horn of Africa will for the foreseeable future remain mired in problems of its own making. The stalemated war between Eritrea and Ethiopia will go nowhere because the two bull headed chiefs of state have too much of their personal egos on the line. This has consequences, especially for Eritrea because this small state has never really had the time to grow into its own. Now its populace adheres to a war footing where hardship will not abate.

In Ethiopia Prime Minister Meles has become increasingly autocratic and rules from an even narrower base of minority Tigrean support. The cost of war and antipathy of the majority of Amharic citizens conspire to keep economic growth low and a wave of out migration strong. Meles has seized opportunities - to wit the invasion of Somalia - to burnish his standing with the United States. For the time being that strong anti-terrorism stance has deflected anti-democracy criticism, but Ethiopia’s deteriorating record bears careful scrutiny.

Somalia will make little or no progress during coming years. Ethiopian forces will leave, but inept Ugandan and Burundian troops that under African Union command don’t have a fighting mandate won’t be able to enforce peace. Insecurity will continue. Somalis, however, operate with long time frames and over time indigenous structures, such as negotiations among clan elders, will help restore some semblance of daily order. Nonetheless, a functioning national state is unlikely to emerge.

In addition to the progressive states noted earlier, Cape Verde, Benin, Mozambique and Madagascar are also doing well. At the opposite extreme; Guinea Bissau, the province of Nigerian and South American drug lords, is struggling. Ivory Coast has not yet emerged from internal conflict and Guinea risks collapse into anarchy. Comoros has recently begun a slow climb out of anarchy. Finally, citizens in all African states suffer from poverty, inequities, poor social services and unresponsive governments. Those after all are the characteristics of the developing world.

Advancing American Interests and Policies

To recapitulate our interests are:

-- access to oil.
-- containment of international blights.
-- reduction of conflict.
-- humanitarian aid to the vulnerable.
-- trade and investment opportunities.
-- African support in international organizations.

Protection and advancement of American national interests is best accomplished by helping to create stable democratic nations with viable growing economies. Such a community of states would not be warring, would respect the rule of law, would create jobs and opportunities at home, would be responsible international partners and would not be breeding grounds for international terrorists. We have existing programs designed to do some of this, but many are sort of scatter shot. For example, our anti-AIDS activities accomplished via the PEPFAR program are very effective. However, PEPFAR is only active in 12 (out of 53) states. Similarly with USAID that unfortunately retrenched about fifteen years ago and eliminated dozens of worthy states from direct bilateral assistance. The Africa Growth Opportunities Act (AGOA) has provided limited trade benefits to textile producers and the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) has usefully financed a limited number of infrastructure projects. The Department of Defense via newly created Africa Command apparently intends to build on military assistance programs to dramatically expand military aid to Africa on a selective basis. Finally, Peace Corps remains a highly successful people-to-people program as intended, but expansion in eastern Europe and Central Asia has left Africa (again) holding the short straw.

Recommendations

The new Congress and the new president should look carefully at the dichotomies of American efforts in Africa and seek to bring consistency and logic to policy efforts. On a global basis the U.S. needs to fully fund the Department of State so that it might field the number of diplomats needed to advance our interests. (Currently the Department is about one thousand persons short in a planned total staff of 7,500 diplomats because of administration/Congressional decisions not to meet funding requests. That coupled with requirements to staff Iraq and Afghanistan has robbed embassies worldwide of personnel, Africa being no exception).

For Africa, I recommend:

• A broad policy discussion internally within the USG to clarify democracy policies and how we intend to pursue them. Case by case circumstances do differ as do U.S. interests at stake, but we should not disavow or neglect free and fair elections as criteria for bilateral relations.

• Reinvigorate USAID so that it will have the leadership, the mandate and the resources to be America’s chief provider of development assistance. Poverty alleviation and democracy programs are sound investments, but a revamped agency needs to look also at infrastructure – water, dams, irrigation, electrical grids, ports, railroads, roads - and other larger projects, especially in the agricultural sector, that have multiplier effects on economic growth. Part of a revised mandate would be greater geographic coverage. Logically MCA should be subsumed into a new USAID.

• Rein-in AFRICOM. Our military/security interests are minimal. We are not going to war in Africa. We ought not to be in the business of strengthening armies whose chief responsibility is to maintain oppressive governments in power. Civic tranquility should be the responsibility of police forces (there we can help). Development and humanitarian relief are best (and more cheaply) done by civilian experts, so why create a war fighting $300 million, two thousand person headquarters entity whose real function will be management of about $150 million in bilateral training and a few exercises? - a job that heretofore was done by a dozen people. Congress should walk this horse back to the barn. (As an aside, it would be hard to think of a more inappropriate name than Africa Command, a sobriquet which implies both American paternalism and imperialism.) As a second part of this retrenchment, American troops should be withdrawn from Djibouti.

• Although recognizing that global terrorism rears its head in Africa – to wit bombing of U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, we must refrain from letting anti-terrorism become the pretext for supporting otherwise unsavory regimes. Striking the necessary balance will require carefully vetted intelligence, sound perspective, good judgment and good communication between Washington policy makers and Ambassadors in the field.

• We have a proven record of gaining friends in Africa and helping them understand us via cultural exchange and civic education programs. Consistent with other neglect, funding for these activities has sunk in the last decade. Let’s re-engage and revitalize these people-to-people contacts.

• Maintain support for Peacekeeping. Operations in Sudan, Congo, Somalia, Ivory Coast and Burundi merit full U.S. support. Besides training, supplying and transporting African contingents for deployment, we could do more. Supplying fifteen helicopters for UNAMID in Darfur, Sudan would be a start.

• Prepare for an even greater food crisis in Africa as its population grows and arable land decreases on account of climate change. This should be double tracked: expanded assistance for local production coupled with plans for greater export of food surpluses from the U.S.

Conclusions

Obviously the topic is larger than can be dealt with satisfactorily in this article, but the change of administrations offers an opportunity to assess, study, modify and change as necessary. We can and should do a better job of helping African nations and peoples better their circumstances, enjoy peace, participate in pluralistic political systems and become more fully integrated into the wider community of the planet.

Book Review - Say You're One of Them

2008-08-01T07:30:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of Uwem Akpan's collection of stories entitled Say You’re One of Them. It was published by Little, Brown and Co., New York 2008

This collection of stories – two long and three short – received rave reviews in the major media. The attention was well deserved because the collection is unique. It consists of recitations from the child’s perspective of very adult themes – abject poverty, child prostitution, religious intolerance, trafficking in persons and genocide. There are no happy endings. Although it was never explained, I suppose the odd title is designed to encourage the reader to identify with the victims.

The author Uwem Akpan is Nigerian born, obviously an author, but also a Catholic priest. Even though religious themes figure in several of the stories, he certainly was not dogmatic. All organized religious systems came in for criticism. However, getting to the kernel of the matter is what Akpan did best. Because his narrators are innocents, the horrors they uncover or elicit are all the more revolting. Indeed Akpan’s children live in terrible worlds – worlds not of their own making.

The five stories are set in Kenya, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Rwanda. By and large Akpan has the locales and settings nailed. Dialogue between characters strikes chords of realism, even though sometimes it becomes a bit wearisome and difficult for those of us not attuned to Nigerian muttering. Akpan tosses Swahili into the Kenyan story, Kinyarwanda into the Rwandan one, a couple of words of Amharic for Ethiopia, good French alongside Pidgin English in one Nigerian story and a variety of uttering in the other. As with any good dialogue the language compliments the narrative and gives instant reality to the characters.

The book opens with a disturbing Christmas story set in Nairobi’s slums wherein the breadwinner for her family is a twelve year old prostitute. Yet amidst the squalor of her family’s life, there is family and some semblance of hope. How it plays out is the gist of the tale. The book closes with a Rwandan tragedy wherein a little girl must watch how her ethnically mixed family decides who lives or dies.

The two longer stories - one about human trafficking and the other dealing with religious violence - are set in Nigeria. Because of their length more transpires and we learn more about the people involved. They are victims of poverty, greed, ignorance and fear. I liked the story entitled “Luxurious Hearses” best. It seemed to shed light not only on religious intolerance, but on how peoples’ beliefs motivate them and how easily they get caught up in mob violence. Additionally, there was telling commentary regarding the absurdity of Nigerian politics from the perspective of those at the bottom of the pyramid. Finally, construction of the story was intriguing because it occurred on a bus in a bus park waiting to carry refugees from northern violence southward towards home. I was not sure how the author would pull it off. But he did.

In sum, innocent children are caught up in vortices of violence and vice, of which they only grasp the barest outlines. Readers, on the other hand, clearly see the evil at play. By design the book tugs your heartstrings; you pity the children, denounce the adults and deplore the circumstances.

The Eye of the Leopard - a book review

2008-06-30T18:35:00.000-07:00

The Eye of the Leopard by Henning Mankell was published by The New Press, NY, 2008.

This novel by Swedish author Mankell was first published in 1990 in Swedish. The English translation came out earlier this year.

The story bounces back and forth between the Sweden of protagonist Hans’ youth and his later days as a farmer in Zambia from 1969 to 1987. It is a complex novel that takes American readers into two different cultural worlds, both of which are not easy to understand.

Hans comes from a broken home where he was raised by a drunken father. Mostly an observer in his home village, he had but two friends: a boy his own age who was injured in a tragic accident and a disfigured woman Janine about ten years his senior. Theirs was a weird ménage, but out of the destructive force of their friendship came the impetus for Hans to abandon Sweden to seek his fortunes in Africa.

Initially Hans only aspired to visit a missionary hill station to honor Janine, who had always wanted to go there, but circumstances got complicated and rootless Hans was drawn progressively into a continent and culture that he was poorly equipped to fathom and never really understood. Befriended by European farmers, at the behest of a widow, he took over a chicken farm that he ran for nearly twenty years.

Hans’ Africa education allows author Mankell to investigate many aspects of Europeans’ encounters with Zambians. The thrust of the story puts Hans in league with the small community of post-independence European farmers. Although critical of their attitudes, he comes to understand their fears, if not their love-hate relationship with Africa and with Zambians. Despite trying to be more modern in his relationships with Africans, Hans increasingly faces the conundrum of not belonging. Betrayal, violence and political intrigue bring matters to a head.

In the course of the novel author Mankell touches on racism, witchcraft, missionary zeal, sex, work ethic, foreign assistance, corruption and politics - all in compelling fashion.

“Superstition I can understand, but how can one convert someone from poverty?”

“It isn’t normal to live a life surrounded by hate.”

“The poverty of the whites is their vulnerability.”

“Aid work would be easy if we did not have to deal with Africans.”

“A white man in Africa is someone who takes part in a play he knows nothing about.”

Neither Europeans nor Africans come off well in this novel. No one breaks out of the stereotype assigned by the author, but their interactions do provide a solid background for the drama of the plot. There is considerable introspection by Hans about what life is or means, mostly when in a malarial fever, but this provides the mechanism to jump back and forth in time and between countries.

Although set in Zambia (and authentic in regard to geography), every part time visitor to anywhere in Africa will recognize the cultural dissonance that provides the grist for the book. It is an intriguing read that works slowly to one of two possible predictable ends.

Prime Minister Raila Odinga in Washington

2008-06-19T07:21:00.000-07:00

I attended this talk and wrote the following report.

The Honorable Raila Odinga, Prime Minister of Kenya, spoke at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington on June 17 on the topic of “Kenya: A Way Forward.” The Prime Minister thanked the U.S. and high ranking officials for their support during Kenya’s recent difficulties. He commended foreign partners led by former UN Secretary General Anan and retired President Mkapa from Tanzania for helping to achieve internal peace. He noted that the transition government was now 60 days old. He admitted that the process of establishing the “grand coalition” had required soul searching, sacrifice and compromise, but that the Orange Democratic Movement was determined to make it work. He later added that he and President Kibaki have a viable partnership.

Reflecting on post election violence, Odinga said that Kenya “had lived a lie” in thinking it was immune from such disturbances. It was not an island of peace, but its façade had hidden disparities, inequalities and anger. Some issues dated from colonial times, others came later; all should have been addressed earlier. However, now was the time. A first step would be a new constitution. He also pledged investigations into election irregularities and human rights violations. He supported the creation of a truth, justice and reconciliation process.

The Prime Minister noted that Kenya now faces enormous economic difficulties. The chaos stalled the economy and the rains have been poor. Growth has tumbled. The new cabinet – bloated he said by necessity – will work through committees to redress the nation’s ills. Reviving the economy is a major task. Kenya will count on its friends and outside investors to help.

During his talk Odinga also strongly criticized President Mugabe of Zimbabwe saying that elections there were a “sham” and an “embarrassment” to the continent. He called on African leaders, especially President Mbeki to step up and help resolve the crisis.

In answering a question about how to restore the social fabric, the Prime Minister said that Kenya would draw on the experience of others such as South Africa to help salve wounds. Proposals for a truth and reconciliation commission were being studied. Those persons involved in mob violence would face no sanctions, but perpetrators of crimes would be prosecuted. Abuses by security forces would be investigated. Issues of compensation for victims have not been decided. Odinga noted that in the aftermath of violence, Kenyans themselves discovered their interdependence. Matatus needed passengers, just as passengers needed matatus; similarly for shops and shoppers, farmers and markets. He implied that these interconnections boded well for reestablishment of societal trust.

The Prime Minister acknowledged that land issues remain troublesome. He said that many internally displaced persons - not just Kikuyus, but Luos too - had long been settled outside of their traditional homelands. Generations later these folk have little knowledge of where their ancestors came from, so they have no “homes” to return to. He stated that land reform would be a priority and opined that the breaking up of large European farms into small plots that were increasingly sub-divided had not served the nation well. He suggested that agricultural advantages of scale could be achieved and better services provided to citizens if farms were managed cooperatively.

Comment: Prime Minister Odinga made an impressive presentation to the effect that Kenya is on the way back and on a thoughtful track. Clearly, he knows the issues and appears determined to treat them straight forwardly. Whether or not the governing coalition will permit this to occur, remains to be seen. That notwithstanding, Odinga’s visit to Washington and contacts with policy makers in the administration, the Congress and the World Bank was designed to raise Kenya’s (and Odinga’s) image and to assure interlocutors that serious efforts – that merit American support – are underway. Without doubt, that message is being heard.

