From Poverty To Power: a day at Nairobi University

Duncan Green, an activist from Oxfam International.....who has been working for them for quite a long time in London. In his opinion, he is in Oxfam to challenge internally. He questions about what progress we have made in eradicating poverty after working such a long time. As he is the research unit head for Oxfam, he did utilized the opportunity to look for the issues behind not doing good in the poverty business. His research from Oxfam working countries and also some non-working countries shows how the power dynamics is controlling poverty.

Recently, I have got the oppotunity to visit a seminar where he presented about the book about his research named 'From Poverty To Power' (visit: www.fp2p.org ). Indeed a strong title with thoughtful twist to re-think about the businesses (I am using business for the activities that we, development agencies, private sector, politicians and government deal with) with poverty. The foreword for the book is written by Dr. Amartya Sen. It was a rare opportunity to meet the author himself, a very good speaker- 'Brian' from ActionAid and Joyce from Results for Africa Institute under a same roof talking from 3 different perspective but also supporting some facts came out of the book.

Followed by the discussion on book, many issues came up during discussion with special focus on Africa. It was interesting to know that how african writers are deprived from publishing books in international platform. A member of the panel claimed in front of the writer if the same book was written by an african, it wouldn't get the same level of exposure. It was also evident from the consensus among the hall full of African (mainly Kenyan) that how they fail to bergain with north. In the hall, I could feel some similarities between Bangladeshi youth and Kenyan youth. From the comment of stuedents, I could understand the similar frustration about polictical system, economic liberty and mindset. The contrast between having the richest continent and being poorest hurts badly. Even to an outsider like me, I get surprised how a normal kenyan survive with the price of commodities! I get surprised looking at road full of lates Mercedes, Range Rover, BMW and other luxerious cars driven by Kenyans and having the 3rd largest slums in the world side-byu-side! Who is controlling the poverty?

Probably to answer above question, the book 'fp2p' tries to make us think. You may want to think again about the MDGs, about the approach of government and development organizations towards povery eradication. Many writers like Mr. Green gets praise and good review every year. But I wonder whether they really are satisfied to see how poorly we have been handling their thoughts!

[end]

::The Sun-Kissed Land::

They call it a 'Sun-kissed land'. After a tiring night flight, didn't understand why unless got kissed by sun in the morning on my bed, obviously with amazing beauty of indian ocean! It is worth being born, it is worth beleiving in GOD!It has been more than a week that I have joined one of the regional offices of CARE International at Nairobi. On the way of slowly catching up with city life, I have got a call to visit Tanzania! Though was not looking up to a place of the differenc of 1 hour flight, but got impressed by the airport. When I was coming out of the arrival lobby, a handsome guy wearing probably one of the best hawaii print shirts that I have ever seen, was holdin my name in a plackard. He is 'Ramadan', the driver of the hotel to pick me up. The car ride is another one hour with similar road side view with Bangladesh, except for sign boards. They even have Bajaj CNG three-wheelers! Not to mention the Indian communities are preety strong as Kenya. There are develpment sign almost wherever you look at. New constructions of buildings, roads is a common scene of Dar Es Salam, the capital. Anyways, with some chit-chats with Ramadan (probably in Bangladesh he will be called as Ramjan) and some swahili music at radio I found a cozy bed awaiting thousand miles away from my home. That reminds me how badly I miss home. But hey! I have the great Indian ocean to subside the sadness-saying 'Karibu' (welcome).

:: [2] ::

...I was spending my week with all fellow Africans from more than 10 countries in this hotel. Among 35 participants I am the only one who is not African! But these people are full of fun once you start getting to know. So, in my case, I didn't feel like an alien after 1/2 days. Cracking practical jokes in the middle of session, laughter and openness about feelings, obviously gives a chance to be close. I think for the first time I met someone from a country called Lesotho. I have also managed to learn how we are similar that are usually not reflected on media! By the way, for the first time I have also met Sudanese people, they are fun! They are adorable!! I didn't have any idea that Khartoum (Sudan's capital) is actually as developed as many developed African cities. Probably the westernize media doesn't like the good side of Africa! I was shocked to know that funding from western donors have reduced at Tanzania sicne they don't have any political importance in terms of civil war-in other way, its not a good weapon market! But it is certainly a good job market for Muzungus (Muzungu: its a swahili word meaning 'white people'). Just by looking at the driving seats you can tell that Africa is definitely a good place for them to earn! Well...probably for some south asians like me too :-) (FYI, my pay scale is not at all like other X Pats). Anywyas, I did like the crowd withouth Muzungu in the White Sands Hotel. I did get a chance to dance with african beats as the hotel aranges BBQ nite with live band on every wednesday. The artists thought that I am Indian and they also played a Hindi song for me :) I politely managed to make them convince that hindi is not my language.

