AfricaTrip08.com

First off, read Colin’s last post before you read this one. He’s got a lot of good recap of our meetings, and I’ll probably spend more time on analysis. Sorry the posts are getting long-ish, but it really is interesting, and worth-while reading if you can. We’re learning a ton about the situation, and it’s very underrepresented in the international community.

I won’t elaborate on the meetings themselves, but it is pretty cool that we’re having hour meetings with members of parliament and NGO leaders. These guys are incredibly busy, but are spending significant time talking with us. They’re also incredibly interesting, but incredibly modest. Every person we’ve met has been jailed, most have been tortured, and all are careful when meeting with us through fear of being targeted. You don’t get their perspectives in the international media, so we’re trying to portray them as best we can. Each person we’ve talked to has had a different take on the current situation, and more specifically, what the next steps should be from the international community. I’ll try to address that a bit.

As Colin said, we spent the latter half of the day at a place called Mbare, which is a local marketplace. It was packed with people, but we were the only white people in sight. It feels slightly intimidating, but never at danger (we also walk around with nothing on us). It was a pretty dirty area; it smelled of a broken sewage and there was trash littered everywhere on the side of the street. The market place itself is pretty vibrant; food is sold at significantly cheaper prices than elsewhere, and a lot of people were out and about. There was also a handicrafts section, which would usually serve as a tourist component. I’ve been there everytime I’ve been here, but the most recent time was six months ago. Every single person recognized me, which speaks much more to the fact that tourists frequent the area, rather than myself being a memorable person.

The crafts themselves are gorgeous (hopefully we can give some as gifts). They’re shona sculptures (google it) that require days and days to intricately make and polish. We got a tour of a cooperative with about forty individuals making different types of sculptures. But each person told us that no one was coming to buy them; one person told us his last customer came 3 weeks ago. These are guys that already have nothing, and aren’t gaining anything through an art that really is difficult manual labor. The saddest part was that we bought four miniature statues for ten dollars (which is overpaying by a ton), and they were extremely grateful for it. We probably were their first business in months; and that’s all we could muster. It’s a weird feeling, just through being white, we provide hope to them. That’s what American represents, an opportunity that they will never have. We represent that opportunity.

The great part of the trip thus far is that we’ve been able to talk to people from every sector; individuals at the market, members of parliament, NGO’s…and we had a great dinner tonight with my dad and some women that also work in the political section. Each person though, has a different prescription for the conflict.

Here’s my (probably uninformed) take: Zimbabwe is a really good example of how incredibly difficult it is to apply any sort of Responsibility to Protect doctrine to countries throughout the world, and how far away we are as an international community from making such a though process a norm (for those of you unfamiliar with R2P, it basically says that states have a responsibility to protect their own citizens, and if they fail to do so, the international community must intervene). Firstly, by all accounts, the Zimbabwean government is failing to protect its own people. They are torturing, displacing, threatening, and killing individuals to hold onto their power. Moreover, everybody we talk to says this violent behavior is completely calculated towards supporters of the opposition, small-scale politicide, if you will.

The problem is that it’s too small-scale for anybody to care about. Only fifty plus people have died. When contrasted with Sudan, the DRC, Burma, that’s chump change. But you come here, see the inflation, the displacement, talk to torture victims, see the unemployment, and tell me the Zimbabwean government is doing its job. The international community has to do something. The problem is, simply, it won’t. Everybody I’ve talked to at the US State Department is pretty resigned to the fact that the UN Security Council will not send in peacekeepers, however needed they are, and will not take definitive action. There’s no possible way the US or UK would, or should, take unilateral action, so we’re stuck. Saying that Zimbabweans should take care of their own problems, on the other hand, is, as someone said to us, an extremely privileged position. We’re not being tortured, threatened, or killed.

So despite the great meetings and interactions we’re experiencing, this place does leave me rather depressed. And, as an international community, if we’re actually serious about taking R2P into account, Zimbabwe’s a good case study. We need to move beyond using buzz words and simplifying conflicts in order to try to create a norm. It’s necessary to understand the nuances of conflicts, the obstacles of intervention, and the possible courses of action. That’s really hard in Zimbabwe. But it’s also crucial.

