The African Big C.

At the end of long, hot day, our car was well loaded with a mixture of colleagues and students. Despite the heat and the hour, the banter was flowing in Krio and English with laughter in both. We were approaching the time for examinations and tension around a number of issues emerged frequently and humour served as a release from the tensions. From a student who is also a senior school administrator we heard a story from a previous decade and of the malpractice of a teacher who ensured that students, who should not have been able to sit for an examination, found with a little payment that there was a place available on the day that mattered . Suddenly the flood gates opened on the stories of corruption... “Did you see that story on the 80 million Leones that has gone missing from the Anti Corruption Commission?” The carload laughed in chorus and further corruption anecdotes flowed faster than the traffic. 80 million Leones is £120,000, a huge sum of money in a country where the largest denomination 10,000 Leones, is only the equivalent of 2US$, a day’s pay for a 12 hour shift on building site.

In teaching a course on Christian Leadership and Church Management, Peter finds when addressing the formation of conscience and its influence on decision making, the students are over eager to provide evidence of the existence of corruption and struggle to concentrate on its causes. It is as though their experience of injustice, accumulated during the civil war, in society and in the church, is so acute that they need to unload their anger and frustrations, before addressing any analytical thinking as to what creates corruption.

The correlation between income per capita and corruption generally indicates that those nations with the lowest levels of economic inequality perform higher in the international transparency league and demonstrate a lower level of corruption. Recently the BBC world service has chosen to explore the existence of corruption by highlighting two countries at opposite ends of the spectrum, Sweden and Somalia. In doing so, they have highlighted another aspect of cause and effect, that of war and civil conflict. Sweden is nation without a history of war in the last 200 years whilst Somalia has been in civil and international turmoil for decades and where, currently, heavily armed African Union troops are desperately trying to establish government control of the capital Mogadishu.

Corruption in varying degrees is universal and the recent decision to award the 2018 World Cup to Russia has captivated the attention of those who seek to establish transparent good governance in all aspect of life, including in football. By definition corruption is a secretive transaction and as such is difficult if not impossible to measure accurately but this does not prevent attempts being made to determine the consequences of it. In this respect civic education on the end product of corrupt practices seems more beneficial than trying to offer definitions of what it is and is not. In Freetown the roadside publicity seeks to inform the public of what public services are not being delivered as a result of corruption and as such it seeks to promote accountability for individual decisions.

Across the continent corruption is seen as a pervasive problem that creates barriers to development. Transparency International’s (TI) 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), released in October 2010, identified Africa as the most corrupt region in the world and Sub-Saharan Africa as one of the most under-developed regions on earth. Whilst Sweden is ranked number 4, of the 178 countries surveyed, Somalia occupies the lowest position. Unfortunately six African nations rank among the 10 most corrupt countries surveyed. As Sierra Leone is ranked 134, anti corruption education and strategies is vital, nevertheless, the costs of providing such is an expenditureis an added financial burden upon the nation.

Being able to afford the funds needed for Krisi Mas is a very high individual priority. The arrival of Christmas is welcomed by Muslims and Christian alike with regular talk of ‘my Krisi Mas’, meaning a personal gift. City life becomes more intense and whilst there are no grand eye-catching public displays, the increased activity of the enormous informal commercial sector is clearly evident along the roadsides of Freetown. The arrival of the Salonean diaspora from Europe and North America for the purpose of weddings and family reunions is never stronger than in December, so that the promotion of beach side carnivals results in rapid improvements to clubs and bars in the Aberdeen area of the city.

Whilst friends and family in Europe are reporting their underfoot struggles with an early arrival of an excess of snow, the return of a cobra, apparently of the spitting variety, to the area around our house, has increased the need for us to watch our step and tread carefully through the vegetation. A cobra of any size is taken very seriously and the one that we are sighting is of considerable length so that the spraying of a little diesel fuel to the surroundings and the cutting back of some of the bush, are the recommended ways to indicate that it is not welcome.

If Janice’s English class were to be asked to give words to describe snakes, many of the words would be similar in meaning to those used to describe individuals who choose to deal dishonestly. However, she would gently remind them of the positive symbolism of the snake on the pharmacy signs around the city. Snakes are also a symbol of health, and wholeness, and this is what we celebrate as the season of Christmas draws closer. With maternal health mortality at such a high level in Sierra Leone, that Amnesty International described it as a violation of a human right, posters around the town that indicate corruption as a cause of poor health care are very pertinent. The good news is that there has been significant improvement in maternal care provision in the last 6 months. However there are still far too many Salonean mothers, who are like Mary, giving birth to a baby in the isolation of the bush, on the road hoping to get to the nearest clinic, or in the most humble of surroundings should they manage to get there, and yet each birth will be honoured as yet another blessing from God.

May your season of Christmas be a time of blessing too.

Glancing at the sky and staring at the streets

Janice has just spotted the first signs of winter visitors in the sky. Were they swifts or were they swallows, mingling with resident vultures soaring high above the city? The sight of the smaller species begs the question, are the martins, swallows and swifts constant visitors, be it the northern or southern hemisphere? Do they not have homes?

