Jumamosi = Saturday in the Kiswahili language of East Africa
Finally! Bruce from Zimbabwe has organized SHINDA's first youth workshop in South Africa this coming Saturday. His boss has given him use of the cafe in which he works for 2 hours so ten youth can tell me what kind of help they need to create more lucrative employment for themselves. I will use this research to re-create SHINDA's non-scripted TV series pilot here in SA - hopefully with Endemol SA. One of Endemol's creative guys warned me over the phone that I should 'beware of how aggressive the company is'. Having been trained by some of Hollywood's most ruthless network executives for 12 years and then surviving Kenya's post-election violence while it became a 'failed state' - nothing scares me anymore. To be an entrepreneur in Africa builds muscles beyond your imagination.
Bruce says this group of youth is different that the township youth - more confident, more optimistic - that in the townships youth are idle, they have given up. This is a kid who doesn't have time to give up - he's heading upwards quickly which is why I hired him.
Bruce left Zimbabwe at age 20 on bus arriving in South Africa with R50 in his jeans - about $6 USD. A friend of a friend helped him start his life over again here. Do I know what that feels like! Now he has a good job but he needs to make more money. Because he is from Zimbabwe he is not allowed to open a bank account in South Africa and he has to renew his work permit every six months. Robert Mugabe is the reason why Bruce is here. He tells me that everyday he thinks about his mother.
This kid is smart and kind and happy. I could tell the moment I saw him for the first time in the Depasco Cafe on Long Street. Quick movements, attention to detail and buckets of charm. He hasn't given up. He is the future of Africa. The Zimbabweans stick out here - they're very different from the South Africans. It's like they perceive there is less of a barrier between them and white people like me. They come closer. They expect to be listened to - a product of a country that had developed into a very sophisticated economy - until Morgan Tsvangirai showed up threatening everything.
My husband and I talk about Zimbabwe a lot because he grew up there and still maintains a small farm. His heart is broken and angry about how far the country has fallen into decay. While we start our lives all over again here after watching Kenya also collapse - I wonder, will South Africa go down this same badly-managed road? The curse of mineral wealth looms over us all everyday in the news. There is talk of nationalizing the mines - which wouldn't be the worst thing - it would scare the hell out of the foreign investors, but it could actually work. It seems to be working in Bolivia and Cuba's redistributive agricultural policies are working. But the problem in Africa is governance.
The South African parastatals are not performing and tax revenues are being hijacked out of the system and into the pockets of the elite. So because of this, nationalization of the mines will never be accepted. What a great shame because the truth is - the mineral wealth of South Africa SHOULD belong to the people. Theoretically, wealth redistribution within a constitutional democracy is a very very good idea. Done well and you get the Province of Alberta where each resident gets $1000 cash each year from oil wealth and nobody pays income tax. Done badly, civil society slowly crubmles allowing the peel to paint, the moss to grow and shoulders to slouch.
Of all the things I get angry about watching how badly Africa is being managed for so many different complicated macro-economic reasons - this is the thing I can't stomach. To see such strong and dignified people just give up. Deeply ingrained cultures of giving up are one of the hardest things to change through policy. How do you legislate hope? What law has the strength to rebuild the optimism of a nation? A great leader can do this - like Mandela.
I think about Patrice Lumumba who began to emerge as a great leader in post-colonialism Zaire when the country became independant from Belgium. He was young and handsome and a had lovely family, corduroy jeans and drove a Buick I think. I see the images of his young family and think of John Kennedy or Pierre Trudeau. Lumumba was loved and destined to lead Zaire into it's new ideal future. But he didn't get that chance. He was assassinated and I wonder when I read the paper here about the criminal trials going on in France now about arms dealing in Angola - who arranged for Joseph Lumumba to be killed? Who decided that NOT empowering a nation was a better choice? If the rich mines in the Southern province of Katanga could talk.
When I sit with youth in Africa and listen to their dreams it's so painful to realize how much has been wasted in the last fifty years. So much time. So many pieces of gold and platinum that could have built highways and schools and dignity. And the kids here end up feeling bad about themselves, the shame of poverty in which they live. They need so much love and compassion and support because they are the ones who will finally make Africa work one day. All their tiny little efforts added up together day after day, year after year. Few of them see a 'future'. I ask Bruce what his most important issue is in terms of employment. He says 'feeding myself'. When I ask him about what he sees in his life next year he tells me he doesn't think like that. But he has to. His desire to create a better for himself forms the foundation of the life I live now. I need Bruce to believe in his dreams. My business will never succeed in Africa if kids like Bruce don't make this choice - if they don't choose 'to win'.
Mo Ibrahim did not award his $5 million USD prize this year. No African leader was decided to have accomplished the goal of the award for good governance. I guess $5 million just wasn't enough. How the system works now is far more lucrative. True change will probably only come once all the mines and oil deposits are gone so there's nothing left to fight over. Will it be too late or will it be the beginning of something much more peaceful that we are all failing to see?
Resilience - the ability or power to return to the original form.