Today was another busy day for us, with three really amazing experiences that I’ll talk about, and Scott will elaborate on later tonight. I want to try and address Janessa’s question of the role of the international community (unfortunately we can’t do this from a female perspective yet), and a few other questions that we’ve gotten about people’s ideas for what the solution for Zim is.

Our first meeting was with a Member of Parliament (MP) for the MDC, or the opposition party. The MP is a young, active, and very vocal MP who was elected in 2000. We called him yesterday to set up a meeting, and he agreed, knowing very little about us. We met him outside a hotel at 9 this morning, but immediately had to get in a car and leave because he didn’t feel safe staying in the same place to talk to us. We drove around for over an hour, and stopped infrequently due to his safety concerns. There is virtually no danger for Scott and I in talking to him, but sharing information with white foreigners holds significant risk for him. He has been targeted by the government on several occasions for his activism, the most recent of which resulted in a 6 month imprisonment where he was tortured to the point that he could not open his eyes from the swelling. When we asked him why he continued to serve as an MP, he resolutely stated that “somebody has to do it.”

A few common question have surfaced in each of the interviews that Scott and I have conducted. What are you trying to do to ensure a fair election? What do you predict will be the outcome of the election? What will you do if the MDC wins, and Mugabe predictably refuses to leave his position? What role has the international community served, and what role should it serve?

He was very confident that the MDC could succeed in the run-off. He was inspired by the victory of the MDC in the first election, and seemed quite hopeful that enough voters would stick to the MDC in the run-off. However, he recognized the effect of the beatings, murders, and scare-tactics that Muagabe has employed recently, and knew that this would deter many voters from showing up or from voting for the MDC. Interestingly, he was leaving Harare for another location that he felt would be safer just an hour after our meeting because he heard the following week could be a dangerous one for him and his family. I probed him about his thoughts of Tsvangari’s flight from the country after a rumor of an assasination plot, and he said that he thought people did not have an issue with this because it was a matter of security. On the contrary, the man from the Progressive Teachers Union told us yesterday he was infuriated by this, and that he thought the MDC needed to take a much more powerful stance than they did post-election.

When we asked what the MDC would do if they won the run-off and Mugabe either rigged the results or refused to leave, he told us that it was the role of the international community to step in at that point. He emphasized that the MDC had no weapons and would (could) not cause violence, and seemed to think there was little else that they could do. This once again contradicted what Raymond told us, as he seemed to believe that it is the responsibility of the MDC to be more resilient, and to push for accurate reporting on the election.

The second person we met with was an officer for the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition. He once again met us with very little notice, and quickly drove us to a hotel on the outskirts of the city where we talked at an isolated table outside the hotel. The Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition represents a number of civic organizations (out of which the MDC was born) and provides them with legal and logistical support. We learned that he had been arrested as well, and that their offices had been targeted over 10 times since the beginning of their work in Zimbabwe (which was well before the election). At this time, they were not even working out of their offices because of the consistent raids.

He took a different perspective than are other interviewees in terms of what would happen in Zimbabwe and what is needed. He seemed less confident that the MDC was surely going to win the run-off. He repeated several times that the MDC only had a good chance of winning if the MPs from the MDC got out into the community more, gained more support, and became much more transparent in their actions. Clearly, this is not easy for somebody like an MP to do when he is constantly in fear of violence against him, but he thought this was the only sure path for MDC victory.

When we asked him what he thought would happen if Mugabe refused to leave, and if the international community should respond, he again repeated that the MDC would absolutely have to make a greater presence for itself and empower the people, even after the run-off. However, he also told us that the UN, along with the African Union (AU), Southern African Development Community (SADC), and European Union (EU), would need to ensure the proper and fair result of the election. He specifically wanted a UN Humanitarian Resolution to be introduced that would condemn the violence and unfair electoral process that has been led by Mugabe’s Zanu PF party. It was interesting to see how he thought that the best chance for success would require both internal and external pressure, almost a hybrid of the two viewpoints we had previously heard.