:: [3] ::

It was then shopping time! At the last day of workshop, the organizers managed a bus to have a trip to city for some Tanzanian style shopping! They took us to a place looks similar to our Bongobazar. But the sad part is I could not find anything for me as all t shirts are long (they wear very long t shirts), but I really felt for my soccer lover friends back in Dhaka as the jerseys are very cheap! One thing is to be mentioned that Tanzania (but I guess other African nations too) is a football crazy nation. I was passing a railway crossing and saw a black board beside the road mentioning the timetable of English Premier League for next two days and also the updates from previous matches. Here, poor day-labourer works wearing football club jerseys. Here, developmetn agencies desigining projects based on Football (they have major movements of HIV/AIDS awareness through sports). Local TVs are showing live matches, Supermarkets selling TVs through soccer based promotions! Football is everywhere!

After an hour when I got tired of finding somthing to buy, I decided to have some bites. But hey, even though Dar has only 50% muslim community-all restaurants are closed for Ramadan :( After searching a while I found a food stall in a gas station. They were selling 'alu-chop' and 'piaju' :) I was so surprised to find a food like that and could not resist myself to have those. As the clock was ticking, I had to be off for my meeting with CARE Tanzania for the time being (yes, after the meeting we will go for interesting places). I had a tough time locating CARE's driver since he doesn't speak english and I could not understand his location....somehow, with the help of Almighty I found him by walking/ running around! I think that's a long story to tell separately.

CARE Tanzania is one of the interesting CARE offices in the region. Because, it has many interesting projects with private sectors. They have worked with The Coca Cola Company (Coke has a very big market here), they are working with a big mining company too. The office looks very busy all the time. It can be an example for other development agencies how we can be innovative in having meaningful partnerships to reduce the dependency of donors. This office also has numerous projects focusing environment and climate change.

:: [4] ::

Later that day, our bus with all my workshop mates came to pick me up from CARE office. It was 5 in the afternoon and the sky was started to smile in red. Once again, I was enjoying the twilight of Dar- from the front seat of bus, not beach. After a while when we got stuck at 5 pm traffic (I guess this is common in all countries), a very familiar sign caught up my eyes. It was a big sige on a huge gate of a building showing bold presence of BRAC. I could not resist telling others in the bus about BRAC and it seems many of them already know how big they are. Readers many think why a CARE employee so excited about its competitor like agency. Well, I guess its the pure honesty of heart's feelings about your country that can't be controlled by so called professionalism all the time. You do feel proud to see a Bangladeshi organization working for world's humanity! Maybe development agencies need to challenge each others more to be efficient. As we all are paid activist to fight poverty, we should better justify the salary by doing our best for the sake of poor people!

Just after sunset, letting above thinking away, a very decent beach side area suddenly pops up in the windshield of bus. One of the Tanzanian colleague declared- 'people! We have 20 minutes to see around'. After getting off to a square-like place, I thought I won't be bored spending 20 hours at a stretch here! This place is called SLIPWAY. It's a tourist complex, nicely designed with a harmony of international & Tanzanian touch of architecture having 1 terrace cafe, 1 beachside restaurant with live cultural performance, a nice coffee shop with bar and delicious ice-cream parlour. I could say it's delicious from the facial expresssion on people who were coming out from there. Oh! I forgot to mention the book shop, handicraft bazaar, posh home decor shop (I didn't have courage to enter as it was that posh!), the Japanese restaurant and the ONE-WAY t-shirt shop. Now you tell me, is it possible to enjoy this place in 20 minutes?

I did not have any proper camera but my cell phone camera. So, could not capture the beauty of Slipway or the things that I have seen in Tanzania. Or maybe I have captured...in the celluloid of my bio-negative film of life. [End]

N.B. My facebook friends can also see this post at fb notes. And some pictures in my photo album.