The question of homes is on the computer screen in front of Peter, as the UK government has just announced a radical package of measures allowing local authorities to offer council houses on short-term lets rather than for life. It is a measure intended to shuffle the homeless to areas outside local government limits in a bid to stop ‘their houses’ becoming a ‘poverty trap’. Not surprisingly housing charities have condemned the proposals for appearing to mount ‘a deliberate attack’ on the poorest in society. British society that it is!

Meanwhile the BBC world service radio, announces that the UN Habitat - The State of African Cities report, indicates that the size of many African cities is likely to triple in the next 30 year with 60% of all Africans living in cities . “No African government can afford to ignore the ongoing rapid urban transition taking place across the continent. Cities must become priority areas for public policies, with hugely increased investments to build adequate governance capacities, equitable services delivery, affordable housing provision and better wealth distribution,” said Joan Clos, the Executive Director of UN-HABITAT.

Known as “The push and the pull factor” in rapid urbanisation in Africa, the effect is clearly seen across Freetown. Salone’s civil war exercised a push that created a huge demographic growth in the capital and with it a massive urban proliferation, a steep economic inequality and widespread human misery which persists today. The pull effect is that individual economic progress is perceived to be available in the big city where options and opportunities are assumed to be greater than in rural areas. Economic growth is most evident in the mining sector, beyond the capital, but the development that includes urban industrialisation with job creation and higher productivity is not evident . If it were, such progress would provide the basis of the pursuit of good governance, proper housing and basic services for all. Meanwhile the number of informal settlements continues to increase both along the shoreline of Aberdeen Creek, Kroo Bay and up the hillsides of Dwarzak and New England. However it is in the East of the city where in 1999, the invasion of rebels caused the destruction of about 6,000 homes in the areas of Kissy, Wellington, Calaba Town, and Allen Town.

One of our colleagues, after completing his days teaching, has never been swift to make his way home eastwards from the college in the centre of the city. To get home, he faces a tough task. There are choices, be it on over saturated public transport (mini-buses) where the competition for even space and not a seat is keen and at times aggressive, or a life threatening journey on the back of a motorbike, or alternatively on foot, with the tens of thousands who choose to walk along the major highway, the Kissy Road, all forms making such journey demanding and problematic. Of late his procrastination and delaying tactics have been even more exaggerated, as he and his family are living under the threat of eviction from a home that is without running water or electricity and for which he pays the owner £25 per month, 25% of his basic teaching salary. The imminent removal comes as result of his protesting at the 100% increase in rent. Explaining the options available, he cites the working of the city housing rent tribunal to which he can appeal and be heard by under-paid public servants who at best would delay the demand for increased rent and at worse be tempted to take the offer of financial support (from the landlord) for urgently needed domestic expenses of their own and rule against the tenant.

A driver, of the Methodist Church connexional office, and his family have just become our new neighbours, living in temporary accommodation . All six members of his family, along with several other families, were forcibly removed from a compound in the heart of the city by bailiffs, supported by police officers. The event attracted national press coverage for a brutal attack on property and provocation of violence but despite the evident injustice no re-instatements have since followed.

An east African catholic theologian Richard Rwiza writes that whilst the urban poor are “the least economically advantaged, the least socially involved and the hardest hit by the housing problem, they are paradoxically the least institutionally assisted people of the urban area”. And as our colleagues, (neither of them being abjectly poor) would testify, it is the poor who can least expect the support of judicial institutions like the courts, the police station, or indeed the health and education sectors.

It would be hard to imagine the Minister for Land, Country Planning and the Environment, in Sierra Leone, Dr Dennis Sondy, quoting the words of David Orr, the chief executive of the National Housing Federation in the UK, who said: “People need the stability and security of a safe home."

However, there has been some recognition made of the dire problems of housing related issues. Some 750,000 residents of slum communities across the Freetown municipality will soon benefit from improved water, sanitation and hygiene conditions through the intervention of the Urban WASH Consortium programme initiated by five international non-governmental organisations operating in the country. Speaking at the official launch of the programme, board chairman Emmanuel Gaima - who doubles as country director of Oxfam - said the consortium was formed to complement government's effort in attaining the millennium development goals (MDGs). "We cannot solve all the problems that have to do with sanitation in this country. 750,000 beneficiaries will be targeted for the next 3 to 5 years of the programme. We will holistically focus on water, sanitation and prolific health program," he said. According to the Oxfam country director, the initiative intends to reduce the rate of water, sanitation and hygiene diseases by supporting and working with the government, adding that the goal of the programme was to improve the health status of selected vulnerable communities in the urban area of the city.

Head of country office DFID, Dominic Oneill, described the initiative as very important as the burden of disease, due to poor water and sanitation, was very huge. He said the long term strategy to ensure the success of the programme should be through national funding, adding that Sierra Leone has the lowest revenue base in sub-Saharan Africa.

However the housing needs of our colleagues and their families continue, but they do not have the same kind of choices as the swift, swallows and martins. Their home is Salone.