After our two meetings, we made our way out to high density (slum) areas of Zimbabwe, where there is an increidble market. I’m going to let Scott talk about our experience there so I don’t drag on too much in this post, but I can safely say it was one of the saddest things I’ve experienced. I told Scott today that I’ve never learned so much in 48 hours, and I have so much more to say. I’m trying as hard as I can to consolidate and deliver what I think is most important and relevant, please tell me if I’m not doing a good job. We unfortunately won’t be able to post for the next few days, as we’re taking a quick holiday to the mountains of Zimbabwe, supposedly one of the most beautiful areas of the country. Keep the questions coming!

Colin

Quick recap of terms and events I referred to:

MDC = Movement for Democratic Change, the opposition party who won a greater amount of votes in the presidential election

Morgan Tsvangari = Current presidential candidate representing the MDC

Zanu PF = The current controlling party in Zim, led by Mugabe, who has carried out most of the violence.

MP = Member of Parliament, there are members from both Zanu PF and MDC (and other parties)

MDC won a greater percentage of votes than Zanu PF in the election, but the final (rigged) results indicated they did not reach a majority of 50%. Therefore a run-off is necessary.

Today was an incredible day, and my first day waking up in the continent of Africa. Despite yesterday’s short excursion, this was the first time I was able to get a real feeling for what it’s like in Harare. Scott covered a lot of what we did, but like our posts yesterday, I’ll try to take a bit of a different angle and fill in some of the gaps.

We spent a good deal of time just walking around downtown Harare. As Scott mentioned, one of the first things that stuck out to us is that we werethe only white people. I’m not exaggerating when I say that in our 4 hours of walking around, we only saw 3 other white faces. In truth, this doesn’t really mean much for us, but it’s obvious that people were looking at us as we walked by.

With so many reports of violence coming out of Zimbabwe, Scott and I felt incredibly safe walking around. We didn’t hesitate to walk to side alleys or some of the more impoverished area’s of the city, and we never felt threatened. As with most cities in the US, people largely ignored us and went on with their business.

The only real threat that we were nervous of was that of being arrested for “reporting.” Scott’s parents warned us of taking any pictures, especially in the wake of the arrest of NYT journalist Barry Bearak, who was charged with the crime of “committing journalism” a little over a month ago. To ease my parent’s minds, we were actually quite careful with the camera and we put it in our pocket whenever we walked by people in uniform, of which there were plenty. We were frustrated by the fact that we couldn’t talked to people in the city about the situation, but many people wouldn’t have hesitated to turn us in to the police, especially since it could have earned them some desperately needed cash for food. Furthermore, there are enough CIO (equivalent of CIA) workers in the street, that stopping anybody on the street to talk would have been too risky. Nobody from the US has been targeted for violence because of this, thankfully, but one arrest for Scott and I is enough for now. An experience like today makes you start to appreciate the freedom of press that we enjoy.

We stopped in a few grocery stores to see what was still available for sale. Not much. Many shelves are completely empty, and as I mentioned yesterday, you just can’t find some items like butter, bread or flour. We were able to find some meat, but the most of the cuts looked far from appetizing or largely inedible. Prices are low for the accessible items like fruit, drinks or some non-perishables, but a small chicken was quite expensive.

Banks in Zimbabwe are plentiful, it seems like there is at least one on every block. However, that doesn’t mean that access to them is easy. Some were completely closed (as are many other stores in Harare and elsewhere), and those that are open are usually have lines that are 50+ people long, often spilling out of the front door. Today was particularly hard to get money, but I’m told that the situation was even worse just a month ago.

After walking around for an hour and half, we made the 2 mile trek out to the suburbs where the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe’s main office is located. Scott filled you in on most of that, so I won’t go into much more detail. Really the most rewarding part of talking to the men was how resilient they are in working for positive change. They see teachers as the most valuable portion of society (they told us you need teachers for the mind just as much as you need doctors for the body), and are willing to put their lives on the line to support that ideal. They aren’t hopeful that the MDC (opposition party) will win the run-off election, and they aren’t sure that they could stay in power even if they win. They’ve seen the teachers they represent beaten and driven out of the country, and they themselves have been abused physically and mentally. Still, however, they continue to work and to expand, and they continue to encourage the mentally defeated teachers they represent to push on.