Book Review - The Zanzibar Chest

2008-05-24T17:08:00.000-07:00

Following is a book review:

The Zanzibar Chest: A Story of Life, Love, and Death in Foreign Lands
By Aidan Hartley; Atlantic Monthly Press, NY, 2003

This book is half memoir and half biography. The Kenyan connection comes via the memoir. Author Aidan Hartley was born to a British family in Nairobi. His childhood was spent in Tanganyika, at school in England and at the family home in Malindi. Scion of a family of empire builders, Hartley’s father was a colonial official, rancher, aid agricultural advisor and humanitarian worker. Rarely at home, Hartley’s father was constantly seeking adventure on the dusty plains of the continent. Thus, the son mythologized his father and imbued himself too in the call of Africa. Aidan followed the family path, but in the ways open to him in the 1980s and 1990s. He became a foreign correspondent for Reuters.

In the book Hartley reflects nostalgically on the Africa he knew as a child, an Africa that passed away due to independence, corruption and population pressures. Yet Hartley does not criticize much, he just reports. As a young adult Hartley signed on as a journalist and was soon smothered in the adrenalin of the profession caught up in a never ending series of wars, famines and disasters. He recounted marching for months with Tigrean rebels as they toppled Mengistu in Ethiopia. He was there in Somalia off-and-on for years as warlords – Hartley claims to have coined the term for Somalia – battled each other, looted the nation and ravaged humanitarian assistance. Hartley was also there in Rwanda as genocide swept the land. He walked into Kigali with rebel forces, bunkered down as fighting raged about and chronicled in very human terms the unfolding catastrophe.

The memoir gives an inside look at foreign correspondents. Home based in Nairobi, they were a colorful lot, fueled not just by the constant flow of new horror, but also by liquor, drugs and sex. They called the impetus of needing vibrant new copy every day, “feeding the beast.” And they did their best to comply.

Hartley’s talent as a writer is clear. His taunt prose paints vivid pictures of violence, death and famine. The details – for example, rescuing a still twitching child from a mass grave or a conversation with an abandoned stringer in the ruins of his Mogadishu home - provide the realism that makes the narrative compelling. Additionally, Hartley’s honesty, reflections on his actions, motives and feelings provide credible depth to his journal.

Juxtaposed among the journalistic memoir is another story - that of Peter Davey, a colonial era friend of his father who died in 1947 in Aden. Burned out from war, Hartley found Davey’s diaries carefully stashed in a Zanzibar chest in the family home in Malindi. Hartley then tells Davey’s tale of intrigue and mystery on the Arab peninsula filling in connections to his own family and even his name – the Irish spelling of Aden. Strangely enough, the mix of stories works. As did Hartley, the reader too needs respite from the flow of degradation, misery and violence of the reporter’s memoir.

The Zanzibar Chest is gripping read and highly recommended. The book is a couple of years old. Copies are available from on-line bookstores, but also check out your local library.

Implementing AFRICOM: Tread Carefully

2008-05-02T16:14:00.000-07:00

Following is an expanded version of an article I posted on this website earlier. The previous version has been removed. This version appeared in the May, 2008 edition of the Foreign Service Journal.

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On Oct. 1, 2007, the United States Africa Command was established as a sub-unified command, still subordinate to the European Command, which covers most of Africa. (The Central Command is responsible for U.S. military relations with the Horn, Egypt, Sudan and Kenya, while the Pacific Command covers activities in the Indian Ocean islands.) Headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, AFRICOM will become fully responsible for U.S. military relations with all 53 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa by the end of the current fiscal year (Sept. 30, 2008). The command is led by General William E. Ward, whose deputies are Ambassador Mary Carlin Yates (a Foreign Service officer) and Admiral Robert T. Moeller. The FY 2008 transition year budget is $75 million. $392 is requested for FY 2009.

The rationale for the new command is that it will improve the U.S. military focus on Africa and enhance American interagency support for the development of African military establishments. AFRICOM’s mission is to build African capacity so that African states can manage their own security issues. It is also intended to stimulate professionalization, enhance civilian control and inculcate respect for human rights.

While many African governments embrace the idea of more attention to their military needs, they are concerned about possible great-power militarization of the continent. And they are apprehensive about the perception (as much as the reality) of undermining continental neutrality enshrined in the charter of the African Union (formerly the Organization of African Unity). Others are generally skeptical of America’s intentions, fearing a hidden agenda of hegemony.

Even though the Bush administration has articulated a credible explanation for the evolution to the new command, many – at home and abroad - remain skeptical. Details are scarce about how AFRICOM’s civil and economic objectives will be pursued. President John Kufor of Ghana, for example, seized the occasion of President Bush’s recent stop to ask point blank about real U.S. intentions. Clearly, doubts regarding U.S. intentions, coupled with concerns arising from our military posture in Iraq and Afghanistan, have tended to excite and feed fodder to critics. They variously decry the initiative as representing the extension of a global war on Islam, a preparation to annex African oil fields, and U.S. military interference in politics, including the threat of regime change for nations that run afoul of Washington’s capricious whims. Of course, those conclusions are balderdash, to be blunt, but they do contain kernels of truth. American policy does combat terrorism and much of the global variety does have Islamic connections. We want the world’s oil supplies to be secure and we do criticize autocratic regimes, especially those like Robert Mugabe’s in Zimbabwe that egregiously abuse the rights of their people.

Reaching out to African Militaries

Shibboleths aside, it is worth examining the premise that African military establishments merit American support at all. Even though national defense is regularly cited as their primary task, African armies rarely need to repel foreign invaders. Most African conflicts – e.g., Sudan, Chad, the Central African Republic, Cote d’Ivoire, Burundi, Liberia and Sierra Leone -- arise from domestic issues. Only the unresolved Ethiopia-Eritrea border war, the recent Congolese wars and the Ethiopian presence in Somalia fit the mode of external aggression.

So instead of defense, the primary job of African armies is to protect the ruling regime by keeping the life president in power (by informal count some 15 current leaders initially came to power via military means) and to thwart threats to the status quo mounted by the opposition, democratic or otherwise. To this end, militaries or special units thereof become tribal fiefdoms loyal to the president and dedicated to his well-being.

Despite this objective, history shows that this sort of Praetorian Guard has had mixed results in protecting the incumbent. In fact many, if not most, coups were organized by those closest to the president. The list of chiefs of staff who mounted coups is lengthy: Amin, Bokassa, Kolingba, Deby, Buyoya, Bagaza, Habyarimana, Barre, Mobutu, Ironsi, Obasanjo, Babangida, Eyadema, Kountche, Bashir and more.

Perhaps recognizing this fact of political life, many presidents – including military men -- have been only reluctant supporters of the national army. This hesitancy, reinforced by the impecunity of most states and the fact of underdevelopment, has kept African military establishments in the last rank. Even so, there is great diversity across the continent. Some are a mere hodgepodge of ill-equipped, untrained thugs who are more of a threat to society than an asset (e.g., the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Chad, Sudan). Others are a repository of political support for a regime, either because of ethnic affiliation or because of largess handed out to military leaders (Nigeria, Gabon). In some countries, army personnel are politically astute revolutionary fighters who learned their craft prior to becoming part of the ruling apparatus (Rwanda, Eritrea). And a few military establishments are impartial, professional and fairly competent, with limited objectives and responsibilities (South Africa, Botswana, Senegal).

In any case, almost all African institutions suffer from a lack of resources and equipment. Their leadership structure is often internally incoherent and subjected to political interference. Still, compared with other national institutions in most of those countries, the military is well organized and adequately funded. Few nations have the wherewithal to operate tanks or fly jet aircraft, but they regularly cough up salaries for the troops. The challenge is sorting out the regime maintenance function and the brutality that occasionally accompanies that from other defense responsibilities, and judging when and where to draw the line regarding militaries that merit support and those that don’t.

Over the years, former colonial powers like Britain, France and Belgium, as well as the U.S. and Russia during the Cold War, and now China have sought to modernize and professionalize African militaries, seeking to develop them into smaller replicas of their own establishments. In contrast to earlier years when revolutionary ideology (Tanzania, Zambia, Namibia, Zimbabwe) provided the basis for military cooperation, China today is flogging a full range of military assets, weaponry and aircraft to all buyers. At least in part, this broader approach reflects Beijing’s perception that Africa constitutes a growing market, as well as a source of sympathetic partners in the non-Western world.

Washington continues to provide training and some equipment, such as basic troop kits, communications gear and night-vision devices, but little in the way of sophisticated weapons systems. Such limited access to the African military market is unlikely to change, for our offerings are simply too complex, expensive and unsuitable for the main tasks confronting the continent’s armed forces.

So what can we do? On a case-by-case basis, we already evaluate each country’s military forces and offer the sort of help we believe realistic for its situation. This ranges from zero assistance for the egregious, abusive nondemocratic regimes of the continent to various types of individual or unit training, to communications gear, electronic equipment, transportation assets and a full range of support for peacekeeping units for more respectable nations. Such aid is predicated on a political assessment that such assistance to the military supports rather than contradicts broader U.S. policy in support of democracy, development and respect for human rights.

The nexus of two competing objectives is where the hard calls arise. For example, an African nation’s commitment to counterterrorism might entice U.S. policymakers to seek closer ties to further such activism. However, recognition that the forces in question are blatant abusers of the rights of a struggling democratic opposition ought to dampen the prospects for American support. Which side do we want to be on in such cases?

The current crises in Chad and Kenya pose policy questions that might be answered differently in a robust AFRICOM era. We have not meddled in Chad (leave it to the French!), but would we do so if we were focusing greater attention on its army? And in Kenya, except for one brief foray into Naivasha, the army has thus far stayed in the barracks – in part because it, too, is riven by tribal divisions, so any deployment might well result in intra-army violence. While we can applaud this restraint, it raises the question: What use is a national military in such a crisis? And what is the value of our investment in training it?

Both situations certainly fall under the rubric of maintaining continental security, one of AFRICOM’s stated objectives. Yet it is hard to see how any direct U.S. involvement, via our military or theirs, could be productive in resolving these crises. Although U.S. policy eschews direct military involvement in such situations, American attacks against purported terrorist elements in Somalia, for example, do raise the issue of if-you-have-the-assets how will you use them?

Thus, observers are correct in asking questions because DOD and State intend AFRICOM to be different from other combatant commands (e.g., EUCOM, CENTCOM and PACOM). It has still-undefined responsibilities and tasks beyond the purely military sphere. For example, staffing plans call for an FSO as lead deputy (Amb. Yates is already in place) and up to a hundred or more interagency personnel. If nothing else, this demonstrates a clear intent for programs that focus on humanitarian and development issues.

Some American advocates of paying more attention to Africa, particularly in the NGO community, dismiss AFRICOM as a mechanism to do that without really providing more resources. But the assumption is that once the command is in place, more resources will flow to it. Undoubtedly, they will. Pentagon cynics would add that one more four-star billet and all the accompanying support translates into more advancement opportunities within the system.

Do Something Dramatic!

U.S. spokesmen have said that the new command will be oriented toward humanitarian issues and military improvements. It will respond to catastrophes, help build competent national militaries, sustain nascent regional organizations, support economic development and political democracy. What appears to be missing in all the hoopla is an unequivocal response to Africa’s pressing security needs, which include elimination of warlords, reduction of tribal strife, achievement of internal peace and the need to live in a safer regional neighborhood. More tangible support for the continent’s armed forces, including training and some equipment, is indeed desirable, both for its own sake and to facilitate effective participation in African peacekeeping operations – to wit: Sudan, Somalia, Liberia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. While this is a laudable objective, the U.S. contribution has a long time line. Meanwhile, dangerous situations fester. Why not move faster?

Three opportunities come to mind. Fortunately, the first is already under way: using the U.S. Navy to combat piracy in the Red Sea and off the Horn of Africa. A broader effort to patrol the sea lanes off West Africa in order to halt illegal oil bunkering would be similarly aimed at restoring the rule of law. Clearly, this would entail enlisting the support of littoral states.

The most dramatic initiative would be the provision of U.S. helicopters to UNAMIS, the United Nations peacekeeping operation in Sudan. The United Nations is seeking a squadron of several dozen choppers, most for lift, as well as several gunships. Efforts to find helicopters have so far come up empty, posing the risk that the whole operation will be scuttled.

Offering up such support would indeed reinforce our intent to help Africa. But howls and arguments against the idea would be loud: we cannot bleed Iraq for Sudan; the U.S. should never participate in U.N. peacekeeping operations; Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir would never accept American forces. Undoubtedly, these are legitimate issues, but if AFRICOM wants to respond to legitimate security needs in Africa, no better task awaits. And the mere willingness to fight the policy battle within the U.S. government, with the U.N. and with Sudan to implement such assistance would show solid commitment to Africa and underscore the legitimacy of the new command.

Ambassadorial Responsibility

From the State Department perspective, we need not fear AFRICOM’s advent. Not only does it have positive elements that should advance U.S. interests in various African nations, but seconding FSOs to the command will help ensure that DOD has broader thematic perspectives. However, AFRICOM does pose some issues that, if not sorted out early, might become irksome.

Existing chief-of-mission authority is adequate for AFRICOM, so long as serving and future ambassadors exercise their responsibilities pursuant to the presidential letter of authority and under National Security Decision Directive 38, and the military components follow their own chain of command. In short the ambassador has absolute authority over personnel and operations in his or her country of assignment. We should think about and treat non-resident AFRICOM personnel exactly as we considered previous command elements. To wit:

All visitors, military and civilian, will still require country clearances. All programs, whether involving JCET (exercises), IMET and ACOTA (training), FMS (sales) or TSCTP (counterterrorism), are subject to ambassadorial approval. The only exception is the forces of the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa, some 1,500 troops stationed at Camp Lemonier, Djibouti, who currently fall under the operational control of CENTCOM (but will eventually shift to AFRICOM). In accordance with existing practice, such combat elements enjoy a separate chain of command, but their in-country, non-combat activities – drilling wells in Djibouti, for example – all remain subject to ambassadorial oversight. Because the new Africa Command does not anticipate stationing any additional combat personnel on the continent or setting up other bases, there should be no other exceptions to chief-of-mission authority.

As an aside, let me note that Africa Contingency Operations Training Assistance, the program that provides training and equipment to African units scheduled for deployment as multilateral peacekeepers, will not -- at least initially -- become an AFRICOM responsibility. ACOTA (formerly known as the African Crisis Response Initiative) is America’s most successful and useful military program in Africa, one that has helped prepare contingents from Nigeria, Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi, Ghana and other countries for service in Darfur, Somalia, Liberia and Congo. ACOTA is funded via the peacekeeping account administered by the State Department, and State does not intend to relinquish control.

