26 April 2006

Focus got Jayson Blaired. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, one of our reporters was making up quotes. The explanation that he gave was that he got a friend at the New Times to give him quotes from the United Nations High Commission for Refugees when he had trouble getting in touch with them. The alternate explanation is that Bonny just out-and-out plagiarized. Both of these are time-honored New Times practices that we’re trying to break. And by the way, he got the story wrong.

Either way, Bonny had to go. Apparently the explanation Shyaka and I gave on Monday didn’t sit well with some of the reporters. One of them, Helen, asked why we couldn’t accept an apology and let Bonny come back. We both took our turns explaining journalistic integrity and all that stuff. Trust is all we’ve got, blah, blah, blah.

So yesterday, I spoke to Helen again to make sure she understood what Shyaka and I were talking about. “Well, I know someone who sawed off his pregnant wife’s head during the Genocide. He asked for forgiveness and they let him back into the community,” she said.

Touché. How do you come back from that? I mumbled something about the same blah, blah, blah that I did on Monday. And then finally Helen and I figured out that she didn’t understand exactly what we meant. When we explained the plagiarism and lying (Bonny told me he spoke to these people), Helen conceded that in newspaper terms what Bonny did was worse than chopping off his pregnant wife’s head. I’m glad I made my point.

Anyway, I’ve got big news. We finally know where we’re going. I’ll give you a clue. Here it is: Beef jerky time.

Stumped? For the one of you who got the clue (Jon Abrams, I’m counting on you), congratulations on existing in fantasy land with me. For the more normal people out there, I’ll give you another hint.

In the movie “Trading Places”, Eddie Murphy impersonates a student from this African country on a train, and punctuates a fake prayer with the phrase “Beef jerky time!”

Still stumped? Fine, I’m out of clues. It’s Cameroon. Rebecca will be, as she puts it, a “professional schmoozer” in the Yaondé office. Yaondé is the capital. It’s basically a fund-raising, PR and relationship position. I don’t quite understand it, but I don’t need to. It’s her job. Officially, her first day is May 20, and we’ll know exactly when we’re leaving Kigali soon. But it’ll probably be between May 15 and 20.

Don’t be embarrassed if you don’t know anything about Cameroon. There’s not a whole lot written about it. The reason is that it’s stable and has been for around 40 years. It’s essentially a one-party state where the president’s been in power for 20-something years. It has a raucous independent written press, but political parties mostly control the press. I did say that it was essentially a one-party state. There is an opposition, but it will never get into power. It’s sort of like Japan.

Anyway, what else do I know about Cameroon? It has an 85 percent literacy rate. The corruption is blatant, obvious, open and joyous. Cameroonian food is apparently very good, and the culture is reportedly warm and inviting. I can understand the Cameroonian French accent much better than the Rwandan French accent (a couple of Cameroonians who work for CRS were here last week). There are over 200 different ethnic groups, and over 200 different languages. And yet they haven’t killed each other. It’ll be interesting to come from a place where two essentially colonially created ethnic groups take turns killing each other into a place where people at least can’t be bothered. I think there’s a book there, but I’m not sure.

Finally, Cameroon’s neighbors are basket cases. We’ve got Equatorial Guinea, which has lots of oil, lots of poor people and a violent corrupt government. We’ve got Gabon, with its impressive national parks but the longest-serving head of government in the world, President Omar Bongo. And we’ve got Chad and the Central African Republic, which are vying for the title of “saddest place on earth”. I’ll let you know who wins.

All of those places are filled with great stories, and there are no foreign journalists in any of these places, except Chad. The field is open. I’m ready to go.

14 April 2006

Today marks the end of Genocide commemoration week.

On April 6, 1994, Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana’s airplane was shot down over Kigali – in fact it crashed into his compound and one reporter I know claims that the plane wasn’t shot down at all. Instead, Habyarimana was showing off his swimming pool to the president of Burundi, who was also on the plane. I don’t believe this story at all.

On April 7, the 100 days of madness and killing that made Rwanda infamous around the world began.

So for the week from April 7 to 14 every year, the country stops and thinks about what happened. In fact, unless they leave the country, people don’t have a choice. It’s Rwanda, after all. Radio stations, even privately owned ones, are only allowed to play programs relating to the Genocide. Only religious music or music talking about the Genocide is allowed to surf across the airwaves. Television is filled with news footage of the killing – horrible, hellish images of violence – and movies about the Genocide. The National University of Rwanda caused a scandal by holding lectures during Commemoration Week. The minister of education showed up at a different university to complain that one professor held a class – a class his students asked for. All sports leagues are cancelled.

