Yaoundé, March 14, 2008

Greetings all!

Well, life has certainly been fun over the last few weeks, so this may be a bit long – just a warning. I suppose I could keep some of it for another time, but anyway!

In my last instalment, I mentioned that a general strike had started. As it turned out, it lasted for most of a week. As mentioned, in Douala, the economic centre of the country, about 250 km away, things got a bit rough, with a fair amount of vandalism and looting. This spread to other towns and cities in the country, with the result that a number of public buildings were burned, as well as a number of shops – and many shops that didn’t get burned got thoroughly looted. A number of people died also, 16 is the official number, and over a hundred according to the Cameroon Human Rights Watch organization. The police and other security forces were out in full strength, with a special battalion called in as well – unsmiling young men that you don’t want to mess with. Here in Yaoundé, things were calm, in the sense that there was very little looting, although there was a fair amount of marching, and the taxis stayed off the road, as did most other transport. The president finally spoke to the nation on the Thursday evening, basically saying calm down or else… and that all legal means would be taken to quell the uprising. He didn’t sound very friendly, to put it mildly. So, on the Friday, Yaoundé was back to vaguely normal, and an unsettled calm reigned everywhere. There were round-ups of hooligans (and anyone else caught in the net) and summary justice has been carried out all week – prison terms being handed out left, right and centre, and hundreds of people being processed per day, with no chance of raising a defence. Some of them are innocent, we are told, but too bad for them! According to the local radio, over 1600 people have been arrested across the country, most of them youths.

The president stated that the transporters’ strike was legal, and that hadn’t been the problem. The problem was unscrupulous opposition parties (any excuse for a thrust at them) who wanted to exploit the situation and also vandals and hooligans who took advantage of the strike to loot. Of course, the opposition parties have denied this, claiming that the government is using any excuse to blacken their reputations. Nothing was said in the president’s speech about the main underlying cause, the rise in the cost of living which is making it hard for all Cameroonian households to make ends meet. The price of basic necessities has risen astronomically, as had the price of gasoline. The president did grant a decrease in the price of gasoline by lowering it by 2.5 cents a litre (after having raised it to by 12.5 cent a litre!) and that was it. Some foodstuffs have increased by 140% over the last year, and in one instance by 400%, and, of course, salaries haven’t kept pace.

The following week was a bit tense – people aren’t sure what may happen once the president submits his proposal for a Constitutional amendment, allowing him to run for as many seven-year terms as he wishes (at the moment, the limit is two terms, and Paul Biya is nearing the end of his mandate, which runs out in 2011). Of course, the man was also president before the last Constitutional amendment, back in 1993; Biya first took over in a peaceful coup in 1982, after having served the previous and first president as prime minister since 1962. Only two presidents since independence… Mr. Biya, who is 75 this year, like many other presidents around the world (at least in many countries) would like to carry on until he’s in his grave – after all, who else could possibly do the job?

On Friday of last week (March 7), the president announced a couple of measures designed to make Cameroonians happier (and to ensure that his amendment goes through). First, he raised public servants’ salaries by 15%, as well as the military’s and then announced a series of reductions in excise taxes on various foods, to take effect on April 1 (April Fool’s?). Those who are not public servants or soldiers, of course, don’t get a salary raise, and are wondering why there’s enough money now to do all this… So we’ll see…

In my area of town, things are always calm, as we are way out in the suburbs, so nothing much happens. One just stays put… and stocks up on food and other essentials in case things go awry again.

The fun bit about the whole week (well, sort of!) was that a Canadian colleague of mine was here for meetings. She managed to make it from the hotel to the Centre on the first day of the strike, using a hotel taxi (they use unmarked cars, so were thought to be private vehicles). The next day, I went to fetch her at the hotel, with my taxi man Njikam, because taxis ran from 7 a.m. until 10 a.m. At noon, she went back to the hotel with the Centre’s driver. On the Wednesday, she took the hotel taxi again, and then, in the evening, I accompanied her back in the taxi, posing as her husband, and the taximan as our driver, in case we were stopped. On the Thursday, Liane stayed at the hotel but managed to get out again on the Friday, since taxis were back on the road. All fun!