Finally! Bruce from Zimbabwe has organized SHINDA's first youth workshop in South Africa this coming Saturday. His boss has given him use of the cafe in which he works for 2 hours so ten youth can tell me what kind of help they need to create more lucrative employment for themselves. I will use this research to re-create SHINDA's non-scripted TV series pilot here in SA - hopefully with Endemol SA. One of Endemol's creative guys warned me over the phone that I should 'beware of how aggressive the company is'. Having been trained by some of Hollywood's most ruthless network executives for 12 years and then surviving Kenya's post-election violence while it became a 'failed state' - nothing scares me anymore. To be an entrepreneur in Africa builds muscles beyond your imagination.
Bruce says this group of youth is different that the township youth - more confident, more optimistic - that in the townships youth are idle, they have given up. This is a kid who doesn't have time to give up - he's heading upwards quickly which is why I hired him.
Bruce left Zimbabwe at age 20 on bus arriving in South Africa with R50 in his jeans - about $6 USD. A friend of a friend helped him start his life over again here. Do I know what that feels like! Now he has a good job but he needs to make more money. Because he is from Zimbabwe he is not allowed to open a bank account in South Africa and he has to renew his work permit every six months. Robert Mugabe is the reason why Bruce is here. He tells me that everyday he thinks about his mother.
This kid is smart and kind and happy. I could tell the moment I saw him for the first time in the Depasco Cafe on Long Street. Quick movements, attention to detail and buckets of charm. He hasn't given up. He is the future of Africa. The Zimbabweans stick out here - they're very different from the South Africans. It's like they perceive there is less of a barrier between them and white people like me. They come closer. They expect to be listened to - a product of a country that had developed into a very sophisticated economy - until Morgan Tsvangirai showed up threatening everything.
My husband and I talk about Zimbabwe a lot because he grew up there and still maintains a small farm. His heart is broken and angry about how far the country has fallen into decay. While we start our lives all over again here after watching Kenya also collapse - I wonder, will South Africa go down this same badly-managed road? The curse of mineral wealth looms over us all everyday in the news. There is talk of nationalizing the mines - which wouldn't be the worst thing - it would scare the hell out of the foreign investors, but it could actually work. It seems to be working in Bolivia and Cuba's redistributive agricultural policies are working. But the problem in Africa is governance.
The South African parastatals are not performing and tax revenues are being hijacked out of the system and into the pockets of the elite. So because of this, nationalization of the mines will never be accepted. What a great shame because the truth is - the mineral wealth of South Africa SHOULD belong to the people. Theoretically, wealth redistribution within a constitutional democracy is a very very good idea. Done well and you get the Province of Alberta where each resident gets $1000 cash each year from oil wealth and nobody pays income tax. Done badly, civil society slowly crubmles allowing the peel to paint, the moss to grow and shoulders to slouch.
Of all the things I get angry about watching how badly Africa is being managed for so many different complicated macro-economic reasons - this is the thing I can't stomach. To see such strong and dignified people just give up. Deeply ingrained cultures of giving up are one of the hardest things to change through policy. How do you legislate hope? What law has the strength to rebuild the optimism of a nation? A great leader can do this - like Mandela.
I think about Patrice Lumumba who began to emerge as a great leader in post-colonialism Zaire when the country became independant from Belgium. He was young and handsome and a had lovely family, corduroy jeans and drove a Buick I think. I see the images of his young family and think of John Kennedy or Pierre Trudeau. Lumumba was loved and destined to lead Zaire into it's new ideal future. But he didn't get that chance. He was assassinated and I wonder when I read the paper here about the criminal trials going on in France now about arms dealing in Angola - who arranged for Joseph Lumumba to be killed? Who decided that NOT empowering a nation was a better choice? If the rich mines in the Southern province of Katanga could talk.
When I sit with youth in Africa and listen to their dreams it's so painful to realize how much has been wasted in the last fifty years. So much time. So many pieces of gold and platinum that could have built highways and schools and dignity. And the kids here end up feeling bad about themselves, the shame of poverty in which they live. They need so much love and compassion and support because they are the ones who will finally make Africa work one day. All their tiny little efforts added up together day after day, year after year. Few of them see a 'future'. I ask Bruce what his most important issue is in terms of employment. He says 'feeding myself'. When I ask him about what he sees in his life next year he tells me he doesn't think like that. But he has to. His desire to create a better for himself forms the foundation of the life I live now. I need Bruce to believe in his dreams. My business will never succeed in Africa if kids like Bruce don't make this choice - if they don't choose 'to win'.
Mo Ibrahim did not award his $5 million USD prize this year. No African leader was decided to have accomplished the goal of the award for good governance. I guess $5 million just wasn't enough. How the system works now is far more lucrative. True change will probably only come once all the mines and oil deposits are gone so there's nothing left to fight over. Will it be too late or will it be the beginning of something much more peaceful that we are all failing to see?
Resilience - the ability or power to return to the original form.
Photo - Bruce with six SA and Zimbabwe youth telling me about their employment situation in Cape Town at the Depasco Cafe on Long Street.
