Hope.. and Sweet Salone

Democracy and Development
I am excited about the recent turn of political events in Sierra Leone. I’ve had a particular affection for Sierra Leone since the late 1990s when I first started business travel there. I relished the warmth and friendliness of her people, her astonishing beaches, and the delicious, mouth watering range of seafood. For many years thereafter I actually wanted to relocate to Freetown.

As I laid on the Mauritian beach this week and soaked in the natural and stunning landscape, I wondered what was so different about this wonderful landscape to that of Sierra Leone, for on the face of it there was really not much difference. To many Mauritius is a magnificent, glorious island – and I know that few people would describe Sierra Leone as such.

But as I looked more closely around me, even along the beach front of the hotel I was staying, I had the answer to my question. To my left and to my right were a dozen odd hotel gardeners and cleaners, tending to the landscape and cleaning-up the beach front, free of the wastage of hotel guests. That’s maintenance for you. Then I thought of the one-hour long drive from Mauritius’ international airport to the hotel. The second difference would have to be the social and economic infrastructure. A fantastic road network, pot-hole free, and an undeniably buoyant and prosperous business sector. It is certainly a delightful and hassle free venture to be a visitor in this country – and without doubt that is the particular intention of the Mauritian government.

When Poverty is so very tangible
I always say that of all the countries I have visited on the African continent, Sierra Leone strikes me as the leading one in which poverty is tangible from the moment you touch down at the airport. In Accra, Dar es Salaam, Nairobi and even Lagos, you may have to drive say one, two or three square miles before you come into contact with abject poverty. My personal experience of Sierra Leone is very different, and I ache for the suffering that I have seen to date amongst the ordinary folk of that country. From the maimed twenty something year old who looks like a forty year old begging for a dollar in the corrugated iron roofed waiting room at the helipad in the airport, to the young seemingly able bodied but unemployed young man you see, loitering and planted up on a tree at 3pm on a working day, on your way to the sea front to catch the hovercraft across from the airport to Freetown. It is a sorry tale.

And it is so because our political leaders have time and time again let us down. I am convinced that political gluttony and the want for despotic power has been the root of Sierra Leone’s economic, social and political woes of the past decades.

Reconstruction and Development
When I first visited Sierra Leone in 1998, though poverty was rife, there was a determination amongst the public servants I worked with to birth positive social and economic change in Sierra Leone. And that urgency was also evident within the donor community who so very readily disbursed hundreds of millions of grants across sectors in the country – I should know, I was tasked to undertake a number of pre and post -disbursement audits of such multi-million pound grants during that time.

But I don’t see that spirit of urgency, that hunger to see change, in the public sector anymore, less, of course, a handful of groups and sectors. There is lethargy around the place, and there is also, forgive me to say, a thick air of mendacity around which was not so heavily prevalent during those times.

It’s a pity because things were just not that bad a decade or so ago.

Guest houses and well, hotels
There were few hotels in Freetown then but I remember there were a number of basic but decent guest houses – one particular one that we stayed in on several occasions in Babadorie (yes, I know – not particularly a tourist district but we appreciated where we were and why we were in Sierra Leone in the first place as public sector reform consultants), was spotlessly clean – though very basic in amenities. The staff were incredibly friendly and warm – and eager to please. Water flowed most of the time and although there were frequent power failures, at least you could be certain of ten to twelve hours of power per day – and for the average Sierra Leonean that meant that they could plan their days better – cooking, working, etc, etc. Even if there was no power, we were happy to rely on candle light. On many occasions I very readily and contentedly lunched with my counterparts at the Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank – at the local equivalents of what we in Ghana call ‘chop bars’. The chop bars were clean and you could confidently enjoy a meal in the surroundings

And since 2002?
The Sierra Leone I have come to know though after the official end of the war since 2002 is, regrettably as I see it, a poorer nation. Some of those same guest houses have closed down, those that still exist are of an even poorer standard than they were seven odd years ago, and even the new ones are really nothing to write home about. All, and I mean all, fall short of acceptable standards of cleanliness – I have on many occasions had mice as room mates in all four of the hotels that I return to on business travel – plus the musty rooms, soiled carpets, not-so clean bed sheets, cockroaches and mildewed walls.