Where to Set up Shop?

Various soundings around the continent have shown that the time is not ripe for the establishment of a large military headquarters in Africa. The issue is apparently too emotional and too tied up in the uncertainties of what AFRICOM is all about. Logistic issues also constrain a move. When or if a relocation from Germany is approved, facilities for it will have to be built from the ground up. Only Liberia, perhaps understanding the positive economic impact of such an installation, has stepped forward to seek the emplacement of the headquarters on its soil.

Even though the headquarters will remain in Germany, AFRICOM anticipates standing up about three or four sub-headquarters. The intent is to get at least some personnel into the theater of operations. About 30 personnel on standard tours of duty would be assigned to each sub-headquarters unit. Although locales have yet to be determined, logically they would correspond to the geographic regions of Africa. Djibouti takes care of eastern Africa, so sites will be needed in the west (Ghana or Liberia are leading candidates), the south (probably Botswana) and the north (Tunisia or Morocco, although this idea has less traction in the north). While the structure will be important for the countries concerned, what is most crucial from an interagency perspective will be the interaction between the regional headquarters elements and the host embassy.

Note that such regional offices will be a new global element to be invented in Africa. Sub-commands of other combatant commands – Diego Garcia, Okinawa, Korea, etc. -- include operational forces that are exempted from chief-of-mission authority.

On the whole, we should consider such offices similar to USAID’s Regional Economic Development Services Offices: i.e., they and their personnel fall under COM authority. Thus, when they operate in a particular country, the U.S. ambassador there is in charge. And when personnel travel regionally, personnel and projects remain the purview of the ambassador of the nation being visited.

It is worth noting that both USAID and DOD already deal separately with African regional organizations, such as the Southern African Development Community or the Economic Community of West African States. For instance, what if ECOWAS wants to conduct a military exercise in Togo with U.S. input, with the planning, logistical support, etc. coming from its headquarters in Abuja? Which ambassador has authority? The answer is both, but this will require coordination on the U.S. side. Such multi-country coordination will loom even larger and become more complex as AFRICOM expands its cooperation with the African Union and its security programs around the continent.

Practical Constraints

According to Pentagon sources, each AFRICOM regional office should consist of about 30 personnel; some uniformed, some not. These staffers will need a lot of office space that is clearly not available inside any existing embassy. Thus, pending expansion of chancelleries or building annexes, facilities will have to be leased. These personnel and their families will also need substantial administrative support: housing, health care, shipping, transportation, contracting, cashiering, and educational opportunities for dependents. Virtually all these services will place an immense burden on receiving embassies. Although initially many AFRICOM personnel might be assigned on a TDY basis, except perhaps for housing, the required logistical support package is just as intimidating as for those on longer tours.

While all concerned will do their utmost to make this work, it won’t be easy. A key principle at stake is equity, keeping the playing field even so that no one gets more, better or different services at post than anyone else. The new influx of staff -- particularly military personnel who are accustomed to a global standard of support -- will challenge that approach, but adherence to that principle will be key to making AFRICOM offices and personnel part of the country team.

An augmented in-country military presence also raises thorny operational issues like communications. Initially, AFRICOM offices can utilize existing embassy networks, but they will soon want their own separate systems. How can this be accommodated? Similarly, AFRICOM will want its own security force, which will have an impact on the regional security office. Who will do the hiring? How will State and DOD practices be melded? Will there be military police alongside Marine security guard detachments? And then there is the question of weapons, an operational issue related to force protection in the wake of terrorist threats. Who in the country team can bear arms and under what circumstances?

Then we come to responsibilities for reporting, intelligence collection and analysis. Most ambassadors have existing understandings with defense attachés as to which DAO messages need clearance by the political-economic section and the front office. But a larger military element at post will necessarily intrude upon such understandings. It will be incumbent upon the ambassador and the AFRICOM chief to work out these parameters. In order to ensure consistency, written guidelines should be developed.

Striking a Balance

With the Africa Command’s advent, turf issues will intensify -- and not just in the countries hosting those personnel. Already, U.S. military resources and projects are crossing ministerial lines across the continent. While the key local client for AFRICOM remains the host-country ministry of defense, U.S. military resources already go toward projects in various civilian ministries, including water development, women’s affairs, health, interior, aviation and so forth. Undertakings include a full gamut of activities ranging from humanitarian succor and HIV/AIDS prevention to democracy promotion and public diplomacy.

Obviously, military programming risks duplication where USAID, the Centers for Disease Control, Peace Corps Volunteers and others are already engaged. That said, host governments are quick to realize where the money is, so they will increasingly focus requests on U.S. military elements.

The proposed interagency structure of AFRICOM recognizes this issue. Although the number and type of interagency billets has yet to be finalized, it is clear that the command will have a significant civilian element, including experts in economic development and complex humanitarian emergencies. Initially, AFRICOM wants several dozen FSOs for a range of political/military and economic jobs. Although assigning personnel would certainly affirm the interagency character of the new command, in light of service demands for Iraq including the elimination of jobs in Africa, it is unlikely that the Department of State can spare many personnel for such excursion tours.

Also still at stake is what AFRICOM’s non-military tasks will be. The U.S. already does a pretty competent job of economic development and humanitarian relief. What additional benefits – besides money – can AFRICOM bring to those tasks?

Washington policymakers, as well as ambassadors in the field, need to decide how much militarization of non-military assistance is wise and ensure that such undertakings are properly vetted. Such discussions will become increasingly important when (not if) AFRICOM gets more resources to play with.

In conclusion, AFRICOM is initially a reorientation of American bureaucratic responsibilities that will probably work well for us, but remain confusing to African governments. Having nothing else to distract it, the new command will undoubtedly focus on Africa and follow through on programs. This augurs well for a more consistent partnership with the continent, but how it evolves remains to be seen.

I suspect that African governments will adjust to progress and that press-stoked fears of hegemony will diminish. However, the temptation on the American side will be to try to do too much. Even a small AFRICOM looms large compared to host country military establishments. Furthermore, the command’s initial budget of $392 million will dwarf a number of national budgets. We should recognize that Africa’s absorptive capacity is limited and, as noted above, few of its leaders really want competent generals commanding capable forces.

To misquote Teddy Roosevelt, we don’t need a big stick in Africa, but we do need to tread carefully. Although Washington (as usual) will have the ultimate say, it will be up to U.S. ambassadors in the field to guide all these new boots into careful paths.

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Retired Ambassador Robert Gribbin spent many years in Africa posted to the Central African Republic, Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda. He also served on delegations to the United Nations General Assembly and the U.N. Human Rights Commission. Since retiring from the Foreign Service, he has undertaken When Actually Employed assignments to Liberia, DRC, Djibouti, Ghana, Chad, Burundi, Mauritius and Nigeria. He is the author of In the Aftermath of Genocide: The U.S. Role in Rwanda (2005).

Rwanda: Film Review - Beyond the Gates

2008-04-18T07:13:00.000-07:00

Beyond the Gates is a film about the Rwandan genocide. It adds fictional characters to a real incident in order to create a story line that accurately portrays the horror of the genocide itself, but with emphasis on the stark moral dilemmas faced by westerners in the face of that evil.

The setting is Ecole Technique in Kigali where an elderly priest (played by John Hurt) and Christopher, an idealistic young Englishman (Hugh Dancy), are working in the weeks prior to the social cataclysm. Viewers see preparations for genocide via a slimy local councilman who makes lists of Tutsi families and checks on the small UN peacekeeping detachment housed at the school. When the troubles begin, the priest knows that hundreds of Tutsi will seek refuge behind his gates both because of the ostensible protection of the church in times of trial and on account of the real protection afforded by the peacekeepers.

The Tutsi come by the thousands as do several dozen Europeans. As the genocide unfolds beyond the gates the protagonists each venture out on errands of mercy only to discover the horror that awaits. Friendships are betrayed. Ethnic madness rules. Gangs of Interahamwe killers prance and chant and butcher. Meanwhile the issue of why the killings and why the indifference of the peacekeepers to it play out center stage. Ultimately, French troops arrive at the school, but only to evacuate the Europeans. The Belgian peacekeepers are ordered out shortly thereafter leaving the priest and teacher to their choices and Africans to their fates.

I (the reviewer) served as U.S. ambassador to Rwanda in the years just after the genocide. This film, which was shot in Rwanda and involved survivors of the Ecole Technique massacre, does accurately reflect the overall sense of doom during the execution of genocide. Yet, the story line is set up so as to highlight western shortcomings and frustrations in face of the killings rather than Rwandan ones. Identifying with the principle characters, viewers see the issues in understandable terms. Perhaps that is as it should be because we all need to reflect upon this catastrophe. Be aware that this is wrenching drama that contains some graphic scenes.

Other films about the genocide include: Ghosts of Rwanda (a documentary), Hotel Rwanda, Sometimes in April and the recently released Shake Hands with the Devil. The latter film is a cinematic treatment of General Dallaire’s (the UN Peacekeeping Force commander) book of the same name. It is a powerful drama, well acted and shot in Rwanda. It makes the case that the west – especially the UN Security Council – did not authorize actions to halt the genocide because it did not view the crisis as severe.

Note that Beyond the Gates, a 20th Century Fox film, was released eariler by the BBC as Shooting Dogs.

Opinion - Kenya must seize the moment!

2008-04-01T09:37:00.000-07:00

I applaud the recent agreement signed by President Kibaki and now new Prime Minister Raila Odinga. This start to cooperation between warring camps bodes well for return to peace within the nation and the prospects for crafting more permanent solutions to long standing problems. But first, the two principals need to decide on a cabinet. Kenya especially needs dynamic ministers who can lead and act and translate noble sounding rhetoric into reality that improves the lot of the wanainchi.

Many wounds need salve. The tribal clashes that rendered the nation are mostly over – for the time being – but underlying issues of access to land, land ownership and freedom of movement and residence must be sorted out. Also, a new government must debate reparations for victims of conflict. Security forces have to cope with roving bands of tribal militia. And if the issues of returning to normal were not tough enough, Kenya must also cope with an economy devastated by the troubles. Many businesses are defunct, the transportation sector crippled, schooling interrupted, agricultural production halved and tourism all but halted. Additionally, thousands of internally displaced people require shelter, food and water.

Resolving these myriad issues will require determination, resources and political compromise, but that is the task before the new government. Outside help is certainly available, but it is incumbent upon the collective leadership of Kenya to take the lead. History (and the Kenyan people) will judge them on the record of their achievements.

Book Review - Acts of Faith

2008-04-01T09:07:00.000-07:00

This is a review of a novel, Acts of Faith, by Philip Caputo. It was published by Vintage Books, NY, in 2005.

This novel set in Kenya and Sudan revolves around humanitarian efforts to aid stricken people in war torn southern Sudan. That is a large topic and author Caputo strives to include something for everyone. For example, the cast of characters include a jaundiced Kenyan soccer player searching for meaning; a vivacious white settler, who out of guilt, engages in good works; cynical mercenary pilots; a dew-eyed young missionary overwhelmed with Africa; a driven evangelist who is also a sharp businessman; a romantic SPLA commander and an Africa-seasoned, wise priest. There are many others, but those are central to the various plots that swirl around.

Themes in the novel include the logistics and economics of food aid, gun running, Kenyan bureaucratic corruption, slavery in Sudan, redemption by external Christian groups, sensationalist journalism, Janjaweed raids, the awful impact of warfare upon civilian populations, love, and lust.

The setting in Lokichokio (the gritty northwestern Kenyan base for Sudanese relief operations), Nairobi, and the Nuba mountains is authentic. Obviously well researched, Caputo realistically captures the feeling of the places that he describes well. Swahili usage was minimal, but accurate.

The reader will be overwhelmed as the various threads of stories make their appearance, but eventually they do coalesce into a coherent stream. The characters too start off as stereotypical profiles, but as the story moves along they too fill out and become more realistic.

The fate of the characters and the thrust of the plot aside, underlying questions being addressed in this novel are those of the utility and/or futility of western aid in catastrophic situations. Does such aid really help? Is it manipulated for private gain? Just what is the cost of such business? Morally, what is acceptable? And how to sort out motives? Does why folks engage really matter to recipients or only to the donor? Caputo does not provide any direct answers to such questions, but he does lay issues so that readers might consider them.

In conclusion, this was quite a readable and entertaining novel, indeed even a must read for those engaged in humanitarian operations or missionary undertakings.

Concern for Kenya

2008-01-26T06:28:00.000-08:00

Following is an appeal for calm that I wrote as Vice President of the Friends of Kenya. It is also posted on the FOK web site (www.friendsofkenya.org).

Statement of Concern

The board of Friends of Kenya and, as we well know, many members of our organization have followed events in Kenya over the past month with a great sense of sadness, concern and apprehension. We send our condolences to the families who have lost loved ones and our pole to those who have been displaced. We hope that peace will be restored soon in Kenya

As a non-political organization, FOK has always refrained from expressing political views. We will continue to adhere to that policy and thus cannot support either President Kibaki or challenger Odinga.

However, we can and do take a stand in support of the Kenyan people. We support all Kenyan people at this time of crisis. We abhor ethnic enmity and tribal violence. We adamantly stand for truth and justice and call for the cessation of the senseless hostility that divides Kenyans from each other. We endorse the efforts of UN and African mediators to craft, along with Kenyan leaders from both sides, resolution to the crisis.

The toll in Kenya in lives, homes, jobs and prospects is already much too high. We deplore the destruction of neighborhoods and especially of the social comity that enabled Kenyans to mix together without rancor in pursuit of national development. It should be of highest priority to regain that lost ground, that togetherness, that sense of nationhood, that sense of being Kenyan. Success in pursuit of this goal will require a workable political settlement between the warring factions which is something that only they can author. The world insists that they achieve this. But beyond that Kenyans themselves will have to set aside suspicions and fears. Each person will have to take the brave steps to instill peace and forgiveness in his or her heart and to extend that peace to fellow citizens.

Friends of Kenya as an organization composed of individuals who harbor a great respect for Kenya want Kenyans to know of our concern for them and their nation at this time of crisis. We pray for peace and for reconciliation so that the nation that we all love so fondly might regain the vibrancy and the tolerance that served so well for generations.

