DC, EJS and the HLP

David Cameron was in Liberia on Friday on the last leg of his African tour. While in Algeria and Libya his focus was how Britain and the international community deals with extremism, in Liberia it was poverty which I would argue is a greater threat to peace and stability, not just in Africa but across the world. Poor people are hungry people, people without access to education, clean water, health care, people who see their children die of diseases which wouldn't kill them if they lived in the West. Extremists of any persuasion like poor people because they are easy pickings. We have to do something to tackle global poverty. And that is what Cameron was doing in Monrovia.

He is co-chair, along with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and Liberian President Ellen Sirleaf Johnson (ESJ) of a high level panel of "eminent persons" (HLP) convened by UN Secretary General to agree the global development priorities to succeed the Millennium Development Goals.  

The theme of the Monrovia meeting was putting in the national building blocks for sustained prosperity. In Liberia and indeed most of the rest of Africa this means short- and medium-term foreign support so that long-term Africa can stand on its own two feet. Because no matter what those opposed to the concept of international development would have you believe, no African country, or in fact any country, wants to be aid-dependent.

This is why it is significant that ESJ is co-chairing the Panel. She is having a direct impact on the development priorities the world sets itself. She can and will ensure that the priorities of Africa and Africans are properly reflected.

ESJ knows well that countries like Liberia need help to get in place the basic infrastructure upon which its future prosperity is dependent. The civil war destroyed the national grid, the road network, the ports. Without these crops don’t get to market, children don’t get to school, the sick don’t get healthcare, goods don’t get traded. The formal economy is stifled, taxable income is suppressed, countries remain poor. Ok, I know it is a bit more complicated than that but not much.   

So Liberia needs help now to help it not need help in the future. It is doing what it can but can’t do it on its own. And why should we give help? Well I could write at length about theories of under-development and the role of the developed world in the impoverishment of Africa but I think it is simpler than that.

• We can: we can afford it no matter what those opposed to it tell you
• It will have a real impact: done effectively it is a short-term investment that will be transformational
• It is better for us: poor people are vulnerable not just to disease but to the allure of extremists and instability Africa is not good for anyone
• We should: it is the right thing to do

I hope that Cameron enjoyed his visit to Liberia. It would be great if he fell in love with it as I have, but at the very least I hope he has returned with a strong commitment to do the right thing and supports EJS, Liberia and Africa. 

The bright side of the road.

I have become obsessed with roads over the last few days. Liberia is building roads, hundreds of kilometres of them. In the last two years it has rebuilt over 300 km and there are a further 500 km planned for the next three. That is a lot of of road in a very short space of time. The expansion of the road network is a reflection of the progress Liberia is making and is one of the key building blocks of sustainable prosperity.


We take roads for granted in Britain. We are very well served on this front. Yes sometimes there are problems fixing potholes or gritting but basically we can rely on them, so much so that almost every road building project provokes challenge and opposition. But here in Liberia there simply aren't enough. Getting from one end of the country by land is difficult and takes a really long time, especially in the rainy season. Some parts of the country are completely inaccessible by road. Until recently this included Vahun, a small town near the border with Sierra Leone. During the war, the road out of Vahun to the neighbouring town of Kolahun which connected it to  county capital and Monrovia stopped being maintained, so just disappeared, cutting Vahun off from the rest of the country. The townsfolk of Vahun had to go across the border to Sierre Leone by canoe to do anything. But in the last few months the road from Kolahun has been restored and finally the children of Vahun can go to school without having to paddle across an international border.

Roads, particularly in rural areas, are bringing communities together, helping farmers get their food to market, increasing employment opportunities, allowing children to go to school and giving villagers access healthcare. And major roads attract foreign investors who can see how they can move their goods, people and services around the country quickly and safely.


