After more than ten months of street protest and demonstrations, resulting in the loss of lives of hundreds of demonstrators, the question remains if this election will be accepted by the ordinary Yemeni people. The ordinary Yemenis are waiting for stability and peace. They have been asking for the ousting of the president who has ruled the country with an iron fist for 33 years.

Saleh had the backing of the United States, as he was considered to be an ally in the ‘global fight against terrorism’. The US has pumped hundreds, if not thousands of million dollars into the country over the past decade. Especially since 9/11 when the fight against Al Qaeda took root, Yemen has been a staunch supporter of the US, and the US has been supporting the Yemeni president. Even though Saleh has been battling Al Qaeda with fluctuation success (he is known to have released Al Qaeda militants on a regular basis, against the wishes of his American sponsors).

And now the Americans are one of the driving forces of Saleh’s resignation. But how do the Yemenis who protested against the president feel about his dismissal president and the circumstances in which he was dismissed?

Some of the protesters are very clear why they want to continue to struggle; they’re convinced that this is not what they have been demonstrating for. And this is not why some of their friends have given their lives in the past ten months:

 “Why should we go to the voting stations and cast our vote, we should be able to have a choice, isn’t that part of democracy that there is a choice? We have non choice here. The only choice is between voting for the man and not voting for the man. If we disagree with him, than we shouldn’t vote for him.”

“Who selected this candidate; he was selected by Saleh to be his Vice President. And now he should become President. Look at Egypt where the military who was backing Mubarak is now in charge. Egyptians don’t want the military and we don’t want the Vice President. We want a president of Yemen elected by the people of Yemen, not a president elected by foreign powers; Saleh stayed in power with the backing of the same foreign powers!”

“How come that this man (Saleh) has been given immunity for the crimes that he has committed against the people of Yemen? Because the foreign powers wanted him out. But the people of Yemen want him out AND face justice! He wasn’t elected anyway; he came to power in a coup. He was given immunity by the parliament; the same parliament that was supporting the man for so long and who have now given him immunity. The people who have worked to give immunity to Saleh do not know what the people of Yemen want; the people who support this immunity are collaborators of Saleh, they are accessory to the crimes that Saleh has committed.”

Yemenis want to see a number of questions being answered, before they are willing to give legitimacy to the process that has been put into action over the past few months;

1. Why do they have to vote on February 21^st?
2. Why has the president been given immunity and why has he been allowed to leave the country?
3. How will the ‘democratic’ process be continued?
4. And most important: How (if at all) will the Yemenis be involved in the democratic process, as they have the clear feeling that all arrangements so far have been settled behind closed doors, without input from the ordinary people and without their consent.

• Politics: President Saleh has been in power since 1978. His authority has been challenged by southern separatists, northern rebels, al-Qaeda militants, tribal leaders and mass protests calling for his resignation since the beginning of 2011 as a part of the “Arab spring”.
• Economy: Yemen is the poorest country in the Middle East; economic difficulties have sparked unrest
• International: Yemen is seen as a source of al-Qaeda-inspired terrorism
• Humanitarian: Needs are increasing as a result of IDPs fleeing conflict areas, as well as the negative impact of the declining economic and security situation. Increases in the price of basic commodities have added pressure on already food insecure households. Moreover, fuel shortages have impacted the private n sector and people have lost their jobs and main income source.

Known in history as the home of the Queen of Sheba, Yemen has been at the crossroads of Africa, the Middle East and Asia for thousands of years thanks to its position on the ancient spice routes. The Romans knew this fertile and wealthy country as Arabia Felix, in contrast to the relatively barren Arabia Deserta to the north. And today it maintains its distinct character.

The modern Republic of Yemen was created in 1990 when conservative traditionalist North Yemen and Marxist South Yemen merged after years of border wars and skirmishes. Peace broke down in 1994 and a short civil war ended in defeat for separatist southerners and the survival of the unified Yemen. Since unification Yemen has been modernising and opening up to the world, but it still maintains much of its tribal character and old ways. Tensions persist between the north and the south; southerners maintain that the northern part of the state is economically privileged.