Tribalism in Kenya

2008-01-09T08:22:00.000-08:00

Understanding Tribalism in Kenya

Recent rioting, score settling, ethnic cleansing and other tribally motivated violence in Kenya was sparked in the aftermath of the December 27, 2007 presidential election when incumbent president Mwai Kibaki, a Kikuyu, flat out stole the election. Opponent Raila Odinga, a Luo, had led in all polls and by early counts seemed to be almost a million votes ahead as tallies came in. When that reality struck, Kibaki and his “Kikuyu mafia” inner circle simply had the results changed to assure a second term. They were probably prepared to do this all along and probably correctly assessed they could get away with it. So far, they have succeeded, but not without turmoil.

It is not genocide

First, despite the horrific video clips of mobs and police running amuck, it is important to understand that what is happening in Kenya is not genocide. The situation is not analogous to what transpired in Rwanda or to what is ongoing in Darfur. In Kenya there is no government policy of extermination of an ethnic group. There are no government backed armed militias. There is no official propaganda machine egging murder on. In short, tribal violence in Kenya is not genocide; nor have killings occurred on a truly massive scale.

It is also important to point out that tribalism in Kenya is not atavistic. It does not arise from ancient hatreds or warfare from cultures clashing over the eons. In fact, the two opposing groups, the Luo of western Kenya from the shores of Lake Victoria and the Kikuyu from central Kenya surrounding Mt. Kenya, had little contact with one another until the 20th century. Accordingly, Kenya’s tribalism is a relatively new phenomenon. It is a product of modern times arising from colonialism, urbanization, the population explosion and independent Kenya’s political culture. Yet, however induced, the tension and the hatred are very real and quite damaging.

Historically apart

Traditionally in Kenya, tribes lived in their own distinct areas with their own cultures, i.e. language, customs, myths of origin, etc. People interacted from time to time with neighboring tribes with some sporatic clashing over cattle or land, but given the space available in lightly populated east Africa, what long term animosities that there were grew up between the nomadic cattle keepers – the Masai – and their sedentary neighbors – the Kikuyu and Kamba. The Luo and Kikuyu were separated by miles of inhospitable Masai and Nandi land. With the coming of Europeans, being Kenya’s largest groups as well as chiefly farmers, the Luo and the Kikuyu accepted outside ways, especially Christianity and education (the two often went hand-in-hand). Individuals from these tribes were at the forefront of early politics. Many moved from home areas to work on European farms or to the towns and cities. Thus the ethnic mix of present day Kenya began.

British rule in the colony was founded on the principle of divide and conquer. British administrators accentuated differences and sought to play groups off against each other. So from the beginning of multi-tribal life, seeds of discontent were sewn. Mau Mau compounded such distinctions when the British recruited Luo and other tribesmen into “loyalist” forces to combat Kikuyu nationalism. Negative tribal stereotypes became embedded in popular belief. Lazy, uncircumcised, fish-eating Luos contrasted with clever, cheating, arrogant Kikuyus. And so forth.

With the achievement of independence in 1963, the spoils of government accrued to the victors. First President Jomo Kenyatta rode multi-tribal support to office, but his regime reverted both to the reality and to the perception of favoritism towards the Kikuyu. This manifested itself in greater government expenditures for social infrastructure in Kikuyu areas, corruption benefits to insiders, privileged access to governmental and parastatal jobs. Such favoritism for one group was coupled with blatant discrimination against the other, including intimidation of opponents and even assassinations. Politics since has essentially pitted Kikuyu against Luos, with each side attempting to attract other tribal groups to its banners. This political struggle continued even while Daniel arap Moi, a Kalenjin, was president. Even though Kalenjins emerged as new contenders in the graft game, divide and rule tribalism remained the basis for politics wherein Luo and Kikuyu leaders vied for prominence either inside Moi’s camp or in opposition to him.

During the last half of the last century as Kenya’s economy grew and its population expanded, there was more movement of people, especially Kikuyu tribesmen into Rift Valley Province in search of land at the expense of Masai and Kalenjin groups. Also, Kikuyus were becoming Kenya’s small traders and as such establishing themselves in cities, towns and villages throughout the country. As is true with Jews and Koreans in American ghettos, Kikuyu traders were resented by the local population that viewed them as exploitative. Such resentment was reinforced by national politics when patronage jobs, contracts, secondary and university school slots, etc. went to Kikuyus at the expense of other tribes. Consequently, Kikuyu economic success (humble as it might be) was seen as due to unfair factors. Thus, the ethnic pot boiled over onto both national and local fires.

Passions enflamed

Even though Luos and Kikuyus reluctantly joined forces to oust President Moi in 2002, the coalition between Kibaki and Odinga quickly dissolved, essentially because Kibaki reneged on the power sharing terms. It was back to winner take all, divide and rule. In 2007 the election was more clearly cast as tribal, Kikuyu and affiliates versus Luo and allies. Election issues of change, economic and social policies got subsumed into tribalism. It was time, Odinga supporters argued, to rotate the presidency; time to try to improve a system that was not performing. This theme struck a chord among voters who rallied to Raila’s banner. Entrenched Kikuyu interests in the presidency, in the administration, in the courts, in the military and in the private sector opposed dissolution of the status quo. So far, they have shown the power to prevail.

The outburst of violence in the wake of the stolen election has to be seen as the eruption of frustrations due to that egregious act; the arrogance of which underscored the stereotypical conviction of Kikuyu pride. The wave of anti-Kikuyu emotion expressed the pain of democracy usurped. Sadly, Kikuyu people became easy targets, blamed as a group for the actions of the Kibaki clique. Rioting also expresses itself in anti-government actions, challenges to the police and the disruption of civil order. As in any such mob scene, those engaged in violence while espousing political motives, quickly moved to acts of personal vengeance, destruction, looting and crime. Sadly, as elsewhere in Africa, Kenya has an abundance of unemployed bored young men who are willing participants in violence. Once they have the taste for this odd sort of adventure, it is difficult to restrain them. Now, it will be hard to avoid the emergence of rival tribal militias.

What can be done?

I fear the social fabric of Kenya has been irreparably torn. The clock cannot be turned back. Ethnic cleansing has occurred. Kikuyu have been driven out of some areas, Luos and Luhyas from others. Loss of relatives, friends, livelihoods, homes and opportunities will only entrench hatred in the hearts of victims. Slowly, of course, life will return to more peaceful patterns, but there will be a consolidation of tribal enclaves, greater separatism and sensitivity to tribal slights. Rioters will fade away and/or be beaten into submission by the police. A grievous price will have been paid, most perniciously in terms of people’s faith in each other, but also in terms of the economic system and in politics. The venom of tribalism will poison the society for years to come.

Both Kenyans and outside friends, including the U.S., seek modalities to defuse the immediate crisis. The first espoused option is to encourage the formation of a government of national unity including both Kibaki and Odinga. Essentially this asks the winner Odinga to be magnanimous in victory and to concede defeat to the man who cheated him out of his win. Second is to re-do the election. Neither looks especially promising. If there is no progress of this sort, donors and friends of Kenya will likely keep the government at arm’s length. This will have consequences in terms of bilateral relations, aid budgets and Kenya's prestige in the international community. Shunning Kenya will undoubtedly impact adversely on tourism. Kibaki’s team, however, is probably prepared to sit tight, weather the storm, grant a concession here or there, but otherwise to wield power as before. However, none of the possible resolutions or next moves can diminish the fact that tribalism is loose in the land and that Kenyans are worse off for it.

Djibouti - I remember a Gift

2007-12-06T11:00:00.000-08:00

In 1986 I was making a tour of U.S. embassies in eastern Africa. I was in Djibouti, a small desert country at the southern mouth of the Red Sea. Neighboring Ethiopia and Somalia, then at relative peace, had been warring for years. As a result many thousands of ethnic Somali tribesmen from the Ogaden Region of Ethiopia had sought refuge in Djibouti. They were confined to United Nations run camps located in the arid hinterland of one of the most desolate nations in Africa. I visited one of the camps, which grouped several thousand refugees who had lived there for months; essentially on a moonscape.

This refugee camp was a bleak and seemingly hopeless place. Yet, the elders of the camp committee greeted me graciously and guided me on a tour of their squalid domain. Green plastic sheeting provided cover from the sun. Bags of U.S. donated maize and tins of vegetable oil were stacked in the food distribution warehouse. A one-tent school was operating, as was a small clinic. Flies buzzed incessantly. However, the camp committee was most anxious that I see their newly acquired well, water pump and garden.

We walked up a rock-strewn ravine past the cemetery where several new graves provided mute testimony to the ravages of disease and malnutrition. Beyond, nestled in slope of the valley in the region where there was not a blade of vegetation visible for miles, was a small patch of green. The elders showed me how boys carried water from the new well to the plots where they had managed to coax several scraggly tomato plants and other vegetables from the hard earth. The chief pointed with pride to the first water melon, about the size of a small soccer ball. He then had it picked. He presented it to me with great ceremony and thanks for America’s concern and assistance. I was overwhelmed. The camp’s children were desperate for this sort of nourishment, yet it was given unhesitating to a stranger – to someone who obviously had no need for it. Yet, I had to accept. This was a gift from the heart. I managed to utter thanks and a few words of encouragement. We then shared the bits of melon.

In the years since, I have always been struck how people with so little and with such great needs could give so easily. Yet we with so much, find it hard to give a little.

Zambia - Book Review of The Unheard

2007-11-30T09:49:00.000-08:00

The Unheard – a memoir of deafness and Africa

by Josh Swiller; Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2007

If you yearn to relive the angst, frustrations, self-doubt and self discovery of your Peace Corps experience, this may be the book for you. Josh Swiller who served in northern Zambia in the early 1990s was an unusual volunteer who apparently had an unusually conflict ridden tour. Perhaps, as he himself would admit, it was his combative personality, but also – as he repeatedly refers to in the book – it was because the town where he was assigned was just mean and devoid of effective leadership. In any case, common cultural misunderstandings often flared up into major confrontations, especially when our idealistic hero put his foot down and stood firm on his scruples.

Josh’s experience was sadly typical in many respects. He was puzzlement to the community. Why was he there? Why was he impotent to wave a magic wand and heal the diseased and dying or provide wells, jobs or education? Ultimately since he could not work wonders, what was amiss? On Josh’s side, he too wondered why he was there. What was he to do to promote development? And how to do it? Especially since the community’s response was nearly zero. Finally, what did he accomplish?

Josh carried an additional burden as a deaf man. He could partially understand one-on-one when his hearing aids were working, but in crowds or with background noise intelligible sounds ceased. Josh wrote frankly about his deafness and the issues that he had to deal with - exclusion from group conversations for example. But part of his motivation to join the Peace Corps was to find himself and to find a place where deafness mattered less. He said he found that in Zambia. Being white and American was odd enough; no one seemed concerned with his deafness.

Josh forged a solid friendship with Augustine Jere who served as his guide to Zambian culture and the strange town they lived in. Ultimately, this friendship was tested by culture and corrupt, even evil, circumstances. Without divulging the story, let me say that it tracks. Zambians, their town, expectations and frailties come alive. The author writes compellingly. Former PCVs will recognize the reality of the world Swiller so ably describes and will admire his tenacity even while deploring his (self admitted) foolishness in attempting to deal with it.

Reviewed by Robert E. Gribbin, December 2007

Book review - The Camel Bookmobile

2007-11-17T12:50:00.000-08:00

The Camel Bookmobile

Marsha Hamilton

Harper Collins, New York, 2007

This novel has an odd, but quite descriptive title. The story revolves around a camel carried bookmobile that operates out of Garissa into Kenya’s northern reaches. The delivery of books to isolated nomadic villages brings into play the tension of the novel - the clash of worlds. Modern Africa and America represented by the books and the warm-hearted do-gooder young New York librarian on one hand and the tradition bound villagers of Midima on the other.

Books turn the village topsy turvy. Some welcome the introduction of new ideas and wider windows on the world. They – a teacher, a progressive grandmother and many youths – see that change in Kenya is inevitable and that the village or at least some villagers ought to join the outside world. Elders and cynics scorn the effort seeing it realistically as undermining the culture, tradition and bush knowledge that sustained the tribe for generations.

Our heroine Fi Sweeny brings her naiveté about Africa and western values to bear. She gets caught up in the inner tensions of village relationships where she herself is a catalyst interrupting the predictability of rural timelessness. As is true with PCVs, Fi learns more about love, hope, and life than she gives in her exchanges with villagers. The engaging story plays out against the backdrop of impending drought where the very survival of the semi-nomadic people is menaced.

The various elements of the plot and characters permit the author to observe alternatively cynically or sympathetically about the intrusions of the modern world into traditional life, the role of women and motivations behind humanitarian good works. The various characters are nicely developed. The village setting is authentically rendered. The story has good pace and keeps the reader guessing until the end.

Nigeria - book review of Half of a Yellow Sun

2007-09-26T08:02:00.001-07:00

Book: Half of a Yellow Sun

Author: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Published: Farafina, Lagos 2006

Reviewer: Robert E. Gribbin

I spent the last three months in Nigeria. It was indeed a fascinating place. Under new President Yar'Adua it was full of energy and the expectation that problems can be solved and that the nation can look forward to a brighter, more prosperous future. Nigeria today has moved far beyond the passions of the 1967-70 Biafran civil war, yet some of the issues of disenfranchisement and tribalism remain as troublesome impediments to true national unity. Chimamanda Adichie's novel, that all of Nigeria is reading, is a haunting reminder of the enmity of the war, the arrogance, the violence and the hardship that was visited upon the Igbo people.

The title of the novel evokes the half of a yellow sun that was the central emblem on the Biafran flag. The sun also figured on the uniforms of Biafran soldiers. The half sun initially is symbolically seen as a rising sun representing the hopes and expectations of the new state. However, as the story progresses and Biafra descends into a besieged hell of poverty, starvation and collapse, the sun is clearly setting. Dreams are over and lives are irreparably changed.

The story focuses on a rich Igbo family, especially twin sisters, Olanna and Kainene, whose personalities are quite different. Tracking them and their various relationships to family, lovers and friends provides background for the war and a soap operatic setting for the plot that finally gathers together and moves forward seriously to delve into what happens when the normal stresses of living are overwhelmed by senseless violence. Much of the novel is viewed through the perspective of Igwu, a young naive houseboy called to service in the home of Professor Odengigbo, a fervent believer in the Biafran cause, who becomes Olanna's husband. Although Igwu does not understand his social superiors, he carefully observes them and gets to love them (and they him). Several delightful passages in the novel reflect Igwu's village naivete when he puzzles about middle class life style.