In Monrovia itself, the main thoroughfares have been in pretty good state of repair for a while now. They are now tackling the side streets. And the other night driving back into town, I noticed something pretty amazing - catseyes along a long and particularly busy stretch of Tubman Boulevard (the street which bisects Monrovia). It is a major innovation and I for one am pretty excited about it (and that is something I never thought I would say). So now Liberia can look forward to a future with more and safer roads. The way ahead looks bright.

(Yes I know the photo isn't of catseyes but the one I took was even worse than the pic of the cheesecake.)

Liberia at last

So I am here, finally. I arrived 16 hours later than scheduled, crumpled and dishevelled but delighted to be back. I really do love Liberia. It feels comfortable. Now anyone who has been here will know that when I say comfortable I don't mean in the creature comforts way, but in the familiar, I know and like this place, I know where to get great cassava greens and there are people here who know me and dare I say are pleased to see me.

But things have changed in Monrovia since the last time I was here.  The progress I reported then continues. The road building programme has been going apace and there is so much construction work. There are brand spanking new petrol stations, hotels, markets and homes from luxury villas to modest three- and four-roomed houses. Today the Minister of Energy announced an extensive electrification programme which will see 10 times as many properties in Monrovia connected to the national grid by 2015 as now as well as turning the lights on in large parts of the rest of the country. It is hard for those of us who live in the West to conceive of life without being able to flick a switch whenever you want. But in a country where nights last about 12 hours and the cost of using a generator is high, the impact of affordable, safe electricity will be huge. Businesses will be able to stay open past dusk, employment opportunities will increase, children will be able to study after school, the streets will be safer, food will keep safely longer. Life will be better for many more people. And for a country still healing from the brutal wounds inflicted by 16 years of war which ended just 10 years ago, this kind of progress is just what is needed.

(By the way I am claiming Casablanca - I was there nine hours, that has to count.)

We'll always have Paris

I am in Casablanca. As previously reported I had no plans to be here today but circumstances are such that I find myself in the Royal Air Maroc lounge waiting for a flight to Liberia which has been delayed so I am unlikely to make it to Monrovia before 0600.

When I decided that visiting the letters of the alphabet would be one of my resolutions for 2013, my rules for myself were that it had to be a proper visit, I couldn't claim any places I was just passing through - so Crewe wouldn't count if I was just changing trains there. I still think it is a good rule but I think I can make the case for Casablanca. I will be here for at least 5 hours, will eat a meal, drink a Coke and might even have a shower (believe me I would like to have a shower, the only doubt I have stems from the fact there seems to be little evidence of the required facilities). I think that constituents a visit. And people, we are already half way through January and I haven't bagged any places yet, so for the time being at least Casablanca is on the list.

If the airport is anything to go by it may not be a place to which I will want to return. I know this is a very poor criterion, on this basis one could hardly recommend London - yes Heathrow is getting better but Luton? The lounge I am in is over-lit, playing rather exhuberant marching music and has very uncomfortable chairs. Rick and Ilsa would not recognise it and I am sure Captain Renault would have something to say about the state of the loos.

Wait in lounge

I am being tested, severely tested. As well as my many New Year's resolutions, I also decided that I would give up alcohol for January. My poor liver was pleading with me to give it a break and who am I to deny one of my vital organs? It really hasn't been too bad and I have been using the time I would normally spend in a bar, running.  There has been lots of running. But today I find myself in an airline lounge with hours to kill and booze on tap. Thus far I have resisted but for how long I am not sure.

It was going to be easy to stay on the wagon, I had two relatively short flights  and was scheduled to land in Liberia in good time to meet colleagues and have a sober dinner. Alas this was not to be. Instead of being in the skies above southern Spain right now I am sitting in Heathrow where I have been since 5.30 this morning. I did leave briefly on a plane meant to take me to Brussels but there was a "bird strike" and we returned.