Rebecca saw a sign at the Novotel saying that the pool was closed for recreational activities for the week. We originally thought that it was because people were not allowed to swim and enjoy themselves for the week. Actually, they were doing scheduled maintenance and this just happened to be a good time because people aren’t allowed to have fun.

I wonder if this is the best way to relate to what happened here. It’s a surprisingly difficult question to ask some people, because they assume that you’re telling Rwanda to just get over it and move on with life. That’s not what I’m doing. I’m wondering if rather than enforcing sadness it’s better to let people grieve and mourn in their own way.

Every person has a different way of relating to grief. Many Rwandans who have the means leave the country for this week. Helen, one of the Focus reporters, says that her aunt every year says to hell with it and leaves. This year she and her husband went all the way to Canada.

My reporters say that they have mixed feelings about all this. They say that most people decide not to watch TV and don’t listen to the radio. They can’t deal with it. Other people say that it’s necessary. People can’t be allowed to forget what happened here. But how do you forget?

The New Times, the local, competitor rag, reported in the last sentence of the story with the scandal about lectures happening at universities that there is a sharp increase in trauma cases reported in the country during this period. It being the New Times, this issue was not further explored. (Hopefully I will for an American paper or magazine or something.)

Is this what the government wants?

Again, this is just an intellectual inquiry. Okay, fine, it’s partly a criticism because at heart I hold contradictory political beliefs. I want some government regulations – protection of employees, the environment, provision of national health care, a certain level of gun control – but a libertarian on most social issues. Get out of my personal life, I say.

So what effect does this enforced morning period have on people? And why is it done this way? Is it to make sure no one ever forgets? Is it to make sure the current government – which does many good things – was the group that actually stopped it, and is the only force that can prevent the mayhem from reoccurring? Is it because no one knows what to do? Is it because the people who plan broadcasting and social events are incompetent? Shyaka thinks that last question is part of the answer.

Foreigners get into the act of this self-flagellation. (To a certain extent rightly so. The world stood by and did nothing. But then again, except for France, Egypt and China, no foreigner actively helped, either. Rwandans butchered Rwandans.) The American Club was supposed to show King Kong on April 7, the day of national mourning. It got postponed and instead we watched a new BBC movie called “Shooting Dogs” about the Genocide. I recommend it. It’s quite good. Before the movie, a survivor talked to the teeming masses of foreigners, and took the chance to tell us how wrong we all were for not stopping the Genocide. He kept asking us to remember where we were when the whole thing started. I plead guilty. I was a junior in high school. I was probably watching the Rangers. I did nothing to stop the Genocide.

While he did have a point, he only took a few minutes to talk about the responsibility of the people who actually killed.

A friend of mine was visiting from Kampala, so we finally took the opportunity to go to the Genocide Memorial in Kigali. It’s done by the same people who created the DC Holocaust memorial. It’s quite impressive. You can even buy a purple plastic bracelet (a la the Lance Armstrong “Live Strong” bracelets) that says Never Again on it. The money goes to support the memorial, but I couldn’t bear to buy it. I never bought an AIDS ribbon, either.

So anyway, we’re now moving out of official mourning. There is an unofficial 100 days of mourning where one of the survivors associations digs up mass graves and reburies people, and generally goes around making people feel bad. Kigali is going back to its usual fast pace. Fine, it’s not. It’s going back to its usual lack of pace. (Can I leave now? I’ve got the idea.)

One last creepy thing about all of this official mourning. The colors they’ve chosen to commemorate the Genocide (everything needs an official color) are purple and white. For those of you who don’t know, those are the colors of New Rochelle High School.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks and I’ll write more later. But I figured these thoughts should stand alone.

4 April 2006

Focus is involved in its first major dust up. I’m keeping this short so you guys have a reason to read the book.

We published a story – and please understand that if we publish it, we stand by our reporting – that a former soldier and a newspaper editor here are plotting to set off bombs (possible) and poison gas (whatever you say there, ace) in Kigali. We’ve got an e-mail that links them, and people who say they were at meetings where this plan was discussed. Fine. The story is there, and in my mind it is solid.

We went as far as republishing an entire e-mail we have, including the Yahoo! buttons, advertising – everything. Originally, Andreas and I only wanted the text of the e-mail in there. But at Shyaka’s urging we put in all the outside stuff.