Hanging over the domesticity of Odengibo and Olanna's university household in Igbo territory were the tribal politics of Nigeria in the sixties. Following the assassination of Prime Minister Balewa (a northerner) in 1966 by Igbo officers, a series of pogroms and massacres were visited upon Igbo migrants in northern Nigeria. Thousands died and tens of thousands retreated to the Igbo heartland. Another coup d'etat brought northern officers to power. Rejecting that change, Igbo nationalists declared Biafra independent. The Federal Government responded by beginning a "police action" that morphed into civil war.

Although it only presents the Igbo perspective, this book is not about the politics of the war. Rather, it is about people - rich, middle class and peasant alike - all of whom become victims of forces beyond their control. Part of the tragedy of the Biafran civil war was the absolute conviction by the Igbo people, as represented by characters in the novel, that their destiny was to be free and independent. Consequently, they stoically accepted the enormous hardship visited upon them as Biafra was battered and starved into submission. This is that story: the pride, the courage, the resourcefulness and the initiative as folks coped with the collapse of their lives, with death, disease, starvation, betrayal and ultimately, defeat.

The central characters of the novel fill out nicely as the story progresses. They become real as they struggle with circumstances and against the doom that the reader knows lies ahead. Dramatically told, Chimamanda Adichie has written a compelling narrative of human resilience in the face of tragedy.

Sudan's Lost Boys - a book review

2007-09-06T04:15:00.000-07:00

What Is the What – the Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng

Dave Eggers, McSweeney’s, San Francisco, 2006

Whew! In novel form this book tells all you ever needed to know about the Lost Boys of Sudan. The story begins with the civil war violence in 1983 that shattered the peaceful villages where Sudanese of various backgrounds lived together more or less harmoniously. Fleeing destruction of their world by Arab marauders, first hundreds, then thousands, even ten thousands of black African youngsters – mostly boys, but a few girls and later whole families - began to trek from their villages into the unknown in search of safety and peace. Months and hundreds of miles later, these refugees found little succor in squalid camps in Ethiopia. Later they were forced to move hundreds more miles back through the Sudan into northern Kenya. There they settled into a teeming camp that became home for ten years. Finally, several thousand of these wanderers were granted refuge in America.

Their walk was of epic proportions. The traumatized children were afflicted by disease, weariness, malnutrition, hunger, lack of leadership and rogue SPLA soldiers. They were pursued by raiders, shunned by most villagers, attacked by government warplanes and some were eaten by lions. Yet they mustered their courage, buried their dead along the way, supported one another and buoyed by hope, they marched onward across the swamps and deserts of Sudan. Pinyudo camp in Ethiopia was not the paradise they envisaged, but offered a year’s respite. Yet that too unraveled in an orgy of violence. Again the boys trudged onward. Beset by troubles and responsibilities that most children never encounter, they grew up on the walk and in the camps.

They settled into a more predictable limbo in Kakuma camp in northern Kenya where they went to school and became young adults. Ultimately as word of their travails spread, several thousand Lost Boys and Girls were admitted into the United States to begin new lives in America. It was a dream, but the reality of the dream was fraught with new obstacles of how to cope with America and how to come to terms with themselves and their pasts.

The novelization of Achak’s story with him as an engaging narrator permits the Lost Boys saga to be told in detail and with great emotion. The author uses flashbacks from present day Atlanta to recall events. Achak’s insight into himself and his relationships with others is genuinely touching. Not only are readers educated on the terrors of Sudan and the trek, but also on the reality that unsophisticated young African men confront in contemporary American society.

Geographical fault finder that I am, I noted two errors: Kitale, Kenya was referred to as Ketale in several passages and Kenyatta Airport was regularly misspelled as Kinyatta.

In summary, the saga of the Lost Boys is overwhelming. This book delivers a full dose of intensity - at times it was too much. I had to take a few breaks. Even so, What is the What is a worthy read. Finally, even though it was mentioned from time to time during the narrative, I never really understood what the what might be – perhaps some sort of universal truth - so the title of the book escaped me entirely.

Rwanda Abolishes Capital Punishment

2007-08-16T00:38:00.000-07:00

On July 25, 2007 the government of Rwanda abolished capital punishment. This carefully considered decision sent different messages throughout society. Some citizens were heartened; others quite distressed. However, in several ways the decision will permit the justice system to function more effectively in bringing the many thousands still charged with genocide and crimes against humanity to answer for their actions. Those already convicted and sentenced to die will while out their days in jail.

Lack of accountability for crimes of ethnic hatred was among the contributing factors to the 1994 genocide. Perpetrators of sporadic pogroms aimed at the Tutsi since 1960 had never been held accountable. This impunity led planners of the 1994 event to believe that they too could escape punishment for the ethnic slaughter they unleashed. However, despite the murder of nearly a million people, the perpetrators did not escape. Many were apprehended and held for trial.

Ending impunity and trying over 100,000 persons for genocide crimes was and remains a complicated task. Trials began in 1997 and the first convictions occurred in that year when execution was the law of the land.

In my book In the Aftermath of Genocide: the U.S. Role in Rwanda I write about the executions that occurred on April 25, 1998. Twenty-two persons died that day, four in Kigali.

“In Kigali the four convicted – Froudouard Karamira, Silas Munyagishari, Elie Nshimiyimana, and Virginie Mukankusi – were brought by truck to a field outside the Nyamirambo stadium. About twenty thousand persons somberly watched as the genocidaires were lined up, tied to stakes, and black hoods slid over their heads. There was no ceremony. A team of soldiers shot them at close range with automatic rifles. Another soldier administered a pistol coup de grace to each head. It was quickly finished. The bodies were carted away in the same truck that brought them. The crowd dispersed.

“The government had made its point. Impunity was at an end…. Having made the point the government carried out no further executions in 1998. This restraint began to pose a problem. I did not think the government wanted to execute the hundreds or possibly thousands of prisoners who would be given capital punishment. That would be a lot of vengeance for one government to administer. Suppose then that only the worst offenders were chosen for execution – but how to choose? They would all be convicted under the same law, and all equally guilty. Rwanda’s solution to this conundrum seems to be patience. Those sentenced to die remain in prison awaiting the carrying out of their punishment.”

Since those first executions, no further were done. About a thousand persons have been sitting on death row since 1998 with more added each year. Annulling the death penalty will now commute death sentences to life imprisonment. This relieves the government of the problem of potentially having to execute a thousand prisoners. Of course, it avoids the international outcry that would have resulted if a program of such executions were begun. Presumably the prisoners and their families welcome the change. Opponents of the death penalty are also pleased as are Rwandans who believe that national reconciliation can best be accomplished without further shedding of blood. Yet many survivors are disappointed and dismayed, even feeling betrayed. They had long awaited a final rendition of justice for those who murdered family and friends. They seek a sense of closure they will never have.

On the wider perspective of justice, absence of the death penalty opens the door for the extradition of genocidaires identified and even arrested in Europe, Canada and in other non-capital punishment nations. Heretofore such nations refused to extradite accused to Rwanda on account of the possibility of capital punishment. Now, they will be expected to comply with proper extradition requests. Similarly with the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda that sits is Arusha, Tanzania. One impediment to close cooperation between the ICTR and Rwandan judicial officials was the existence of the death penalty. With the annulment cooperation should improve. Over the longer term as the ICTR winds up operations in coming years, cases can be transferred to Rwanda for adjudication and convicts for incarceration.

In summary, given the circumstances abolishing the death penalty was the right thing to do. Domestically, Rwandans know that impunity is finished and that justice is being meted out. Genocidaires are answering for their crimes. Life in an African prison is no bed of roses. Internationally, Rwanda is doing the right thing that enhances its reputation and its ability to apprehend more of the “big fish” genocidaires.

Nigeria - The Irony of Kleptocracy

2007-08-16T00:34:00.000-07:00

By all reports Nigeria is among the most corrupt nations on earth. Little is accomplished without due consideration. Sadly, corruption has become the political and economic culture of the country. Patron-client relationships govern all aspects of life. For example, candidates for political office are nominated and selected by cultivating supporters with funds and promises. Such comity is extended with the certainty that when installed in office, officials will royally compensate their sponsors from government treasuries. Patronage includes flat out payments with diverted money, as well as jobs, travel, special privileges – building plots in cities, for example - and other patently illegal transactions including un-competed contracts and payments for projects that are not just never completed, but never begun at all. Moreover, people expect to pay “fees” for any service – public or private

Not only are billions in oil revenues blatantly misused, but a portion of Nigeria’s oil wealth is stolen daily via the simple means of pumping crude from isolated wellheads or draining a pipeline. More sophisticated theft involves over-invoicing, under-loading or a variety of slights-of-hand with documents.

Even the criminal system operates through corruption. Internet scams that capitalize on greed reflect endemic acceptance of corruption. Although violent theft and carjackings are commonplace, there has been a rising tide of kidnapping for ransom, extortion and protection rackets.

Because of embedded corruption nothing works efficiently or effectively, but the largest loss to society is that little of Nigeria’s enormous wealth is invested productively for the benefit of the nation. Roads are woeful, the railroad defunct, port infrastructure dilapidated, refineries inoperative and power generation minimal. The industrial sector is faltering and agriculture all but collapsed. Schools, hospitals, and clinics operate under shameful conditions. Most quality of life indicators are in decline. All this in one of the world’s great producers of hydrocarbons!

Is there hope for reform? Well, yes, a little. Successive governments, including the new administration of President Yar Adua have created and empowered anti-corruption commissions designed to identify and prosecute the worst offenders. So far, while some “big men” have been called to account, the record is not encouraging that such institutions can stem the tide. Concomitantly, however, there is increased understanding by civil society organizations, the people as a whole and even elected officials that the system is not tenable over the long haul. Anarchy, as is now occurring in the delta region is a reality that might spread. Disaffection leading to Islamic fundamentalism in the north is also on the rise. Fear of such threats to the state strengthens reform elements.

The irony is that had Nigeria’s wealth been properly invested, the whole economy would have expanded dramatically. All ships would have risen on the rising tide, including those of the small numbers of elite who have benefited disproportionately from corruption. Instead of the distortion that now exists with one percent of the population outlandishly rich, a small middle class composing a second tier and a poverty stricken majority in a distant last place, Nigeria might have more equitable income distribution and a public sector to be proud of.

East Africa - Paul Theroux's Dark Star Safari

2007-07-13T15:59:00.000-07:00

Following is a review of Paul Theroux's latest travel book, which is now several years old. The review also appears on the web site of the Friends of Kenya.

Dark Star Safari by Paul Theroux,Houghton Mifflin, NY 2003

Dark Star Safari – Overland from Cairo to Cape Town marked Theroux’s return to Africa in the year 2000 after thirty years absence. He strove to travel the length of the continent as a solo voyager using local transportation such as buses, trucks and trains. Using his other travel books as models, he closely observed those whom he met and commented trenchantly, candidly and cynically about them. The value of the book is that Theroux writes so well that his observations ring of truthfulness – whether or not they are accurate. The compilation of anecdotes forms a body of work that paints a realistic picture of contemporary Africa. Furthermore, because he revisits territory and situations known to RPCVs, we have the advantage of seeing again places and people we once encountered.

Since this column focuses on Kenya, I will confine myself to comments about the East Africa section of Theroux’s journey, i.e. Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Theroux came down the great north road from Moyale on a cattle truck, an overlander truck and with a missionary. Because he was refused a ride, Theroux gave vent to his negative opinion of AID workers and their undertakings. “They were in general oafish self-dramatizing prigs, and often complete bastards.” Theroux, however, was an equal opportunity basher, noting the provinciality of Kenya’s northern residents who were apprehensive about troubles in Ethiopia, Theroux observed, “These ignorant inhabitants, traveling on a hideous road in an over-heated desert, in a neglected province of one of the most corrupt and distressed and crime-ridden countries in Africa, regarded sunny, threadbare, but dignified Ethiopia as a war zone.” As did the locals Theroux feared shifta bandits. He was told by a driver, however, “They do not want your life, bwana, they want your shoes.” Theroux reflected that indeed human life was cheap in Africa; shoes had more utility.

Seeing the slums outside Nairobi, Theroux said, “it was clear that the Kenya I had known was gone. I didn’t mind; perhaps the newness would make this trip all the more memorable.” Theroux did find a new Kenya, where inhabitants were savaged by Moi’s thugs, harassed on crowded crime ridden streets, governed by a self-serving ruling class, afflicted by HIV/AIDS and gripped by a sense of desperation that he encountered in all African cities. He noted that whenever a city grew bigger, “it got uglier, messier, more dangerous, an effect of bad planning, underfunding and graft.”

The author did not stay long in Nairobi but hurried on through Nakuru, Kericho and Kisumu. He was not impressed. He noted the lack of any modern development. He blamed ineffectual international assistance programs for being a complete waste of money, but also recognized that Africans themselves had botched most opportunities. He saw one “booming industry” upon leaving Kisumu – coffin makers – “a perfect image for a country that seemed terminally ill.”

Theroux returned to his personal past in Kampala where he had taught for several years at Makerere University. He found Uganda marginally better than Kenya; at least it was imbued with a sense of forward motion. In contacting old friends he discovered that the surroundings of the political debates had changed, but the underlying terms were the same. How to develop? Who should rule? How? What systems would work for Africa? Obviously there were no answers to these questions. While awaiting permission to board a lake ferry, Theroux wandered around the city he once knew and reflected on the changes wrought by thirty years in Uganda, in Ugandans, and in himself.

Finally aboard a rail-car carrier to Mwanza, Theroux entered into a Zen like state that would successfully carry him across the lake, on by rail to Dar and via the TanZam towards Malawi. Although he enjoyed the people, Theroux observed, “The dogmatic, motto-chanting Tanzanians had been humbled. No one talked of imperialism and neocolonialism now, nor of the evils of capitalism – though they could have, for even capitalism had failed in Tanzania.”