And as for lunching at the local chop bar – not so fast. Most of them don’t have running water now, so to my mind the risk is just too great. One of my colleagues fell ill with typhoid during a recent visit - another develops severe skin rashes during each visit.

And the helicopter shuttle from the airport to Freetown? Well, maybe I was younger and more fearless a decade or so ago, but I am certain the seven minutes ride back then was not as fraught with danger as they have become – at least the helicopters (yes, the same ones were in use until the recent ban following the fatal crash of earlier on this year) had not depreciated as much then as they have now. And, yes, I mustn’t forget to add – there are no seat belts, no life jackets, not ventilation less the open windows which were in themselves a danger, and no, there is no head gear to protect your ears.

Whoever said that corporate life was all fun and games?

Corruption has been at an unacceptable level, poverty has been even more tangible, and the gap between the rich and the poor is thick and ample. Freetown is over populated with internally displaced people but without the ensuing public services and infrastructure to match the inflows. Public service delivery? You just don’t get a sense that the government is doing anything at all for the people.

Two or three years ago at church service one Sunday morning at a church in Brookfields the pastor led us in prayer. He said we should pray that God would remove the reproach from Sierra Leone. And pray we did.

I echo the same prayer today for Sierra Leone, and pray that the new Government will place national needs, the needs of the citizenry that voted them into office ahead of their own personal wants and needs.

I raise a toast of hope to the people and country of Sierra Leone.

The Run

I went for a run this morning. Wanted to savor in the beach, the turquoise colored sea-water. Savor the peace, the breeze, the beauty of creation.

Decided to do six laps along the sea length path – the sand is way too soft here to run on. On my fifth lap I tripped badly – but did not fall.

I thought to myself: better not tempt fate. Just complete your run here and now. And then I thought, determinedly – what if I do tempt fate? Why not tempt fate? You are a child of Faith, you have The Blood of Jesus. Don’t give in to fear.

So I ran two more laps. And no, I didn’t trip.

And then I thought of all the other issues I am encountering which require me to hold on in faith. Then I determined, assuredly, that the God Who kept me from falling as I tripped badly - in an effort to keep body and soul in tune and enjoy the beauty of creation, which is what we all do every day, I guess - will surely also see me through every and any other fall.

And - He will also ensure that I finish ‘the race’ in victory - with body and soul intact.

Spirituality in South African Jazz

I am in Mauritius this week – and discovering spirituality in music. South African jazz, to be precise.

One of my favorite, favorite, favorite jazz musician in the whole wide world has to be Jimmy Dludlu. I celebrate his music unashamedly. I have often thought, though with fear and trembling, that his music is so complete it’s unreal. What keeps me from saying that though is my belief that the only thing complete in the whole wide world that I know of is The Holy Bible, and also my anxiety that if Jimmy’s work is so complete, that pre-supposes that I might never hear anything new from him again. Perish the thought.

I bought two of his latest CDS at Johannesburg airport on Monday. Could hardly wait to listen to them. Then, I discovered something that just blows me away….

Whilst enjoying the absolutely enchanting and inspiring harmony, I discover on the sleeve of Corners of my Soul (his release of 2006), that Mr Dludlu must be a Paulo Coelho fan! Can it get better?

Sounds like he is an Alchemist fan! There’s a piece on Corners of My Soul named The Alchemist. This is Mr Dludlu’s own script on the piece:

The Alchemist… a young man leaves home in search of a better life in the big city.. the promise, the toil, the hardship, the turmoil, the deceit, the denial, the pain..the pain…the pain.

Whoever said attaining purpose, hopes, dream (call it what you like) is without pain?

Celebrating Mr Dludlu – my musical inspiration.

Fight The Good Fight of Faith

This was delivered to my mail box this morning from The Warrior of the Light, one of Paulo Coelho's e-journals. It spoke volumes to me so I thought to post it. All credits, copyright et al to Paulo Coelho, of course.

The good fight
“I have fought a good fight, I have kept the faith,” says Paul in one of his Epistles. And it seems appropriate to remember the theme now that a new year is stretching out before us.

Men can never stop dreaming. Dreams are the food of the soul, just as food is to the body.

In our existence we often see our dreams come undone, yet it is necessary to go on dreaming, otherwise our soul dies and Agape does not penetrate it. Agape is universal love, the love which is greater and more important than “liking” someone.