We did, however, insist that e-mail addresses be smudged out. We fought Shyaka on that (amicably. It was just a disagreement) and it turned out we were wrong. Andreas and I thought people would understand that we were trying to their privacy. Instead, people saw that we had smudged the e-mail and of course now think we forged the thing. We should have listened to the Rwandan.

As Shyaka said, there was an uproar from the admittedly small journalistic/newspaper consuming populace in Kigali. The guy we published about is the publisher of the opposition newspaper here – sort of a roguish, beloved figure in some circles. His newspaper, however, is terrible. It’s full of lies, slander and bad reporting and writing. The publisher is purported to be a thief, and I know that the reporters there rarely got paid. When they did, it was late and less than promised. This is supposed to be the standard-bearer of the free press in Rwanda? Why? Because he makes stuff up that the government doesn’t like?

I’m not making any of this up. Reporters without Borders tried to claim that Focus was some sort of government stooge out to attack its opponents. A friend of the paper basically invited them to come see both of our computers and reporters playing musical chairs before they released anything. We also proved that we didn’t forge any documents. I haven’t seen anything on my regular e-mails from RSF, so that may have worked. At least one of our reporters has been threatened. Will RSF come to our aid? Although I worked in the human rights community, I’m beginning to have my doubts. I was the militant wing of Human Rights Watch, after all. A country is violating human rights on a massive scale? Bomb them until they stop, I say. Few in those halls agreed with me.

But nothing has happened and nothing will happen.

Whenever I think I’m done being surprised by Rwanda, something new disavows me of that notion. I’d say surprised and disappointed. I found this whole incident disheartening. Doing the right thing – protecting people’s privacy – made people think we were forging documents. I was thinking all sorts of bad things about Rwanda and the people here. I started to wonder if it was ever possible to have a free press in Rwanda if there was such a huge lack of trust. And then I wondered what the point of it was. They can have their country, their newspaper and their petty little fights. I thought about throwing up my hands and walking away.

Shyaka talked me down over a Guinness. He got me over my disappointment (mostly) and surprise (somewhat). This is a cultural difference (although this is the first time I’ve encountered this in any culture I’ve experienced). He said that the reason it’s important to have Focus here is that we’re trying to open up space for people to think and have ideas. Our guys are working too hard to accomplish this goal to leave them now.

Plus, it’s bad form to go home when it’s time to stand up. What kind of an example would I be sending to the younger people I work with? Some of them are as young as 17 and 18. If I didn’t support them when they needed all of us together, then why should I expect them to support each other. I like to think I’m someone you want at your side when it’s time to circle the wagons. Leaving just wouldn’t be right.

If anything, the incident has brought the newsroom together. This is real. This is big time. We’re in this together. I think I’m done with clichés for now, but I can’t make any promises.

So, a lot of you will read this and worry. Don’t. I’m fine. My friends will be fine. This will blow over, or there will be angry articles in newspapers. That’s it. On the plus side, people are buying the paper. They know we’re out there.

On to other Focus news. We are now coming out every two weeks, doubling production. That means more work, but I think we’ll be able to do it. I’m learning how to design a page since Andreas’s family is coming to visit, but what’s one more job. I’ll just have to get my part more organized, and probably stay late a few nights. I’ve done that before.

Andreas redesigned the paper, and you can tell he’s Swedish just from looking at it. It bears a striking resemblance to an Ikea catalog.

We now finally have a key to the bathroom on our floor. This is huge, and will probably save me from any permanent damage.

In still other news, Bec will probably find out soon where we’re headed next and when. We could be on the move soon, and I will keep you posted.

Finally, I am writing this on my Mac. I’m so happy that the Hidden Rebel Base is back, fully armed and operational.

3 April 2006

This isn't something that I'm going to send to editors when I try to get a full-time job (http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0601855.htm), but it still counts.

I've been to Burundi...

We were driving back to Kampala from Jinja on Uganda's election day. The CSM reporter, the NPR correspondent our driver, Ismael, and I crossed a washed-out bridged, faced trucks hurtling past us and stared down mini-buses speeding down the wrong side of the road. "You know, people think that our jobs are dangerous," Jason, the NPR reporter said. "But they don't realize that the most dangerous thing is getting from one place to another on the roads here."

We all laughed.

I'm about to go test that theory and take public transport home. Wish me luck.