Gloom and Doom, November 2004

The Red Sox win the World Series, but George W. Bush gets re-elected. Life is just not fair. I have to apologize in advance for this “gloom and doom” update. I am just so crushed about the results of the U.S. Presidential election. What I want to know is what happened to the “liberal media”? If the U.S. media is so liberal, why didn’t they sway the American public to vote their way? Whatever. There are plenty of other things to make me feel sad these days. I’m not giving “Dubya” another second.

Here at the Embassy in Accra, we wait to see how the post-election period will shake out at work. The same guy still runs the federal agency I work for and he doesn’t seem to be going anywhere soon. The big news is that the State Department will have a new boss soon, and I can’t be any sorrier to see Colin Powell go. I was actually really worried about him when he was appointed Secretary of State, but over time he became my favorite person in Bush’s cabinet. A little-known fact is how beloved Colin Powell is by State Department employees. Say what you want about his foreign policy choices, he is a great manager and people loved to work for him, something you could not say about many of his predecessors.

So we keep going until something changes. My office keeps trying to help West Africa trade its way out of poverty in a horrible business environment while agricultural prices stagnate. Meanwhile, my husband gets to help shape the Ghanaian government’s proposal for “Millennium Challenge Account” funds, which is a huge pot of U.S. government money designed to boost economic productivity and move Ghana towards middle-income status. Why the State Department (and not USAID) is taking the in-country lead on this large-scale economic development project is a long story, but ultimately it is just another contradiction of working for the U.S. government overseas. I’m continuously shocked at just how many government agencies duplicate efforts or work towards conflicting goals in the field. It’s annoying and inefficient as hell, but no one seems to wants to commit career suicide by mentioning it publicly. And what do I know about it anyway? Reforming bureaucracies, even one as professional as ours, can’t be easy work.

Things could be worse. We live next door to a country descending into hell. I am embarrassingly ignorant about the conflict, so I asked my boss who lived in Cote d’Ivoire about the conflict and its causes. She explained that it was a complex issue, but that it could best be explained by a combination of economic and ethnic factors. In sum, the country’s cocoa plantations were owned by Ivorians, and the majority of the laborers on these plantations were from poor neighboring countries in the Sahel. For generations, young people from Mali and Burkina Faso had come to Cote d’Ivoire as seasonal and eventually permanent workers. Although over time, many of these laborers had earned enough to purchase their own farms and were firmly established in the country, they and their Ivorian-born children were always considered “foreigners” or interlopers. The fact that these foreigners were also Muslim, in a country that was for the most part Christian, served to aggravate the divide. So when one when one of these so-called foreigners—who happened to be a former economist with the International Monetary Fund—ran for President a few years back, the incumbent started an ethnic purity campaign against him saying he was not really Ivorian and therefore could not run for President. At the time, cocoa prices were declining, so the country’s cocoa-dependent economy was suffering. The timing was such that people were inclined to listen to ethnic rantings and ravings—after all, someone had to be at fault for their economic woes—and the foreigners were attacked in the towns and villages where they lived. In retaliation, rebel groups emerged, backed by the "foreigners", in an attempt to change the status quo. Then another group in the East of the country (who think everyone else is crazy) started their own militia to protect what is theirs. On top of all of this is the French colonial structure that the Ivorians resent.

So these days the Ivorian government is fighting rebels in the north, and on the side they take pot shots at the French. Recently, government troops killed some French peacekeepers, so the French military retaliated by blowing up the Ivorian President’s airplane and helicopter. Then all hell broke loose when the local media erroneously reported that the French were trying to reestablish their colony. In short, it’s a mess. There is looting and shooting in the streets, the airport is closed to commercial flights, and people are being evacuated. The “Paris of West Africa”, and one of the region’s only economic anchors, is falling apart, something that does not bode well for the stability of the region. Having lived in, and next door to more than a few countries at war, I tend to worry about the consequences.

But surprisingly, the situation just a few hours’ drive away hasn’t affected security much in Accra, at least not yet. The only changes I can see are more cars with foreign license plates driving around the capital filled with the people who were lucky enough to escape in time. The other thing is that the hotels are booked and flights leaving Ghana are full. As far as my work is concerned, USAID hasn’t done much work in Cote d’Ivoire as of late because of U.S. government sanctions against this country. Mostly it is more of a hassle to travel to anywhere else in the region, since so many flights to Francophone Africa went through the hub of Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire’s capital.

But as always in the Foreign Service, one country’s crisis is someone’s career opportunity. The workload for consular officers at embassies in the region just got a lot more interesting, and their supervisors are probably already drafting their awards for service in crisis. The consular officers here are working their share of extra hours, at the airport every night welcoming U.S. passengers on flights arriving from Cote d’Ivoire. The Italians, Germans and French militaries are flying our citizens out of Cote d’Ivoire to safety. The Brits are shaming us at the airport too, with cookies and croissants for their citizens coming off the planes. Be proud that your U.S. government consular representatives are only holding American flags—no tax dollars will be wasted on American refugees! Mostly what the consular folks say they do at the airport is run interference with the Ghanaians so they process on-the-spot visas for U.S. citizens for $20/person (a new agreement given the crisis) and make sure people have a place to stay, an onward flight, know where and how to make phone calls or access the internet, or get medical attention. They say it’s tiring, but interesting, and a nice change from sitting behind bulletproof glass and interviewing hundreds of people a day.

There are always people who try and take advantage of these crisis situations to get visas to the U.S. The Consular Officers were telling me how many of the Ivorians arriving in Ghana have children with them who are U.S. citizens. They claim to be the children’s caregivers, and are responsible for taking them to America. They say that the children’s parents are either in the U.S. working or stayed in Cote d’Ivoire to watch over their businesses. True stories or not, our laws don’t allow for visas to be given out to “accompanying adults” in these types of situations, so the American refugees are stuck in Ghana for a while until they figure something else out, or until the situation at home calms down and they can go back.

To add to all this local misery, last week my husband and I learned that an acquaintance of ours—Will, a young Marine we befriended when he was serving as a Marine Security Guard to the U.S. Embassy in Accra—was killed in the assault on Fallujah in Iraq. Less than a year ago we were partying and horsing around with him and the other Marines in the pool after the Marine Ball. I remember asking him and his colleagues what they thought about Iraq. He said it was what he signed up for. I guess that is why some people become Marines—they want to experience war. But I bet few of them actually think they are going to see their end in one of these wars. Or maybe somewhere in the back of their minds they think it might happen, but it’s a good way to go. I don’t know. But at eight months pregnant, my hormones are raging, and I ran in the bathroom at work and sobbed when I heard the news. He was 23. What makes me most sick is that “we” (the US Government) created this war that he died in. It didn't have to be this way, but it is. Here in Accra the Embassy held a memorial service for him and lowered the flag to half-mast. I couldn’t bring myself to go, but my husband went. He told me that it was a somber event, dignified and fitting for such a Marine. During the ceremony, many Embassy employees cried openly. I wonder if his family knows that.

So, we lick our wounds and life goes on. We can sit around and feel sorry for ourselves, or try and do something about what is crappy and wrong with the world. But I can’t stop myself from feeling cynical and sad. And I have to stop thinking about all this war and focus on the future. Starting in December, I’ll be spending three months in America to have a baby. When I come back to Ghana, I’ll be busy trying to raise this kid, train a nanny and deal with my full-time job. I’m not sure how much time I’ll have for writing, let alone sleeping. So wish me luck, keep the faith and I’ll be in touch as soon as I can manage it.