Remembering Dr Martin Luther King
In his famous sermon on dreams, Martin Luther King reminds us of the fact that Jesus asked us to love our enemies, not to like them. This greater love is what drives us to go on fighting in spite of everything, to keep faith and joy, and to fight the Good Fight.

The Good Fight is the one we wage because our heart asks for it. In heroic times, when the apostles went out into the world to preach the Gospel, or in the days of the knights errant, things were easier: there was a lot of territory to travel, and a lot of things to do. Nowadays, however, the world has changed and the Good Fight has been moved from the battle fields to within us.

The Good Fight is the one we wage on behalf of our dreams. When they explode in us with all their might – in our youth – we have a great deal of courage, but we still have not learned to fight. After much effort we eventually learn to fight, and then we no longer have the same courage to fight. This makes us turn against ourselves and we start fighting and becoming our own worst enemy. We say that our dreams were childish, difficult to make come true, or the fruit of our ignorance of the realities of life. We kill our dreams because we are afraid of fighting the Good Fight.

The Battle Within Us
The first symptom that we are killing our dreams is lack of time. The busiest people I have known in my life had time for everything. Those who did nothing were always tired and could hardly cope with the little work they had to do, always complaining that the day was too short. In fact, they were afraid of fighting the Good Fight.

The second symptom of the death of our dreams are our certainties. Because we do not want to see life as a great adventure to be lived, we begin to feel that we are wise, fair and correct in what little we ask of our existence. We look beyond the walls of our day-to-day life and hear the noise of spears clashing, feel the smell of sweat and gun-powder, see the great defeats and the faces of warriors thirsty for victory. But we never perceive the joy, the immense joy in the heart of those who are fighting, because for them it does not matter who wins or loses, what matters only is to fight the Good Fight.

Finally, the third symptom of the death of our dreams is peace. Life becomes a Sunday afternoon, not asking too much of us and not asking more than what we want to give. So we feel that we are “mature”, leave aside the “fantasies of childhood” and guarantee our personal and professional success. We are surprised when someone our age says they still want this or that out of life. But deep in our heart we know that what has happened is that we gave up fighting for our dreams, fighting the Good Fight.

False Peace
When we give up our dreams and find peace, we enjoy a period of tranquility. But our dead dreams begin to rot inside us and infest the whole atmosphere we live in. We start acting cruel towards those around us, and eventually begin to direct this cruelty towards ourselves. Sickness and psychoses appear. What we wanted to avoid in fighting – disappointment and defeat – becomes the only legacy of our cowardice. And one fine day the dead and rotten dreams make the air difficult to breathe and then we want to die, we want death to free us from our certainties, from our worries, and from that terrible Sunday-afternoon peace.

So, to avoid all that, let’s face the rest of 2007 and the years ahead with the reverence of mystery and the joy of adventure.

Laying Aside Every Weight

Well, I did it. Last week I had just about had enough of physical lethargy. This every moment filled with a ‘to do’ and an activity was just weighing me down. So I made a few phone calls.

To the E-Learning Manager
Most politely I informed Linda that she would have noticed that I had not much participated in the current module of the MBA course. Could I get a refund on the module? Could I refer my participation to the next time the module was running? Could I take a break from the next module as well? Thankfully Linda said yes to all of the above.

Then I remembered that I did not actually have to complete the MBA in the minimum time prescribed, and reminded myself that there is a reason why there is a two year difference between the minimum time it takes to complete the course and the maximum time in which you can complete it in.

I exhale. Maybe I can have my weekends back now.

To the Ladies Club
Erm. We are doing great, valuable outreach work here. But I’ve been quite overwhelmed for the past couple of months. I need repose and must take some time out from so many of the activities that I am involved with perhaps until the end of the year. Please could somebody else take over the coordination of activities? Thank you.

One final all important email
To one of my mentors and leaders. Please. Leave of absence from some of those many activities till the end of the year. Please.

Jethro
Then I remembered Moses’ wise father-in-law who advised him to delegate some tasks and not overwhelm himself with so many activities. What a wise man he was.

My MBA marks on assignments were falling from distinction to merit to passes. I was not carrying out many of my responsibilities and activities with the same fervor and attention to detail. Even going to the gym was becoming a chore. Worse still, my quiet time was not providing the strength that I knew it could.

No. I can’t do this to myself. Time to lay aside every weight.