Since the summer of 2009, hundreds have been killed and more than a quarter of a million people displaced by clashes between government troops and northern Al-Houthi rebels belonging to the minority Shia Zaidi sect. The government declared a ceasefire with the northern rebels in February 2010, and the Al-Houthis are now the de-facto government in the northern governorate of Sa’ada.

Many people still wear traditional dress and the custom of chewing the narcotic plant khat in the afternoons is still widely observed. Yemen had attracted the curiosity of a growing number of tourists, although foreigners have been kidnapped by groups seeking to force concessions from the authorities. Yemen has also gained a reputation as a haven for Islamic militants. Towards the end of 2009, the country came under the spotlight after crackdowns on al-Qaeda-linked militancy in Afghanistan and Pakistan raised fears that it was becoming a key training centre for militants. After a Yemen-based branch of al-Qaeda claimed that it was behind a failed attack on a US airliner on Christmas Day 2009, the government stepped up its efforts to clamp down on Islamic militants, but warned that it would need help to win the battle against militancy.

The truce with northern rebels in February 2010 allowed the government to focus its attention on the struggle against al-Qaeda and southern separatists.

Yemen’s political Crisis: Key players

The power struggle in Yemen took a new twist as President Ali Abdullah Saleh flew to Saudi Arabia for treatment after being wounded in a rocket attack on the presidential compound on Friday. His vice-president is the acting head of state, but correspondents say the real jockeying for position involves Mr Saleh’s sons and nephews and their rivals from the powerful Ahmar clan. Here’s a look at some of the key players involved.

The Saleh family

President Ali Abdullah Saleh has a reputation as a tenacious political survivor. He has likened the task of ruling Yemen to “dancing on the heads of snakes”. He has received little formal education, joining North Yemen’s military in 1958 and rising through the ranks. He was wounded several times during the civil war between Saudi-backed royalists and republicans before participating in a coup in 1974 and joining the military government that took over. He became president of North Yemen in 1978 and took over leadership of the Republic of Yemen in 1990 following unification with the south.

President Saleh’s family hail from the Hashid tribal confederation, one of the two main tribal groupings in Yemen. They are among a minority of Yemenis practicing the Zaydi branch of Shia Islam, common in Yemen’s northern highlands – the more settled regions of middle and southern Yemen follow the Shafi school of Sunni Islam.

Some of President Saleh’s close family members accompanied him on the plane to Saudi Arabia in early June. But his son and nephews – who occupy key posts in the military – are reported to still be in the country.

President Saleh has several children. His eldest son, Ahmed Ali Abdullah Saleh, was widely suspected of being groomed to take over from his father before the popular uprising started. In an early bid to appease the protesters, President Saleh publicly guaranteed that he would not inherit the presidency. Ahmed was born in 1970. After school in Yemen, he studied in the US and at Britain’s elite military academy at Sandhurst. He was elected to parliament for Sanaa in 1997 and appointed as head of the Republican Guard in 2000. He was reported to have survived an attempt on his life in July 2002 and there were rumours of another assassination bid in 2004.

Ali Saleh al-Ahmar is another prominent figure. He is the president’s half brother through the president’s mother’s second marriage. He served as head of the Republican Guard until he was replaced by Ahmed Ali Abdullah Saleh in 2000. He was later military attache in the Yemeni embassy in Washington, and director of the office of the head of the military.

Three nephews – Tariq, Yahya and Ammar – command security and intelligence units and have also been positioning themselves ahead of the expected transition. Yahya controls the central security services and anti-terrorism forces. Tariq is the commander of the special presidential guard and Ammar heads the national security forces. Ammar and Yahya have co-operated with the US in fighting terrorism. Many Yemenis believe their presence in this transitional period is essential and welcomed by regional and international powers.

The Oppostion’s Ahmar clan

The historic rivalry between the Saleh and Ahmar families has been shifting to a second generation as key contenders try to position themselves for a transition. Recently, the Ahmar compound in the capital, Sanaa, has come under attack from government forces, while fighters loyal to the Ahmar clan have laid siege to ministries and other public buildings.