Errors: I always stumble upon geographical mix-ups. I am surprised that “fact checkers” don’t do a better job. Talking about volcanoes, Theroux said that “Mt. Lengai in Rwanda” was erupting. However, Mt. Lengai is dormant and in Tanzania. All the Rwandan volcanoes are dormant, but Mts. Nyiragongo and Nyamulagira in neighboring Congo remain active. Theroux noted that he had hoped to visit “Kabila” in western Uganda to see chimpanzees. There is no Kabila. I assume he meant Kabale Forest where chimps are easily seen. Similarly, he listed Lake Tanzania as one of the East African great lakes. Its name is Tanganyika.

Theroux ‘s journey began before East Africa and continued on afterwards. His take on other countries and people encountered are equally realistic, albeit amusing or infuriating. Theroux wanted to be in-the-mix, but not of it. He sought to retain a dispassionate perspective, but never hesitated to share scathing judgments. He was proud of his undertaking, but arrogant in judging that the sojourns, travels, observations and works of others were somehow less noble. Even so, a reader cannot help but like the guy. He went and did it and told it like he saw it.

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USA - Drive to Alaska

2007-07-10T17:03:00.000-07:00

Following is a piece that I did for the Washington Post travel section, but they have not used it yet.

The Trip: A fifteen thousand mile odyssey from Virginia to the land of the midnight sun – west across the prairies, north along the spine of the Rockies, up the Alcan Highway, north to Dawson, Yukon, “Top of the World” highway into Alaska, north to the Artic Circle, then almost every road in that vast state (there are not that many), back south on the ferry through the inside passage, zip across the lower 48 to home. Whew!

Who went? Me; Connie, my wife, and our 2003 Jeep.

When? July to mid-September.

Why? I had been there briefly in 1992 and knew that Alaska needed more time. There is just too much to see. Recently retired, we had the time and the vehicle; besides, we had not been on a really good road trip since driving around East Africa for two months in 1999.

How long? We did not rush. Twelve weeks.

Getting there was …three quarters of the adventure. Each day was new. The road rolled out before us. Mountains loomed, glaciers gushed, bears prowled, flowers bloomed in profusion, rivers roared, fish jumped. Most roads were well paved and, once past the Canadian mountain parks, traffic was light.

First Alaskan moment: Stopping in the rain and mud at the ramshackle log cabin café at Boundary replete with moose antlers and assorted junk stacked around the yard, but a warm welcome, hot coffee and cinnamon buns inside.

Best museums: A guided walking tour of historical buildings – the court house, customs house, old church, and the army post - in the town of Eagle (population 60) exposed a rich trove of sleds, vehicles, pelts and paraphernalia from the gold rush era 100 years ago. Eagle has few visitors so everything was hands on – touch, sit, feel. A second delight was the hammer collection in Haines that displays virtually thousands of hammers of all descriptions. I also recommend the state museum in Anchorage, the oil pipeline display in Valdez, sourdough cabins in Hope, and Native American artists at work in Sitka.

It was all worth it when…. after two days of camping in the cold rain and mist at Wonder Lake in Denali Park, I arose at 3:00 am and in the dawn’s early light discovered Mt. McKinley, the mother of mountains, towering above. She was out and crystal clear for two days, fading again into the clouds only when we departed.

Wildlife: We saw lots of bears – black, grizzly, brown – along the Alcan, and all around Alaska, but especially in Denali Park where we also had encounters with moose, wolves, caribou and ground squirrels. In the waters we saw tens of thousands of salmon spawning, otters floating, sea lions bellowing and whales breaching. Eagles, hawks, puffins and kittiwake gulls crowded the skies. Good binoculars were essential.

Scariest moments: We hiked for several hours daily – rain or shine. In Alaska we had lots of rain. I wore bear bells and when evidence, i.e. fresh scat, indicated ursine presence nearby, I clapped and sang out, “I can run fastest. Catch Connie!” Fortunately, this was effective; the only bear I met at close quarters completely ignored me.

Best golf: Yes, I carted my clubs along. The links type course at Haines cannot be bested anywhere in the world for its spectacular setting along the fiord surrounded by snow capped mountains and hanging glaciers. It was a decent nine hole layout as well, but the eagles all stayed in the trees.

Thrill: Flying in a small plane below the mountain peaks over the vast Davison glacier and looking up to spot mountain goats on the ledges.

Favorite meal: An hour long boat ride from Homer took us to Halibut Cove, an artists’ enclave, where we dined at The Saltry on scrumptious fresh seafood before a roaring fire on the covered outdoor deck. A good bottle of wine made it perfect!

Hostelries: We stayed at brand name motels, mom and pop’s, even a double wide motel, b&b’s, our tents, with friends, park and fishing lodges, and a cabin on the ferry. We especially liked two old hotels with the charm of an earlier epoch: the Van Gilder in Seward and Hotel Halsingland in Haines. Be warned, however, that all lodging in Alaska – no matter the quality – is about twice the price of “outside,” i.e. the lower 48.

Biggest disappointment: Not the bugs, the distance, the prices, my failure to catch a really big fish, but the weather. August/September 2006 was mostly chilly (day time highs in the fifties at best) and wet. However, long daylight was nice and the few sunny days were magnificent.

While we were there: Alaskans squabbled, then elected a newcomer woman governor over seasoned pros. They voted a cruise ship tax (that will be passed on to passengers.) They vociferously debated routing of a natural gas pipeline, whined about federal controls on federal land, rejoiced in the $1000 per capita payout from the state’s Permanent Fund, bemoaned the extension of the 81st Stryker Brigade in Iraq, and mourned the passing of Iditarod legend, Susan Butcher.

Kenya - Not so Ferocious African Bees

2007-06-15T05:22:00.000-07:00

As a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kenya in the late sixties, I shared a ramshackle European farm house with two other PCVs. Despite its dilapidation, it was certainly not a rural African hut. We had indoor plumbing, running water (when the 1913 vintage pump could be coaxed into operation), electrical outlets (but no generator), even a phone line and telephone number (but no instrument). Nonetheless, it was acceptable shelter.

What did remain magnificent, however, were the flowers. We had a profusion of roses, day lilies and flowering bushes of all types. Orange and lime trees continued to produce abundantly. The most redolent white trumpet shaped flowers grew on bushes some ten feet high. We called them the bee trees because they attracted bees. Hundreds, if not thousands, buzzed around incessantly. When the indoor plumbing was inoperative on account of lack of water, the dash through the bee trees to the outdoor facility had to be timed so as not to agitate the bees. Even so, we got used to them and coexisted amiably.

One of my housemates, Dennis, observed one day that the bees were getting louder and flying constantly around the windows to his room. Investigation behind the shrubs showed that, sure enough, bees were streaming in and out of the crawl space. Our Nandi tribesman night watchman, confirmed that bees had moved in and were making honey. He proposed a solution. He said he had some friends who knew bees and collected honey. In exchange for the bulk of the honey, they would rid us of the hive. We cut the deal. Within a day or two, one of the experts inspected the site. He said his team would return when the time was right.

We waited expectantly, but no one showed. The dry hot days stretched out. The bees buzzed. Dennis could not sleep at night from the hum below. Finally, the rains began, first in the afternoon, followed by a long evening soak. The next rainy night the bee men arrived. In the pouring rain, they stripped naked, busted into the crawl space, pushed a smoky torch under the house (I feared they’d burn the whole place down) and began passing out buckets of honey comb. Soon they located the queen, placed her and a quivering mass of insects into a paper box to cart off to more salubrious surroundings.

With some delight one of the bee men told me that bees did not associate wet hairless human skin with the enemy. However, they would attack furry creatures with frenzy. Woe be to the bee man who was not shaven! The night, the smoke and the rain also confused the bees, impeded flying and communication.

We got a half bucket of delicious honey out of the deal and patched up the hole the next morning.

Kenya - The Struggle for Democracy

2007-06-01T07:39:00.000-07:00

This is a book review of a new academic oriented collection of essays about Kenya's democractic prospects.

Kenya – The Struggle for Democracy

Godwin R. Murunga & Shadrack W. Nasong’o, editors

Zed Books, NY, 2007

Kenya – The Struggle for Democracy, still hot from the printer, is a compilation of scholarly essays about contemporary Kenya. The individual pieces are honest and blunt. Authors make no effort to hide prejudices that are aimed at colonialism, the Kenyatta and Moi regimes. Judgments on the Kibaki era are hedged, but various contributors fear it too is becoming engulfed in the same vortex of oligarchic power that has plagued Kenya for generations.

The editors state at the outset that contributors to the book are young academics not tainted by sell-out to the system. Further, the editors claim, young academics never benefited from mentoring that ought to have been their due from the previous generation (who did sell out). This is only the first of many themes of opportunities lost that run through the tome.

Readers be warned that Kenya – The Struggle for Democracy is an academic book replete with footnotes and citations of other learned works. Language too is quite erudite – often it seems deliberately so – sentences occasionally need several readings in order to make sense. Yet, there is a great deal of extremely good sense in this book.

The overall thrust of the book is to discuss in the Kenyan context the various elements that make up a democratic society. The basic charge against Kenya is that colonialism extended into Kenyattaism and Moism and even Kibakism without substantial change in the format of how government works, i.e. by coercion and intimidation. Although the leadership changed, authoritarian rule only became worse as Kenyatta and Moi expanded the powers of the presidency and then used those powers to assure their predominance. Yet against this backdrop, there was throughout an effort by many to push for democracy, popular participation and accountability. Topics covered in the book include the evolution of civil society organizations, the growth of religious movements and their political roles, the problems encountered by opposition political parties, the growth of youth movements and abuses of the same during multiparty elections, the stymied participation of women, missed opportunities by intellectuals, abuses perpetrated by the police, the impact of structural adjustment policies and the confusing roles of donors.

I judged the chapter on political parties to be among the most interesting, not only for its accurate history of the convoluted opposition to the Kenyatta and Moi regimes, but more on account of the analysis of why opposition did not function well and continues to operate poorly. The explanation that African polities do not accommodate a loyal opposition, i.e. you are either with me or an enemy, rings true in the Kenyan context, but is buttressed by the fact that no parties, expect perhaps KANU for a time, really have had any existence outside an electoral period. Beyond temporary coalitions designed solely to oust Moi, Kenya has no parties of issues –– only parties of “big men” who organize, pay for and selfishly direct “their” parties. This explains why Kenya has 55 registered parties, most of which are simply vehicles for personal ambitions. The author of this chapter argued that until political parties themselves become internally democratic they cannot become “democratic institutions” and realistically foment democracy.

The chapter on women explained convincingly how women were sidelined from national life during the last half century. The exclusion they experienced during colonial times arose mostly from the nature of their subsistence labor which kept them out of the “modern” sector and away from education. Such marginalization was augmented after independence when a perverted form of “traditional” patriarchy pushed them further into the corners of national life. Today Kenyan women account for only 6 percent of public figures; nearly last place in Africa. One solution might be an electoral system of proportional representation for Parliament. Countries with these systems, such as Rwanda (48 %), tend to have much higher proportions of women in public roles.

The discussion of intellectuals was a telling indictment by the author of his peers. He alleged that Kenyan intellectuals have not stood up to their responsibility to foster democracy. Several reasons for this lacuna are put forward: fear of reprisals,love of the good life, co-optation by the powers-that-be, failure of the older generation to give way to the new or simply shirking of duty. The introspection shown by this chapter demonstrates the guilt felt by many intellectuals for the failure of Kenya, both historically and currently, to achieve its democratic potential.

The chapter on the police provided details on how the police and security services evolved under Kenyatta and Moi to become the essential bulwark of presidential power. Instances of assassination, torture, and other egregious abuses of authority are cited as well as the erosion of the rule of law and the compromise of the judiciary. It is a troubling read, but necessary to understand the fear and intimidation that permeated political society and kept the opposition in check. The author hopes that under Kibaki abuses are being corrected, but gives little evidence that the system has undergone fundamental reform.

Finally, the book concludes with two chapters that link Kenya’s political troubles and tensions of the last half century to its economic woes. There were certainly causal links as bad decisions (both political and economic) and bad luck (mostly economic) led to a spiral of decline. The poor internal Kenyan economic dynamic was further destabilized by changing and contradictory policies imposed by the World Bank, IMF and donor nations. Although there is an effort to level blame for economic failures, there is more of an explanation of what happened and an appeal for consistency in the future.

Kenya – The Struggle for Democracy, is full of current information and realistic history. For those ready for a graduate-school level tome, it is a useful guide to crucial Kenyan issues.

Central African Republic - "Passing Through"

2007-05-16T11:42:00.000-07:00

Following is a story I wrote based on my experience as Vice Consul in Bangui. Although elements of the piece are true, overall it is fiction.

Passing Through

It had been a good month for vendors, but poor for commerce. The string of salesmen stopping by home or office in the shady African backwater capital had offered poached ivory - usually small tusks indicating taken from females – smelly leopard skins, or carefully produced leather pouches containing a half dozen little brown stones – diamonds they averred. A few businessmen laid out artistic wares, mostly masks from neighboring Zaire. I was intrigued by a few of those, but had only added one to my collection. As for the ivory and leopard skins I explained that international commerce in either was illegal so I could not and would not buy. The seller, of course, saw this riposte as a bargaining ploy and tried to haggle on. I usually listened to the diamond merchants’ stories about how these were from a clandestine dig, had been brought home by a brother, were the family treasure but now needed to be sold for medicine – ergo, they could be had cheaply. I had no ability to tell if the little rocks were uncut diamonds, pieces of glass or whatever, but I did suggest that the purveyor take them to the American-owned, diamond purchasing office downtown for analysis and possible purchase. Once I asked Fred, the U.S. rep for the office, if any walk-ins really had good stuff. He said that often they did have small industrial grade stones, which, he said, reflected nation-wide artisan production. Only once, he told me, had he really bought a very nice gem stone from a street vendor. He cautioned me not to buy raw diamonds from anyone. He added that the broken glass sellers never stopped by his place for an estimate.

Lately, there was a new wrinkle to sales pitches. Emile, the receptionist buzzed me to advise that a “commercant” wanted to see me. This gent was well dressed and spoke good French. He said he had come upon a “strategic material” that he knew the U.S. needed to corral. After prodding, he confided that it was the uranium used in nuclear bombs. It had come from mines in Zaire. Although he said he could not reveal how he had come to possess it, he affirmed it was radioactive. I asked him to describe what he was talking about: was it liquid or solid, how was it packed? How did he know it was radioactive?