The whole experience has confirmed my view that I am not a good traveller. By that I mean that while I love to be in other places, to see discover new horizons and return to favourite spots, I am not good at the getting there, especially by plane. I find the experience of being a commercial airline passenger unbelievably tedious and irritating. Plus I have never been one of those people who manages to look stylish when she travels, you know the sort, comes through the arrivals gate looking super fresh, well coiffured and perfectly made up. I always arrive clothes crumpled, skin desiccated, hair a mess, make-up smudged. I never start out like that, it just seems to happen almost as soon as I walk into a terminal building.

Inevitably by the time I get on the plane, I am grumpy because I have had to get up hideously early to get to the airport hours before the departure time in order to get through security where I have been almost always the subject of a rather too intimate body search and the picking through of my hastily packed bag. This has then been followed by a ridiculously long time waiting in lounges with varying degrees of comfort.

Once aboard, I use all my Jedi powers to stop the person sitting beside me from catching my eye in a way that can only mean s/he wants to strike up a conversation - I can't do chit chat with strangers on a plane (of course if I am travelling with someone I don't stint witty repartee). Then I have a moment when I have to remind myself that it doesn't matter that I don't really understand how a plane stays in the air (yes, I know it is all about lift and thrust but I still don't get it) because thanks to the laws of physics  its being able to stay in the air is not dependent on what is in my brain. And then I laugh to myself for being an idiot before plugging in my iPod, closing my eyes and falling asleep until a member of the cabin crew tries to feed me.

And this morning, we were on track. I woke up at 0415 (some three hours after I had gone to bed - so wise), got angry with the cab company for collecting me late (I could have had those 10 minutes in bed), made my way to Heathrow and two hours after I woke up boarded a flight to Brussels. As I was going through the "it doesn't matter if you don't understand" routine, it occurred to me that the plane (an Airbus 319 I believe) was making a noise much like my on-its-last-legs washing machine on its spin cycle. It was very noisy and all a bit shaky. I was closing my eyes with the intent of catching 40 winks when the captain said something in Flemish which didn't sound good. To be honest very little sounds good in Flemish but whatever he said got the cabin crew going. Anyway, five minutes later we were informed that as a result of said "bird strike" we were now flying on just the one engine and so were returning to Heathrow. As if to underline the seriousness of it all when we landed, we were met on the runway by half a dozen fire engines. But I have had a lot of dodgy flights - lightning strikes, mega turbulence, no lights and a chanting hippie to name a few - so a few fire appliances were not going to upset me.    

What has upset me is having to repeat the security, searching, waiting all over again. This time with bells on because I have missed my connection so am waiting for a 1740 flight to Casablanca - too late for it be bearable but too soon for it to make sense for me to go home and come back later. Once in Casablanca, I will have a four-hour wait before catching a flight to Monrovia which will get me in at about the time I got up this morning - perfect. I have had to queue much more than I would have expected, pay for the privilege of printing out my boarding card at the airport and been searched for the second time in a morning.

But it hasn't been all bad - I have soothed myself in the traditional manner, purchases from LK Bennett will be delivered next week, and even better the lovely people Clarins have given me a complimentary facial. I just need to steer clear of the complimentary bar. 

Syria: enough already

You might not have seen it what with all the reporting of the fact that 2012 was very wet (who knew?) and the Argentinians deciding that it was about time that it reminded the world that it has a claim on the Falkland Islands (I am afraid I just can’t get excited about this), but last night the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights reported that in the period 15 March 2011 and 30 November 2012 more than 60,000 people had been killed in Syria by both sides. More than 60,000 – it is truly staggering.

And let’s be clear, these are not mickey mouse figures based on hunches or the claims of the opposing sides but based on five months of analysis by independent experts who have only counted people for whom they have a first and last name and a date and location of the death.  So no exaggeration, rather supreme caution. As the High Commissioner’s spokesperson chillingly put it “There are many names not on the list for people who were quietly shot in the woods”.