The strike and its consequences added quite a bit of spice to life, since I had, a few days before, found a house that I decided to rent. A very nice villa, with three bedrooms, a huge sitting room, a dining room and a totally paved courtyard (to lessen the impact of the dust)! Very nicely finished, and not far away at all, just what I was looking for (a bit bigger than I need, actually, but as I have LOTS of furniture, I need a big place, if only for storage purposes!). Actually, I found it about two weeks before the strike, but it took a while to get things sorted out. There was a lease to be negotiated (I consulted a lawyer, at my employers’ suggestion, which was a good idea) and papers to be signed etc. etc. There were still a few things to be done to the house, nothing major, and I was assured that it would all be taken care of within a few days. Since I wasn’t and am not in a hurry to move (I can’t break the 6-month lease on the apartment; I did try…), I was quite agreeable to this scenario. In addition, there are a some things that I want to have done to the house before I move in, such as having mosquito netting installed at all the windows and doors, a hot water heater put in (alas, they don’t come automatically with houses) and an outside toilet for the sentinels. Here, at the apartment, they have access to a field next door which serves well, although Aurel, the night sentinel, tends to want to use the facilities indoors. This, I think, is because he is immensely curious and wonders what on earth I could be doing instead of talking to him!

Anyway, it took a few days to negotiate the lease to everyone’s satisfaction, but finally the papers were signed. The agent, Mr. Olli, had agreed that an outside toilet was a fine idea, and I told him that I would look after this, since it was my wish to have it. I also told him that I didn’t have the money to start the work right away, and that I’d have to get at least three quotes before I could start doing anything. This didn’t cause any problems with him (obviously), and, after walking around the outside of the house, we agreed on the spot where the said toilet would be placed. The strike intervened, so of course nothing could get done, but last week, I went around to the house to measure a few things and met Mr. Olli who was there. He asked if it would be ok to build a little room at the back of the yard, as the landlady thought that this would be a good idea for the future – a sort of shed, if you like, where sentinels could keep their stuff (and sleep, no doubt!). I said I had no trouble with the idea at all, providing, of course, that this was at the owner’s expense, since I didn’t need nor want a shed. No problem…

So, a couple of days later, I went around to the house again, and lo and behold, the shed was almost done. What was most surprising, though, was that the wall of the toilet was half-finished! I called Mr. Olli, who said that there had been some cement blocks left over (there were still some) and he thought he’d be helpful. I said that it was very kind of him to offer me the blocks, since I couldn’t pay for them. There was silence at the other end of the phone line. I reminded him that I’d told him that I had to get three quotes and that I couldn’t pay for anything anyway as I didn’t have the money. There was a bit of bluster at the other end – and I also reminded him that the toilet was my responsibility and that he really shouldn’t be doing anything about it.

In the meantime, the house had been unguarded. Mr. Olli had assured me that he had a guard in place, and one evening, I thought I’d stroll over to the house to meet the man, since I was going to be paying him for a few weeks. No one there… I went back the next evening, at a different time, still no one there. I tried in the middle of the day – no one there; I sent Mustafa, one of my sentinels, two evenings in a row, at about 9 and 10 o’clock, still no one there. Mustafa reported that a neighbour had said that there was no one around… So, the next day, I wrote to Mr. Olli (he reads his e-mail, fortunately) saying that I was a bit concerned and that I would hire a guard forthwith. I called Roger, the friend who works at the Centre and who has been very helpful, and, a couple of days later, he came up with a young man from a village somewhere, André, a brawny young man, whom I hired as a temporary guard.. So, we strolled over to the house and what did we find there… another sentinel!!!!

Together with the toilet episode, the finding of the sentinel sent vibes through the brain. The latter still functions every so often… It was very clear that I was going to end up paying for the shed! So, I asked Roger to deal with Mr. Olli, because I was starting to think that the man didn’t understand me (or didn’t want to, as the case may be). Not only was it surprising to suddenly find this second guard there, what was unsettling was that the guard had all the keys to the house, inside and out. I had understood that I had all the sets of keys, except for the one to the front gate, so that Mr. Olli could let the workers in. Of course, having hired André, I had to let the unknown sentinel go…

Anyway, to cut a long story short, we have had a few tiffs with Mr. Olli – the toilet wall has been built up to height, in spite of Mr. Olli being told to cease and desist, and the plumbing has also been put in. Roger is insistent that I don’t pay a cent for this work, because it shouldn’t have been done, so it’s quite nice to have a toilet built for nothing. Not sure how Olli is going to take it! However, he has been warned! Now, I just have to change all the locks to the outside doors… something that I was hoping to avoid!

There is still electricity to be set up – there is some at the moment, but I’ll need to have the contract changed over to my name, so that will no doubt be fodder for another blog! The various quotes for mosquito netting are in the works; these things take time, as one can’t have the various carpenters around at the same time, so it’s one per day… that should take up most of this week, then the decision as to who gets the work, and then we’ll see how long it takes to get it done – then the move!

On that note, I’ll leave you for now. In case you’re wondering, I still manage to get my work done around all this! It certainly makes life full!

Cheers!

David