Walking around the city was certainly disappointing, but the latter part of our day really got both of our spirits up. I really wish all of you could be here to get the same perspective that we’re getting, but hopefully this blog will do it some justice. Looks like we’ve got some great meetings coming up, so we’ll continue to fill you all in.

Colin

P.S. Thanks for all the great questions. To elaborate on Scott’s answer to Devin and Karen’s question, Mrs. Warren told me that the average salary for a doctor in Zimbabwe is the equivalent of $35/month. That’s far from enough to be able to pay for food, medical bills, education, gas etc. Most doctors have to work another job in addition to make ends meet.

So today was pretty eventful. I’ll write some of my thoughts, and Colin will add his as well. It’s been great to get comments and e-mails, so please keep them coming. We want to write about what interests you.

We both got up pretty late cuz of the jet lag, but I think we’re both over it. I took a quick run, which was surprisingly tough; we’re at about 5,000 feet altitude here. Then we headed out for town.

We walked around downtown Harare for about two hours. Despite being literally the only white people around (Colin will talk more about that), we felt pretty safe. We had about 3 billion dollars with us (or about 5 US Dollars) in a backpack, but, to answer Devin, weren’t really afraid of getting mugged. Firstly, it wouldn’t be that much money, and secondly, Zimbabwe’s really not that dangerous of a place, security wise. There are cops around, and the people don’t seem to be inherently violent or malevolent. That’s not to say there isn’t violence, but most of it is government-provoked, rather than led by civilians. Actually, I feel safer walking around downtown Harare than I would around downtown Nairobi, Kenya, where I used to live. Colin can talk more about our downtown excursion.

Then, we went to meet with two guys that work with the Progressive Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe. The organization does what its name implies; organizes teachers in an effort to gain more rights and salaries. They’re pretty big, they have 6 offices throughout the country. This one was located in a small suburb house.

The meeting was incredibly interesting. They started off by telling us the dire strait of education in the country; teachers make an average of the equivalent of 10 US Dollars every month. They’re discriminated against by the government, and receive no rights. The good ones have left the country to make more money elsewhere.

They then gave us their general thoughts on the situation. Both of them have been targeted significantly by the ruling government, who see their efforts as a direct threat to their power. They’ve been arrested, beaten, and forced to disavow the opposition party, and pledge their loyalty to Mugabe. One of them was even taken to the border once and told to leave the country. He said he’s toned down his rhetoric and appearances lately because of threats to himself and his family (he’s also pretty radical; he had a Che poster outside his door and was decked out in camo clothing).

One interesting note was that they were almost as angry with the opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). They said Tsvangirai, the MDC candidate for president, has shown no leadership, leaving the country at any sight of danger and neglecting to come up with a strategy to effectively combat Mugabe. They accused the MDC of being badly organized and had little faith in their ability to win the run-off election coming up in a month. Basically, they said that people vote for the MDC because they are not Mugabe, not because of what they represent as a party.

Aside from being informative, it was pretty inspiring talking to these guys. Their resiliency and hopefulness was awe-inducing. I’ve considered myself a dedicated activist for pulling a few late-nighters this year to write emails and draw up proposals. I even got arrested for an afternoon. Who am I kidding? These guys have been arrested, beaten, and threatened to death. But they remain resilient at defeating a dictator that has basically ruined their country, and refused to give their union clients (teachers) any basic services. We hear hope thrown around all the time in the US political climate, but they gave the word an entirely new meaning. Being a little cynical, a lot of the people that use the term during in the US are people that won’t be terribly affected by a change in government (upper-middle class, myself included). The guys today cling to hope as a way of actually continuing the most difficult and brutal activism that I’ve heard of in a long time.

One other interesting thing; they said the international community was basically doing its job. According to them, it was now up to the Zimbabweans to take care of Mugabe. The US, EU, or any other international body couldn’t do much now; it’s all up to them.

Anyways, it was a great talk…you read about this stuff in the news, but it was pretty amazing to hear it in person. We’re meeting with 1-2 members of parliament tomorrow, as well as a representative from the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition. We’re meeting everyone in random places in town because of security reasons; they don’t want to meet in their offices. And it’s pretty funny, we’re just cold calling these people, no mention of my dad’s job. So for some reason, in the midst of the most important election in Zimbabwe’s history, we’re meeting with some pretty interesting and important people.