In reply he said it was solid. That answer immediately piqued my interest. This was not just another “red lead” approach. Mercury that had been used in various sorts of x-ray machines circulated in little vials throughout Central Africa. If some of this stuff was slightly radioactive, that was nothing compared to its danger as mercury – especially when used by some “guérisseur” as part of a local cure. Given America’s nuclear might, red lead was flogged from time to time by the street vendors that came to see me.

I remembered a cable from Kinshasa several months back that detailed the disappearance some years ago of a very small quantity of material from the nuclear facility at the university there. Apparently the stolen stuff had no possible weapons implications, but it was real, processed, radioactive and possibly dangerous if kept near people. At the time I had visions of a whole family being poisoned from sleeping near a little brown suitcase with the missing uranium in it.

I asked for a moment, dug out the cable – I did do a little proper filing now and then – and warned my interlocutor of what he might have. He was crestfallen when I said the U.S. government did not want to purchase his item. He blustered that he would go to the French, Soviets or Chinese. I said fine, his stuff really had no value except at the research center from which it had been stolen. He left in a huff.

I recounted this encounter to Joe, the Peace Corps director, over our luncheon beer on the terrace of the New Palace Hotel. Joe, in turn, passed on word from a PCV in Mbaiki, a town at the edge of the great Congo basin forest, some seventy miles south of town. Rob reported that he had first heard about then finally met a bedraggled “blanc” in the market. The man in question said his name was Thomas (pronounced Tow-ma in the French fashion) and that he was an American. Rob invited him home for a meal and heard a bit of his story. Essentially Thomas had been living with a pygmy band for over a year roaming through the vast forest.

Except for a missionary zealot who had vanished while testing the upper rapids of the Oubangui River some ten years earlier – and was presumably eaten by crocodiles - I had no current lookouts for missing Americans. Thomas intrigued us. Was his story truthful and if so, why? We mulled it over, but having run into a number of wayward individuals over the years, reckoned that he probably had his motives. I had no mandate to go look for this guy, but asked Joe to tell Rob to tell Thomas that if he needed any assistance to come see me.

Over the next couple of days, I thought more about Thomas. I grew curiouser and curiouser. Why would some one purposely seek out a stone age existence? Not just for a week or two as an adventure, but for a year or more. I decided to touch base with the local pygmy watchers. Ian, a Quebecois, was part of a university medical team studying pygmies. I had visited their field clinic in the forest. They measured, took blood, obtained family histories, etc. all part of a greater quest to find Eve, the mother of us all. Ian confirmed that his team had picked up rumors from pygmy contacts to the effect that a white shadow was lurking deep in the forest. He thought that was a relatively new phenomenon, but added that the pygmies were full of apocryphal stories. It was impossible to separate fiction from fact. My other pygmy expert was a missionary whose group was translating the Bible into African tongues, including Yaka, the language of the Bayaka, the pygmies of the region. Jim said they started with a few Bible stories like Joseph’s coat of many colors and David and Goliath, both of which had worked well elsewhere in country. He candidly confessed, however, that neither story registered with the pygmies. They did not wear clothes, so coveting a coat made no sense. Additionally, they were not at all violent, so a war based story was equally irrelevant. But in response to my question about a white guy with a pygmy band, Jim hadn’t heard it.

Then in one of those serendipitous moments, Emile buzzed to say that a Monsieur Thomas was there to see me. Yep, he was as described – a gaunt, pale-faced young man sporting a scraggly beard. He wore an old tee shirt, shorts and flip flops. He held an Australian bush hat in hand. Introducing himself as Thomas Breaux, he said he heard from Rob that I might help him. I noted that as the American Vice Consul I was charged with seeing to the welfare of Americans in the country. There were things I could do and things I couldn’t. But first, I asked that he tell me about himself. I was curious as to why he was living with pygmies.

He stumbled at first, advised that he had not spoken much English lately. He also seemed reluctant to tell much, so I just got a bare outline. He had been with an overland London to Nairobi group called Siafu. Thomas said group dynamics were poor; people were selfish, bickering and snarling at each other after several weeks in the truck. He’d had enough, so when they camped near Boda to photo the pygmies, Thomas said he packed his stuff, told the driver to screw himself and walked away. After the overlanders left, he gradually became friendly with Adamo, one of the young Bayaka men. He later learned that his friend was just a visitor to the fringes of civilization. His family group lived far off in the forest. To make things short, he accompanied Adamo on his return trip home. They walked for several weeks. By then Thomas said he was so lost in the forest that he had no way out, even if he wanted to leave.

Instead Thomas said he adjusted, took each day as it came – just like the pygmies did. He gradually learned their language. As his cigarettes and lighter expired, he lost what utility he had to them, although certainly he retained his entertainment value. The pygmies laughed a lot – at him, at each other, at themselves. They always saw the bright side of circumstances. Life was uncomplicated. Search for food, link up nets for hunting, pause for a while in this or that camp, then move on. Although puzzled over him, the small band included Thomas without rancor. Thomas said he learned an enormous amount of forest lore, some Bayaka songs, but more especially the value of human relationships, of gentleness, tolerance and inclusion. He admitted that he needed that healing. When the time came several weeks ago, when Adamo told him they were approaching a town, Thomas said he too knew that his sojourn with the people of the forest was over.

He guessed he needed to reconnect and to tell his father where he was. Their last contact came before Thomas left New York. I offered to stake him to a phone call, but he demurred. His telex essentially said, “Alive and well in Bangui, send money.”

Two days later, Thomas passed by to say thanks. He had just gotten money from the bank. He’d decided to continue on to Kenya. He said goodbye and walked towards the Zaire ferry.

Such people come and go through our lives. I did not really know Thomas at all, yet his small saga taught me something about simplifying complexities and the value of trusting relationships. Yet, it seemed that within his own family, Thomas could not practice his own new gospel.

Of course, I never knew what happened to him.

Central African Republic - Buffeted by Troubles

2007-05-05T09:47:00.000-07:00

I worry about the Central African Republic. I suppose not many people do. It’s a small isolated nation in the heart of Africa. Surrounded by troubles in Sudan, Chad and Congo, nonetheless the CAR has proven capable of surfacing indigenous travails; most of which revolve around tribal politics or bad governance. The saddest part of the CAR’s plight is that nothing need be so bad. Ample opportunities to correct matters have been squandered over the years by self-serving politicians, military chiefs and even the people themselves via passivism in the face of egregious abuses and electoral choices that backfired. Yet, despite the malaise and corruption that belie the country, people are ever optimistic that matters will improve.

Currently, however, unrelated strife in two sections of the country poses difficulties. First, in the far northeast around the town of Birao – truly one of the most isolated towns in all of Africa – the Sudanese Darfur conflict spilled across the border in the form of raids by Janjaweed militias on horseback. The Birao region has much in common with Darfur. It is true Sahaelean land where the conflict between herders and agriculturalists mirrors the imbroglio across the border. Fighting around Birao, however, was exacerbated by CAR army troops who, being southerners from the woodlands and forests to the south, were incapable of distinguishing friend from foe, so chased everyone. With the support of French air power, the CAR army has prevailed for the time being, but Birao town was emptied and the citizenry highly annoyed. The CAR army is simply incapable of maintaining a strong military presence in the northeast; so how matters will shake out in the region in the months to come remains unknown. Perhaps one positive aspect of the fighting is the provision of an additional reason for the UN Security Council to act more vigorously vis a vis Darfur because the Council does have the specific mandate to contain international aggression.

Further west in the northern CAR around the town of Paoua near the Chadian border, the CAR’s internal politics are the cause for strife. The area in trouble is the home region of ousted and exiled President Felix Patasse. The incumbent government of President Francois Bozize continues to believe – with legitimate cause – that the region remains supportive of the ex-president. Thus, it over-reacts with violence to minor sparks of opposition. Short of more inclusive political reconciliation, which is unlikely, the region will remain a tinderbox; mostly to the detriment of rural inhabitants caught in the melee of government heavy-handedness.

One small bright spot in the CAR is in the far southeast along the upper reaches of the Mbomou River and border with the Congo and Sudan. There nearly forty thousand refugees from Sudan’s southern civil war settled since the 1980s and even before. Conclusion of that war in the Sudan in 2004 resulted in massive returns of these refugees to their ancestral homelands around Torit. To its credit the CAR had welcomed and assisted the refugees over the years. They, in fact, quadrupled the population of the thinly peopled east. Yet, despite the hospitality, they were still Sudanese refugees whose stay was temporary. When circumstances were right for their exodus, they went home.

So what can the outside world do for the CAR? There are no easy formulas. A regional, UN backed peace keeping mission has fostered peace in the capital, but doesn’t have the capacity (or mandate) to project forces. France, the former colonial power, retains interest and involvement in the CAR, but is reluctant to do too much. The U.S. has minimal diplomatic presence, few resources and little interest. The UN system responds adequately to humanitarian and refugee issues, but the remoteness of the needy areas limits effectiveness. So ultimately, it is up to the Central Africans themselves to shed the political and economic malaise that engulfs them. That is a tall order that can only be accomplished by many little steps. There is a continuing effort to rectify problems, but don’t expect too much. Meanwhile, worry.

Golf in Africa

2007-04-20T08:26:00.000-07:00

Following is a piece that I wrote about my golfing experiences in Africa that was published in the April 2007 edition of the Foreign Service Journal.

Best and Worst Golf Courses

One valid subjective measure for rating an overseas post is the quality of the golf experience. In that spirit, I offer the following observations.

On becoming the consul in Mombasa, Kenya, I rented a house that backed up to the Nyali Club golf course. It was finally time for me to learn the game and become inculcated into the arcana of golf rules and, especially the formality of a British-origin club. I joined and, depending upon the season, played upon lush green fairways or hard-packed clay over fossilized coral rock. I regularly jumped my back fence for a few practice holes in the early evening. Baby monkeys carted off balls, doum palms ate them and the rough hid puff adders. Most refreshing during competitions was a cold fresh lime drink under the palm trees between nines.

The course in the middle of Kampala was full of ardent players. Thought modest, the prizes - a bicycle, a set of kitchen utensils or a bottle of scotch – were items beyond the reach of many players. Despite the fact that few players were British, an English sense of decorum prevailed. One did not fail to doff his hat upon entering the bar. Most entertaining were rule-committee arguments and rulings conducted in an open fashion over beers on the terrace. Real tension rose once a year in the regional competition organized on tribal lines; we foreigners were allocated any region where more players were needed. In keeping with Uganda’s strife plagued politics, the contest was war by other means. However, it all ended amicably in a huge drunk.

The course in Bangui became one of my favorites. It was not much of a course, with poorly mown fairways and oiled-sand greens, but it had very cold beer. As it happened either Political officer Stacy Kazacos, the only Central African Republic member Martin Yando, or I won every competition for about a year. This infuriated the largely French membership. My triumph was to capture the CAR national championship in 1995. Unfortunately, that was the last year it was played: the golf course succumbed to the ravages of civil strife, and has not reopened.

Kigali has a winding nine-hole course that crosses and recrosses an infernal stream. A challenging course, its fairways are narrow and grass greens unpredictable. The club had a mixed membership of Rwandans (mostly army officers who learned the game in Uganda) and international personnel. I tried to interest now-President Kagame in golf, but he preferred tennis (he rarely lost). Once a year we decorated the club house with left over July 4 bunting and played for the “American Cup.” We cooked hotdogs. I gave away putters, bags, balls to the winners.

Other memorable African courses that I know include Firestone East, located on a vast rubber plantation in Liberia. The main challenge was getting to and from the course, 40 miles from the capital. Players had to run a gauntlet of roadblocks manned by former dictator Charles Taylor’s goons and child soldiers.

The midtown course in Kinshasa is low lying with lots of water hazards. One rarely lost a ball, however, on account of the ever-present “crocodiles” – men who waited patiently by each pond, waded in and retrieved your ball for a small sum. In contrast the course in N’Djamena, Chad, had little vegetation but lots of sand. We carried around a swath of outdoor carpet to hit from into inconsistent oiled browns. Heat was the issue in Chad. It was already 95 degrees when we started at 9 a.m. and often 120 by the finish.

Djibouti’s course resembles Chad’s: sand and rock decorated by remnants of plastic trash bags. Heat and humidity, each about a 100, necessitated a dawn start. I would roust a caddy off his sleeping mat – they slept on the club veranda – and head out. One morning with a tail wind and good bounces, I had a legitimate sub-par round. The golf gods were telling me that even in Djibouti, they smile down on lunatics. A year later, my crowning achievement came on the course in Bujumbura. I aced hole number 12, a 180-yard, uphill par 3…bounce, bounce, in!

So which is the best or the worst? I can’t say. I liked them all. I needed them all! For without a golf course, any post is the pits.

Rwanda - President Bizimungu Freed

2007-04-12T13:12:00.000-07:00

Lost in the flurry of reports from Rwanda last weekend commemorating the 1994 genocide was the news that President Paul Kagame pardoned former President Pasteur Bizimungu and released him from prison. Bizimungu had served five years of a fifteen year sentence for treason. Bizimungu was reportedly delighted (who would not be?) with the news. He was cautioned by officials to become a law abiding citizen.

Bizimungu’s initial arrest and conviction were contentious. Although there was probably some corruption mud on him, his troubles really arose from political reasons. As a Hutu, President during the early RPF era (1994 to 2000) and untainted by genocide, Bizimungu was apparently deemed to pose a credible threat to continued insider dominance by Kagame and the clique around him. After falling out with the inner leadership and resigning in 2000, Bizimungu announced his intention to contest for the top post in the upcoming election with his own new party on his own platform. However, fearing a possible return to ethnic politics, the Tutsi element was determined to prevail. Accordingly, a number of measures were adopted to make it impossible (as in Bizimungu’s case) or very difficult as regarding the effort by former Prime Minister Twagiramungu or other Hutus to run. Naturally, little of this was couched overtly in ethnic terms, even though the code was known by all.

I judged at the time that President Kagame had little to fear from an electoral challenger. He had the name recognition, the power of the military and the power of incumbency. He was the savior of Rwanda and its true leader. Given the way that Rwandan society works, his election would almost be automatic. Yet, electoral success was assured by arrest of Bizimungu and intimidation of other candidates. The message as (correctly) read by voters was continuation of Kagame’s rule.

