My two penny worth

Having spent the best part of the month staying on and off in Accra, I have been exposed to a continuous TV diet of CNN and football – how sad ­- we see no TV in Ho (thank God) but the lure of satellite TV in a hotel room is just too hard to resist. So it has been a choice between back to back live football games – La Liga, European Champions, Premier etc - there seems to be no limit to Africa’s demand for the beautiful game and the insipid, reactionary and precocious CNN – non stop in yer face election fever Amerikan style, interspersed with the collapse of the world financial systems.Talking heads, ageless skin, glossy hair – pigs in lipstick - pontificate, as flashing numbers on the screen reflect crashing stock markets.

Is this the end of capitalism? How bad is it going to get? City traders jumping from the temples of profit? What amazes me is that all this should come as a surprise and shock to us. We all fell for it – lower taxes, more credit, more money, more choice, more useless things to buy – consumer paradise - casino capitalism and houses that became money making cash cows rather than homes to live in. At dinner parties we bragged about how much our houses were now worth and compared rising values. For the last thirty years we have been seduced, under the spell, living in a palace of illusion – or at least some of us have – let us not forget the majority world. Did we really believe that it could go on forever? We let them sell off the family silver in search of quick gains, we let them roll back the state – we believed them when they told us that there is no alternative. We laughed at loads of money but secretly our greed got the better of us – how appealing to get fat without lifting a finger. A life of illusion, Mickey Mouse, imaginary money.
Meanwhile we have worshipped wealth, the rich, their lifestyles, their weddings, their glamour, their style. Our country has opened it’s doors to money, no questions asked. Successive governments have cosied up to the City, big business – money matters. Did we really deceive ourselves so much, did we really buy into this – having our cake and eating it too? We ignored the signs, the widening gap between the haves and have nots at home, the social meltdown, the poisoning of society and the ruining of our environment, let alone the destabilisation and break down the developing world has been experiencing over the last three decades, the millions living in poverty. Are we really surprised that deregulation did not lead to the market magically regulating itself for the benefit of society rather than individual greed? But then there is no such thing as society – we now live with the consequences of the neoliberalism we so warmly embraced. Yes, we show our concern with our ethical shopping, we save the world with our rock stars, we wear our conscience on our sleeves, but it is not enough. We need to wake up before it is too late - we need a less insane system – one that is not based on greed, fear and never ending growth. Whatever happened to social justice? Every year the rich countries receive far more more from the poor nations than they give in so called aid and development. The money being used to bail out the financial systems is greater than the total debt owed by the developing world plus the amount that the UN estimates is needed to help poor countries tackle climate change (itslf created by the developed world). Moral bankruptcy?

I was so surprised to hear (first hand as it happens from a Labour MP doing a two week VSO “stint” here in Accra) that Gordon Brown’s ratings are on the up because UK voters believe that he is “handling” the crisis well – what!? Are we really that short sighted, myopic or just plain dumb? All those years of “prudence”, read whatever the City bosses say goes. Despair and anger wash over me – outraged from Ho – but then it kind of fades into insignificance – to try and explain to our neighbours, a young couple with two babies, who squat in a half built house, have no work and no running water, the ins and outs of the collapse of the financial markets and what this means for us – no point. The stunning arrogance of this lot has never ceased to amaze me – be it war, education, criminal justice, climate change – I could go on forever –the word games, the deceptions – impression management is all – how stupid do they think we are? Listening to BBC World Service tonight back in the sticks here in Ho, I hear that politicians are not to mention the “R” word – recession - although it now seems that the cat is out of the bag. And to cap it all Machiavelli is called back to the fold – the arch manipulator and puppet master returns. Meanwhile as they fiddle and changer the chairs around, desperate to cling on to any vestige of power, we sink ever deeper into financial and moral bankruptcy - shame upon them!

Back here in the other world, the “event” of the month had to be the launch of “Inclusive” education here in Ho. This was organised to celebrate the opening of the first two classes for children with learning difficulties in a mainstream school. We go there twice a week to support the teacher, Esinam, who is working hard with virtually no resources to provide a stimulating environment for the children. Needless to say she was not even consulted about the launch. Things were planned in Accra by the Special Education Department and we found out at the last minute that there would be no involvement of the actual children themselves as they “would be too hard to manage”. Hard to believe – you would be challenged to make this up! So on the day itself all the officials were sporting “Inclusion” Tee shirts, school children marched through town with a band brandishing placards with slogans saying “Disables are our neighbours”, “Disability is not inability” etc. – but no children with learning difficulties. Kiran, however, made a huge fuss and we did manage to support two of the children to participate in the march and the meeting that followed. So what a morning – the great and the good – in their pristine tee shirts – sat up on the stage, lots of mutual back slapping and of course they received their “T&T” (this is money paid to people to attend workshops, conferences etc even though these same people are usually attending during work time – a real problem here). Social welfare staff did not even bother attending for most of the session but turned up for their free dinner and goody bags. Inclusion my arse!

On the bright side though, Carrie, an American photo journalist living in Ho, started a photography project with the children last week. The session was brilliant and she is also planning to document the activities of the class over the next months. I also spent a day in Accra with Francis from VOLPHIG training print and media journalists on disability awareness. We started the day with an experiential session where participants are given a “temporary” disability (wheelchair, blindfold etc) and have to make their way to the workshop venue. This is a powerful experience that gets people thinking far more than any lecture can. The group was large and boisterous but they engaged with the workshop and this is hopefully a step in the right direction to getting more positive coverage in the media of disability issues. We were also very lucky to have Ida, from Senegal, a journalist with a disability and currently the Communications Officer for the West African Chapter of the Africa Decade of Persons with Disabilities facilitating a session in the afternoon. The struggle goes on!