And what have we been doing while 60,000 people were killed? Well, pretty much nothing. We had effectively been twiddling our thumbs while the country burns.  The Human Rights Commissioner Navi Pillay warned that thousands more would die if the conflict continued and if we failed to prepare for the inevitable instability that will occur when it finally does. She called for serious planning “not just to provide humanitarian aide to all those who need it, but to protect all Syrian citizens from extrajudicial killings and acts for revenge.”

And she’s right. We have been here before haven’t we? Somalia, Iraq, DRC, Afghanistan. But with well-planned strategic support from the international community, post-conflict mayhem can be avoided. Just think of Sierra Leone, Liberia, Rwanda, Mozambique.

Now, I don’t pretend to know what the solution to the crisis in Syria other than it must in the end come from the Syrians themselves. But I do know if we fail to heed to words of the wise Ms Pillay 60,000 dead will seem small.  

Rainy season

It is raining here in Monrovia. As those of you who have travelled with me know, I tend to be a bit of a talisman when it comes to rain. I have brought torrential downpours to the deserts of New Mexico and Dubai, to the South African high veldt I the dry season and to Provence in July. On one trip to Hong Kong it rained from the moment my plane touched down until I left six days later, only to resume for the 90 minutes I was in transit from The Philippines on the way back from a rain-soaked island break.

But in all my years, in all my travels, I have never experienced rain like the rain that is falling here. Not that I am claiming responsibility for this precipitation. On the contrary, this rain is on schedule. The rainy season officially started here on 15 April and will continue for the next six months, although there is normally a lull in the second half of August (hence my relatively dry visit last time around). This isn’t the kind of rainy season you get in some parts of the world when it rains for a couple of hours at around the same time every day and that’s that. Oh no. Here the skies empty at any time and the sheets of water pelt down for hours, sometimes days at a time. Very little can be heard above the it, it muffles all sound. To put it in perspective Liberia gets more rain in a single month than we do in an entire year in the UK. That they manage to get any kind of infrastructure work done in these conditions is simply amazing. But somehow they do. What has struck me since I was last here is how much better the roads are. There are also many more businesses open, more restaurants and supermarkets and more airlines flying here – Air France started flights from Paris last week. The country is poor, very poor but it is slowly but surely rebuilding itself after years of brutal civil war. And people are cheery in spite of the rain.

If ever you are in West Africa during the rains, it is worth knowing:

1. it is still hot - locals will tell you otherwise and shiver in jackets and sweaters but for those of us more used to northern Europe it is hot, hot, hot

2. there is no point wearing any make up as it melts off your face

3. don’t wear suede or fabric shoes

4. on the plus side you can go easy on the moisturiser

5. no matter how much you think you have dried your hair, you haven’t and don’t even get me started on managing the frizz

Monrovia bound

So, here I am again, I am sitting in Brussels airport en route to Liberia. And once again I have just left another job. I realise the “I am going to do a stint in Liberia” fast risks becoming a euphemism for “unemployed” but rest assured it isn’t.

Anyway it is Easter Sunday, the airport is deserted and I have yet to break my Lenten fast – that is to say I haven’t eaten any chocolate yet. Despite the very early hour, I do want to but it turns out even though I am in the home of chocolate, the only product on offer in the transfer lounge is a giant Toberlone. I just don’t think even after 40 days of abstention I am ready for “triangular chocolate from triangular trees and triangular honey from triangular bees”.

I am very excited to be returning to Monrovia. I fell in love with the place last summer and am looking forward to catching up with all the remarkable people in the administration of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf that I met last time. It is an amazing country which is making rapid strides after years of the most brutal civil war and I am proud to be playing a part, albeit a tiny one, in helping it recover and thrive.

A quick look at the BBC website weather page tells me that it is hot and wet there so the Joseph barnet will be in full ’fro mode. There will be no photos.

Happy Easter

(Once again Brussels airport's promise of free wifi was not fulfilled, so this is coming to you direct from Monrovia where there is wifi and it is hot and sticky - more soon)

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.

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 . . .

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.

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.]