Once won, however, the question arose of what to do with Bizimungu? Charges (even partially trumped up ones) could not be dropped as that would fly in the face of Rwanda’s very determined efforts to institute a rule-of-law regime nationwide, especially in dealing with genocidaires (which Bizimungu was not, but resolving his case prematurely would smack of favoritism). Also, failure to move forward on the Bizimungu case would indicate that the charges against him were more political than real. Finally, stubbornly proud Rwanda did not want to be perceived as caving to international pressure to free the former president. Thus, the legal process had to run its course. This involved a trial, conviction, sentencing and appeals. Only when all the legal maneuverings were complete could exercise of the presidential power of commutation be considered.

To his credit, when the time was propitious President Kagame exercised his power and had his former colleague released. I judge the decision to have been overdue, but it certainly was a mark of political maturity. Pasteur Bizimungu poses no political threat to the regime, yet his release does indicate that old animosities must pass on and that all Rwandans can and ought to live together harmoniously. That is good news. Rhetoric and reality should always match.

Kenya - Who killed Robert Ouku?

2007-04-09T04:43:00.000-07:00

On the morning of February 16, 1990 the Voice of Kenya radio announced that the mutilated and partially burned body of Robert Ouko, Kenya’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, had been found near his home in Koru. The minister had been reported as missing a day earlier.

Ouku’s death ushered in a long series of inquiries, investigations and speculations, but since the trail led into the highest reaches of Kenyan politics, further pursuit of culprits was stonewalled. No one has ever been charged with the crime.

Professors David William Cohen and E.S. Atieno Odhihambo wrote a book entitled The Risks of Knowledge: Investigations into the Death of the Hon. Minister John Robert Ouko in Kenya, 1990, Athens, Ohio University Press, 2004. The authors recount what is known and unknown about the minister’s death.

Risks of Knowledge is a difficult book to describe and an awkward one to read. It is an erudite mélange of scholarship, sensationalist reporting and stilted legalese. The authors have multiple goals that they spell out in the introduction. Foremost is to assess how the investigations into Foreign Minister Ouko’s murder transformed Kenyan society. The authors assert that the knowledge revealed both wittingly and unwittingly, shed light on ambition, corruption and the practice of politics by Kenya’s most powerful people. Among the consequences of the investigations was the exposure of various efforts to cover-up the high level involvement undertaken in order to confuse and keep the public in the dark. The authors stated that this objective failed as the brouhaha surrounding such blatant attempts to obfuscate led to expanded and ultimately successful efforts to reform and to democratize Kenya.

Like the investigations themselves, the book wanders around a bit jumping from the material at hand to ruminations on its meaning and impact. However, the book does provide a solid structure for revisiting the murder. In turn it highlights evidence of “the white car” seen by the housekeeper, the site of the death, the missing note that perhaps named the abductors, Ouko’s whereabouts in the days before the murder, the minister’s state of mind, corruption linked to the molasses factory, Ouko’s falling out with President Moi, theories of family problems, and special branch abuses. At times the book reads like a murder mystery, yet as the authors point out early, there are no conclusions as to who did it? or why? only mounting evidence that permits readers to draw their own conclusions. Nonetheless, the mounting evidence and the authors’ analysis of it provide fascinating insights into Kenyan political society.

I kept waiting for the authors to deliver a promised discussion of how the investigation elevated the status of servants (such persons including housekeeper Selina and herdsman Shikuku provided the bulk of the damning testimony), granting them credibility in a society that tended to ignore the thoughts and observations of the lower classes, but other than the statement to that effect there was little analysis of this facet.

My disclaimer: Since I lived briefly in Koru as a PCV (1968) and worked in that area for nearly two years, I easily recalled the physical geography relevant to the murder. Although I did not know the minister, I knew other “big men” who owned farms in the sugar zone. Additionally, I gleaned some understanding of the dynamics of Luo politics, at least from the perspective of the common man. Finally, from a later diplomatic posting in next door Uganda, I assisted Ouku’s brother Barrack Mbajah to join his son in the U.S. in 1991.

Those who served in Kenya during the early nineties undoubtedly recall the ongoing soap opera of the investigations, especially the commission’s months long hearings that were reported verbatim in the Daily Nation. All that verbiage will jump back out at you as you read this book. For others who knew Kenya before or after this event, this book serves as a good divider. Earlier observers of the political scene, recalling Mboya’s and Kariuki’s deaths, would perhaps not be terribly surprised, albeit disappointed, that assassination would occur again. Later observers will more realistically appreciate the political currents unleashed by Ouko’s death and the changes subsequently wrought. In any case, Risks of Knowledge is an interesting foray into a complex topic. If you have patience, it is an excellent read.

Rwanda - Commemoration of the Genocide

2007-04-03T16:53:00.000-07:00

April 7, 2007 marks the 13th anniversary of the commencement of Rwanda's terrible genocide. During the hundred days that followed April 7, 1994, almost a million souls perished in a cataclysm of violence that stunned the world...and the world did not respond to the violence. Consequently, guilt for the massive loss of life rests not only on the perpetrators, but also on those who stood by, both willingly and un-willingly, and did nothing. Without resolving issues of responsibility, it is, of course, proper that we pause again to honor the dead and the victims of this tragedy.

As U.S. Ambassador in Rwanda I attended a number of memorial services for the victims. Each year on April 7, a national commemoration was held. Such events involved the exhumation of a mass grave at a genocide site, then proper reburial of the victims. These were sobering occasions when the true horror of genocide was clear to see. Yet they were also healing sessions with prayers and speeches. The dead could now rest in peace. Those present recommitted themselves never to let such events happened again.

I was not in Rwanda when the genocide occurred, but I became the U.S. Ambassador there in the years afterwards. My tasks were recovery, return refugees, reconstruction and reconciliation. I wrote about these undertakings in my book "In the Aftermath of Genocide: the U.S. Role in Rwanda" (go to www.regribbin.com for more info). Reconciliation was the most nebulous of these tasks. How to contribute to a healing process between individuals and communities that were so decisively torn apart by hatred? Many Rwandans considered that the rendering of justice to be an important step. The U.S. could help there, so we created programs to help reconstitute the judicial system, train personnel, help draft a genocide law, etc. Socially, we supported a number of survivor groups, especially women's organizations, that inter alia worked to rebuild trust and communication between ethnic groups. Yet there was only so much outsiders could do. Reconciliation, that is admission of guilt, then forgiveness, are mostly individual decisions. Aid programs, church efforts, discussion groups, government attention to the issues, all could build a climate conducive to reconciliation, but the individuals involved had to make the decisions.

Even as people were coming to grips with such internalized issues, they had, had to get on with their lives. In this Rwandans were more successful. Homes were repaired, fields planted and commerce reignited. The refugees did return. The new ethic of "get along" promulgated by the government was accepted. After a while, peace and predictability returned to the hillsides.

One of the post-genocide/refugee return success stories was the placement of lost, orphaned or abandoned children with families throughout the nation. Initially over a hundred thousand children were collected into camps, orphanages and institutions. One model orphanage was run by an elderly American lady, the late Mrs. Roz Carr. A massive effort was undertaken to reunite the children with their families, extended families or place them in adoptive homes. This succeeded in fairly short order. By 2000 only several thousand children remained in group settings.

Following is an excerpt from my book that highlights this success.

" I visited an orphanage we supported in Rubungo just outside Kigali. A gracious lady, one of the sponsors of the orphanage, showed me around and explained how successful they were in placing children with extended or foster families. So much so, she said, that the institution would be closed within six months. In the meantime, she pointed with great pride to a cow contentedly chewing its cud in an adjacent pasture. She said the cow was newly acquired and would provide milk for the remaining children. She elaborated, saying that the cow had come to the orphanage as bride price. A girl in their charge agreed to marry, and the husband-to-be's family insisted that traditional practices be followed. Otherwise they believed the marriage would not be legitimate. Accordingly, a family group from the groom's side and a team of sponsors from the orphanage conducted traditional negotiations and settled on the cow as the bride price.

I found this transaction to be a remarkable statement of resilience and hope. Despite all the tragedy, lives went on. Customs adapted. "

Rwanda - Gacaca

2007-03-23T05:59:00.000-07:00

Rwanda's community level justice system dubbed Gacaca is designed to deliver justice to tens of thousands of persons implicated in the genocide of 1994. Over a hundred Gacaca courts are obligated to hear the "less severe" cases of persons who may not have killed, but who were otherwise involved in the slaughters. Initially, part of the idea of Gacaca was to relieve the regular court system of the burden of dealing with tens of thousands of genocide cases, as well as to reduce the number of people imprisoned. The regular courts would deal with about 10,000 category 1 individuals and Gacaca courts with about 75,000 other cases. But beware of what you wish for. Rather than reduce the number of cases, opening the Gacaca process to community accusations has dramatically increased the number of cases. Currently more than 800,000 cases are registered and the number of prisoners has rebounded.

Rwandan authorities are just beginning to think about how to resolve this intense, and unexpected, overload. Clearly mechanisms must be found to winnow down the numbers, but key to Gacaca justice - in principle - is local rather than central control. At the current scale Gacaca has serious economic, social and political implications. Economic because so many people are tied up in judicial proceedings and unable to farm or work or otherwise get on with their lives. Furthermore at the 800,000 level about one of every five adults is charged. A huge prison population costs money. Socially constant recrimination and airing of wounds creates new animosities and thus hinders reconciliation. Additionally, abuses of Gacaca to settle non-genocide scores such as land disputes are being documented. Politically Gacaca stings the Hutu majority that views it as Tutsi mandated retribution and not even handed justice. Continuation of such ethnically charged emotion does not bode well for long term political stability.

What are the solutions? First, Gacaca is not going away. Some new legislation will probably be crafted to reduce the numbers of accused, perhaps via a statue of limitations for certain offenses, revised sentencing guidelines or more just plain clemency. Additionally, there will be internal regulations that contribute to dismissal of many cases. Beyond that Rwanda is going to have to find a way to grapple with the political implications. Clearly justice must be delivered, but the sense of political victimization ought to be mitigated.

Following is a story I wrote about Gacaca.

Best Served Cold

Under a bright blue sky the light breeze roiled the stalks of grass on the sun dappled hill. The idyllic scene, however, was the setting for a long running sequence of nasty, emotional, heart wrenching dramas that played out every few days. Five serious citizens, three men, two women sat behind a table arraigned under several massive eucalyptus trees. A crowd of several hundred spectators splayed out on school benches, their own chairs or on the ground around them. Gacaca court was in session.

A free lance stringer, I had come to Rwanda some ten years after its terrible genocide to see for myself – and to get a good story – of how justice was being delivered. My interpreter Emile explained that these community courts were designed to handle the less severe cases. “Less severe?” I asked. “Yes,” he replied, “Not so many murderers, but those who have confessed and those who supported or profited from genocide in other ways.”

Emile was from this region fifty miles southwest of the capital and had chosen this hillside to visit because he said the case against Evariste Nahimana was odd. He was both a killer and a savior. It promised to be an intense discussion.

I felt like a voyeur intruding upon this airing of local passions. What right did I, a foreigner, have to listen and to judge events that were unfathomable? Yet, I stayed screwed to my seat as the dialogue began.

With a nod from the presiding elder the defendant was ushered to a seat before the table. He was a haggard man, of indeterminate middle age, skinny with a gaunt face and sunken eyes. I supposed that ten years of prison would age a man. He was dressed conventionally in trousers and a fraying yellow shirt. Appropriately deferential to the court and the community, he sat patiently as instructed. The president read the committal document from the Ministry of Justice as well as the brief confession Nahimana signed in prison. Next he turned to an old woman – not one of the court members - who being bent at the waist from years of agricultural toil, slowly rose. She identified Nahimana and recited his linage on the hillside. Without doubt this court had jurisdiction.

Emile gave me the gist of the confession. Nahimana had joined the killing bands late, only because he was coerced to do so by agents of the burgomaster. He was assigned to help hunt down Tutsis who had fled from their homesteads and hidden in the papyrus swamps. He said he did participate in searches and was compelled by his companions to chop two boys – teenagers he did not know - found that first day. Thus bloodied, Evariste was included in the evening feast of roasted goat meat – an animal seized and slaughtered by other marauders that day. Thereafter, Nahimana confessed, he went to do the ‘work’ required of him by his band. He witnessed several more killings, but stated he did no more chopping himself. He added that he went with heavy heart and thrashed about in the swamps without truly searching. Once, however, he spotted two women, Agnes and Felicia, hiding, cringing in fear with only their mouths poked above the murky water. He motioned to them not to fear and directed nearby hunters to move along.

The task before the Gacaca court was to hear testimony about Nahimana in order to prove or disprove his statement.

A survivor spoke, reciting the known facts that several hundred Tutsi from this hillside had been massacred. He called their family names. Some died when the interahamwe attacked the mission church nearby, others in their homes, more at roadblocks mounted by the burgomaster’s militia, and still more were chopped or bludgeoned to death after being dragged from the swamps. While the leaders were well known, few lived to identify the killers. Outraged, the victim shook his finger at the assembly stating, “We demand justice. End impunity. Don’t let those who killed and their families conspire to silence.” He concluded that Evariste was a self-confessed killer, his allegation of mercy probably invented, and that he deserved his fate.

A woman, a neighbor of Nahimana’s, stated her conviction that Evariste was fundamentally a good man from a known family. Sadly, like many in the commune, he had succumbed to the madness of the moment. She believed his reluctance to participate in events and his sparing of the Tutsi women.

A Gacaca judge asked if Agnes or Felicia survived? After some murmuring, someone responded that she had heard that Agnes did live, but that she was in Kigali and had never returned to the colline. The judge queried if anyone could substantiate the delivery of mercy to the two women. No one responded.

A man who lived near the swamp acknowledged that he had seen Evariste among the band that prowled the edges of the swamp and probed its depths. He said he was told by others from the band that Evariste chopped the two boys. He added that their bodies probably still lay un-recovered, sunken into the dark vegetation-choked water.

With little else to be said, the judges deliberated among themselves. After a half hour or so, the president delivered their verdict. Nahimana’s act of mercy could not be substantiated, but his act of murder was affirmed. He was to be returned to prison to serve another five years.

On the drive back to Kigali, Emile expressed satisfaction with the verdict. He confided that if not for my presence; that is, a white foreigner critically observing the proceedings, Nahimana would probably have gotten off easier. He added that Evariste’s act of mercy had really occurred. His cousin Agnes had confirmed it to him. “But,” I remonstrated, “you made no acknowledgement. You should have spoken out.”

“No,” Emile replied, “the two he killed were my brothers.”