Please check out the photo gallery for some shots from today. We had to be really careful taking them, so sorry if they’re not the best!

So Colin is currently freaking out about a medium sized spider in my bathroom, so I’ll take the time to blog.  I unsuccessfully tried to take care of the situation with his shoe, so now he’s trying to employ my dog.  Pictures to follow in our photo gallery.

As Colin said, we spent most of the day acclimatizing to the country.  Inflation’s absurd (think backpacks full of cash), and hopefully we’ll get more of a personal perspective on it tomorrow from some Zimbabweans.

I want to spend a little time talking about the other part of our day though, the hike.  Whenever I talk to people about this trip, they always ask me about the chaos that is Zimbabwe.  People must be rioting on the streets, stealing goods, wrecking general havoc.  Now, don’t get me wrong, Zimbabwe is a mess.  The inflation is unreal, by far worse than anywhere in the world.  The political situation is dire, and hopefully we’ll get more of a read on that.  There doesn’t seem to be much hope.

But, it’s possible, and necessary, to get beyond those purely negative generalizations.  The reality is, that underneath the political turmoil, Zimbabwe is an incredibly beautiful country.  The people, despite their daily strife, are warm and friendly, constantly offering greetings and well-wishes.  Their gracious attitudes usually surpass those I receive in Providence on a daily basis.

The land itself is also uplifting.  On our hike today (see the photo gallery for pictures that won’t do it justice), we were able to stand on top of a mountain, overlooking a terrain full of small huts and vast plains.  The only sounds were the joyful cries of children out before dinner time.  This makes me sound like more a hippie than I really am, but being on that mountain made me wistful for a simpler time.  It is hard to imagine a country so externally beautiful suffering through such tumultuous times.

Personally though, it made me glad to be back in Africa.  This past year, while probably the most eventful in my life, has been stressful from a personal and professional standpoint.  But being back on this continent, in some way, makes me appreciate things just a little more.  It’s a good feeling.  A feeling I like to recall whenever I hear of the conflicts occurring throughout this land.

Alright, time to attempt to recover from jet-lag.  I don’t think Colin or Scout have successfully caught the spider, so we could have a long night ahead of us.  Please comment with your thoughts!

After about two days of traveling, Scott and I have finally made it to his parents’ house in Harare, Zimbabwe. We got in during the afternoon and are both jet-lagged, so we haven’t had a lot of opportunity to explore the city and talk to people. We’re making plans to get out and talk to the community and others working here in the next few days.

The most obvious effect of the unstable political situation here is the incredible inflation. Since Scott was last here in January, the exchange rate for the US dollar has gone from 2 million to 630 million (Scott’s mom tells me that it may be up to 700 million by tomorrow). Standard items like fruit cost several billion dollars, and the most useful bills to us are worth 100,000,000 or 500,000,000. Other items, like bread, butter, or meat, are either completely unavailable or are prohibitively expensive, even for us. Gas for cars isn’t sold at the dozens of gas stations in Harare, and is only available on the black market or to government employees.

We visited a market today that did contain a good selection of food, but the prices were so high that none of the locals would be able to afford it. Dozens of road-side stands contain a few pieces of fruit or vegetables that locals have grown and are desperate to sell in order to buy household necessities. The severity of the poverty ranges from area to area in the city, and Scott and I are looking forward to exploring a bit more on foot tomorrow.

Even expensive restaurants, like the one we had lunch at today, struggle. When we came in around 2, they told us that they had just lost power and only had one food item that they could still serve. We bought a few beef pies and some drinks and it cost us over 4 billion dollars, far more than anybody on a local salary could afford on a regular basis. Power outages are common, and Scott’s parents phone line regularly goes out.

The country itself seems beautiful and everybody has been extremely friendly to us. We’re looking forward to delving deeper into how the political and economic turmoil has affected the population. Scott’s going to post in a bit and we’ll keep you updated on how it goes.

I took a picture of the menu at the restaurant and we’ll post that along with a few that Scott took on a short hike we made.

Colin