Tuesday 31 August 2010

Liberia - the end of the first chapter

So here I sit, bleary-eyed, at Brussels Airport again. It is early morning, very early morning. I left Monrovia last night after an amazing stay in Liberia. I loved it. Yes, it has challenges, huge ones, but there is a really positive feel to the place which I just hadn’t anticipated. I was expecting it to be wrought with tension, the brutal civil war ended just a few years ago after all. But walking around the streets of the city, eating in cafes, going into shops, the atmosphere is relaxed and friendly. I am not naïve, I know that that doesn’t mean everything is fine and dandy. People are poor, unemployment levels are high, life is hard. Next year’s elections will be a real test of whether the peace can last but I have no reason to believe it won’t. People talk politics with a passion which, coming from the UK with our depressingly high levels of apathy, I think is fantastic. But I didn’t get any sense that their passion reflects or indeed is creating massive friction within communities. It really is amazing. You only have to look at Northern Ireland to appreciate just how amazing it is. Yes there has been a massive improvement in community relations in the 12 years since the Good Friday Agreement, but for many years the tension in many neighbourhoods was palpable, in a few it still is. So I am giving Liberians a gold star for looking forward and hope that they continue to do so. I hope I will get another chance before too long to see how they are doing.

Thursday 26 August 2010

Liberia - the story so far

So I have been here a few days now, working with an NGO to help build communications capacity in the President's office. It has been interesting and challenging work. I have been talking to lots of people, drafting protocols, writing strategies and running workshops. I am loving it. What is always wonderful about working in a different country is discovering unexpected cultural differences. One of the team here (she is British) was talking to a Liberian colleague about prioritising issues. She started talking about instituting a traffic light system, with each issue given a red, amber or green flag dependent on their urgency. She started to grow slightly alarmed by the blank look on her colleague's face. How was this a difficult concept to grasp? She tried to explain again. More blank looks and then it dawned on her - they don't have traffic lights in Liberia. A concept that we use in the UK all the time makes absolutely no sense here. It does make you wonder how much else we take for granted when we speak. In a country where they don't play cricket, would they necessarily know what I mean when I talk about getting on the front foot? It reminds me of the look on by American friend's face when driving down a highway in the US, I commented on the trees that had been planted on the central reservation . . .

Wednesday 25 August 2010

Flag Day in Monrovia

So yesterday was Flag Day here in Liberia, a public holiday to honour the national pennant. The flag itself (The Lone Star) is from the family of flags based on the Stars and Stripes and Liberians are very proud of it. It was an excellent holiday. Lots of children parading in their uniforms, speeches and prizes. Moreover, it meant that I had a day to explore Monrovia, a vibrant, busy city. On the face of it, strangers could be forgiven for not immediately spotting that the country had been ravaged by a civil war that only really came to an end about six years ago. Shops and businesses are open, markets are bustling and ships are being unloaded at the port. But take a closer look and you will see burnt out buildings all around town. One of the most incredible is the old Hotel Africa, a vanity project of President Tolbert,built to host the 1979 Organisation of African Unity (OAU) Summit. The hotel complex had swimming pool in the shape of Africa and 51 beach villas, one for each African head of state. It cost US$ 36 million, a staggering amount especially then, especially given the economic plight of the country. Today it is a ruined shell, gutted by months of bombardment during the last years of the civil war and subsequently stripped of everything from the tiles on the walls to the copper pipes of the plumbing system. As for the beach villas, well most of them have fallen into the sea.

Monday 23 August 2010

Liberia - the adventure begins

So first impressions - hot, sticky, damp. I have arrived in the middle of the heaviest rainy season for years. It is a bit like being in a Somerset Maughan story.

The country is still recovering from years of a brutal civil war. The first President to be elected democratically and fairly, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, came into power in January 2003 and her government is desperately trying to rebuild the country. The challenges are huge to say the least. Roads, power and clean water are still in short supply, especially outside the capital. They need more medical workers, more teachers, more professionals across the board. The process of reconciliation and nation building is necessarily slow. People needs jobs. But based on my first hours in the country, it would appear that they have hope. And that has to be a good foundation.

Do you still get a UB40?

Technically, I am unemployed. I left Grayling at the end of July and don’t start my new job (more about which later) until September. So August has been mine – five whole weeks to use as I choose. Free time is a luxury I haven’t enjoyed since 2003 when I left Downing Street and had a month or so before I joined Grayling. It is also a luxury I struggle to enjoy completely. I get bored easily. I spent the first two weeks of freedom on holiday in France (a week in the hills near St Emillion and another in Biarritz). It was wonderful – sunshine, good food, good wine, good company – in spite of the eye-watering exchange rate.

Last week was, however, very different. I spent the week on what you might describe as personal admin – I registered for a course, sorted out my ISA, renewed the buildings insurance on my flat, had a bit of a tidy of said flat. Dull, dull, dull. I did spend some time with my niece and nephew (Toy Story 3 is very good but don’t bother with the 3D version), which was very enjoyable but the rest of week was boring. If it hadn’t been for the hours of television I had saved on Sky+ I am not sure how I would have managed.

I have greater expectations for the coming week. I am writing this at Brussels Airport where I am waiting to catch a flight to Monrovia (via Accra). Yes, I am en route to Liberia where I am going to do some pro bono work with an NGO. It is all very exciting. All I can be sure of is that the high levels of humidity there (naturally it is the rainy season) mean that my hair will be huge. I will report on it and my other adventures over the coming days.

[Actually WiFi in Brussels airport did not allow me to upload this yesterday so I am doing so now from Monrovia overlooking the Atlantic Ocean and yes the barnet is big.]