Marrie and I went to the Liberian civil war refugee camp yesterday and today. We stayed at an orphanage a few miles away with 74 kids. Yesterday morning was spent touring the grounds of the settlement and speaking with the editor of the camp's newspaper, "The Vision." Liberia has only recently recovered from the throes of a civil war seemingly instigated by Americans, or at the very least, influenced. 35,000 Liberian and 200 Sierra Leonian refugees reside at Buduburam and try to eke out a living via trading, renting wheelbarrows to hire themselves out and the like. They are unceasingly positive, even after seventeen years in Ghana. Many of them have witnessed unspeakable horrors and I didn't talk to a single person who wasn't missing a family member or more. They have to buy water for drinking, cooking and bathing, as well as food, but practically nobody has gainful employment due to the fact that they are foreigners in Ghana and that even many Ghanaians are unemployed. I believe the unemployment rate here is around 18%. Everyone told me that they survive by sharing what little they have with their neighbors and if someone gets something from America, it goes to everyone.
The editor is exceedingly helpful and smart and agreed to our proposed articles right away. He also wants us to give a lecture on economics and law, respectively.
The people who work at the newspaper all arrived in Ghana in different ways. One came via foot (Liberia is on the other side of Cote d'Ivore, just to the west of Ghana), another on a UN refugee boat and one via a different refugee camp in the Ivory Coast. They all want to go home to a strong and united Liberia eventually but many dont' seem to believe the present peace will last nor do they have the means to get home.
The lucky ones have one-room family accommodation. The unlucky ones, which includes many orphans, sleep on the street. There are vast sanitation, education and HIV/AIDS problems in the camp.
I am going to attempt to write an article on one young woman I met; the only female working at the newspaper. Her father was killed in the civil war, she lost her mother, entered a convent and was encouraged to become a Catholic nun, decided she would like to be married in the future and is now in nursing school. She was at the refugee camp in Cote d'Ivore for six years before coming to Buduburam where she is now pursuing medicine. She told me she would love to be a doctor someday if she can get that far but is going to nursing school for now while volunteering (they are all volunteers) at the newspaper because she also really wants to be a writer. They are all remarkably open about their experiences.
This morning, we had two pieces of bread each for breakfast. The kids had porridge with milk. They all wander around in their various school uniforms. some of them stay on site for class in open-air classrooms and sit on folding chairs or benches in front of a propped up blackboard. The electricity in our room didn't work so we went to bed quite early last night. It was super hot because there was no fan either but by the time we were awakened at 5am by the incessantly crowing roosters and the boy ringing a bell outside of every window to wake up the kids, I had cooled off considerably. Both Marrie and I were exceedingly dirty by this point.
Last night, I hung out with Isaac, the 12-year old who was the size of a 9-year old. I don't think they feed the kids enough there; I was constantly surprised by the ages they told me they were. He showed me the kids doing their prayers at the other orphanage that was just a little ways closer to the road. I asked which one was better and he said "Ours is." we stopped outside the director's house where a few kids were watching football from outside the window and eating fufu. Then more came to get in on the food action and one of the managers came around to yell at them. They scattered super quickly with sincere fear and I walked on with one of them hiding behind me, using me as a human shield. It worked, because he didn't get hit. He grabed my hand and said, "Let's go watch the telly. They let all the orphans watch television at night sometimes." they call each other orphans instead of children. It seems strange and dehumanizing to me; they must have picked it up from the staff.
We came upon a small house on the other side of the grounds with a television displaying a grainy football match and about twenty children crowded around it. A 13-year old or so girl latched on to me right away and hardly let go. A 6-year old boy was on the other side. When I detached myself and headed back to our hut/room (we stayed in a two-room house- Marrie and I in one room and twelve 6 to 15 year old boys in the other), I encountered a 3 or 4-year old standing alone in the dark in the middle of an open dirt space. When I stopped to say hello, he latched onto my legs in a giant hug. When I stooped to pick him up, he instantly relaxed in my arms, laid his head on my shoulder and said, "I want to go to bed." I felt bad because I don't know where he sleeps but even worse because all of the kids there are so starved for affection.
This morning at the Liberian refugee camp was an interesting one. It has been there for 17 years, practically as long as the civil war, so it's quite settled. There was a big meeting with about 2000 people in attendance at the settlement's Catholic church because the UN was going to share the next step with people. Often at refugee camps, the people on the ground have no idea what's going on with decisions being made on their behalf or even the present situation in their home country. This one is better than most in that regard.
We attended the meeting with the guys from the newspaper. There were a few speakers before the "big news" who went on about why there has been no electricity in the camp for the last two months (blaming the refugees for taxing the system by routing wiring from paying customers to their neighbors, along with a black market for electricity). The two news items which received the most reaction was the news that "The laws of Ghana do not prevent refugees from paying tax" and the ban on the use of firecrackers in the camp. Both came from the head of the camp's welfare council who is a Ghanaian appointed by the Ghanaian government. The rest of his council is appointed by him. In other words, the refugees have no direct representation. The tax news is just utterly ridiculous considering these people literally have no money, no means of making money and, in many cases, no education. If they don't pay the taxes, the government in Ghana doesn't have the means to throw them in jail, nor the gall to make an internationally unpopular move like kicking them out of the country. The firecrackers ban got a lot of reaction because people were angry they were being sold to them by the Ghanaians if they were now being delegalized. The reason behind their ban was that it was too reminiscent of the war and it was scaring people. Most of them found this laughable.
When the woman from the UN came on, all she said was "We are now at the stage of local integration," which everyone present knew already. This means that of the 15-20,000 or so refugees left in the camp from its peak population, most will be integrated into Ghana. This is better for a few and worse for most considering most of them want to look for family and friends in Liberia, but after 17 years (for some) in refugee camps, they are eager to do anything to get a real life back. If they are repatriated to Liberia, they get $5 and a pot from the United Nations and are dropped off in Liberia's capital with a "Good luck!" This is what happens when someone has a good idea and it goes through the pillars of bureaucracy. Many of the refugees hope to be eligible for refugee-status entry into Europe, the US or Canada. Providence has a large population of Liberian refugees.
I'm going back next week to get my work done for the articles and give an economics lecture. Today wasn't good for interviews because everyone who was busy with the meeting. It's difficult to know what to talk about because everything we covered at Brown was either theory or applicable only to already developed nations. I can't give a lecture on Smith, Marx or Keynes and supply and demand when what they really need is practical advice. So, I guess I'm going to discuss the factory I saw in India and how the same thing may be able to happen for them with some sort of rubber product (not tires, bad history) in Liberia.
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