The Ahmar family comes from the Amran governorate, just north of Sanaa and the heartland of the Hashid tribal federation. The family was headed by Abdullah bin Hussein al-Ahmar, founder of the Islamist Islah party, until his death in 2007.

Sheikh Sadiq al-Ahmar is now the overall leader of the tribal confederation. But he is seen as less powerful than his father, and is flanked by a number of prominent brothers. The most high profile is Hamid al-Ahmar, a businessman and leading member of Islah, who is reported to have been plotting against President Saleh for years. He has repeatedly called for Mr Saleh’s resignation. Along with other businessmen he is believed to be providing financial backing for the demonstrators, and his Sabafon mobile mobile network has sent out text messages with the times and locations of protests. Other brothers have recently stepped down from official positions as the political unrest in Yemen has escalated.

One, Sheikh Hussein bin Abdullah al-Ahmar, quit President Saleh’s Governing People’s Council on 28 February over the shootings of protesters. Another, Himyar, was deputy speaker of parliament before he resigned in March.

The Opposition’s General, Ali Mohsen

A further figure expected to play a key role in the outcome of the unrest in Yemen is Gen Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, who is related to the president through Ali Saleh al-Ahmar. He is a long-time ally of the Yemeni leader. Despite his name, he is not a member of the Ahmar family.

 On 21 March, following the killing of dozens of unarmed protesters by Yemeni forces, he announced that he was backing the protest movement, but said his forces would continue to provide security and stability. Over the years Gen Mohsen has played a leading role in trying to mediate Yemen’s various internal conflicts. He is the commanding officer of the 1st armoured tank division, which has sent units to a main square in the capital. He also heads the north-west region, one of the country’s four military sections.

The rivalry between him and the president’s family has become known over the past few years. By 2008, there were rumours of a proxy war between Gen Mohsen’s forces and those of Ahmed Ali Abdallah Saleh.

Yemen revolt: Collapsing economy ‘is major threat’

Hundreds of thousands of protesters in Yemen continue to demand the resignation of President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The West is worried Yemen’s uprising could empower al-Qaeda, but the real threat – some believe – is the economic one. For decades, President Saleh was seen as the man capable of keeping Yemen stable, but now his power is weaning. Not so much because of the protests that have swept the country, but because life in Yemen has become harder. Prices are rising, and security problems and roadblocks across the country are making it more difficult for people to make ends meet. People are hoarding, buying supplies for two months ahead just in case.

Cut taxes

Many of the capitals neighbourhoods have no running water, streets are filthy and malnutrition is widespread. Aid agencies say that because of the current crisis tens of thousands are already unable to buy food, and economists warn that Yemen’s fragile economy is on the road to collapse.

When anti-government protests first began seven months ago, President Saleh introduced a number of reforms. Ignoring those who warned him against spending money the Yemeni government didn’t have, Mr Saleh cut taxes, increased salaries of government officials and created public sector jobs. When economic incentives failed to calm the protests, the government called on people to hold rival rallies. And there are reports of sheikhs, loyal to (or paid by) President Saleh bringin people to attend pro government demonstrations. The government, allegedly pays for their transport and food, and each get paid the equivalent of $10 a day to attend. But the central bank is running empty, people say and they (the Government) will soon need more money.

The Saudis getting ‘tired’

Diplomats in Sanaa say the central bank is printing more money to meet the government’s new expenditures. Both the IMF and the World Bank also confirm the government is tapping into its reserves and that this is having a disastrous effect on the Yemeni currency – rial. If there is any confrontation, the rial will collapse and with it Yemen will collapse. The rial’s value has been dropping sharply, and dollars have virtually disappeared from exchange booths and banks across the capital.

In the country that imports most of its food, importers are now struggling to get letters of credit, with suppliers demanding upfront payments in full.  According to the World Food Programme (WFP), the price of wheat flour has almost doubled in the past months. And while food shortages are not an immediate danger, aid agencies worry fewer people will be able to afford basic food.

The situation is getting worse with darker times ahead. The increase of the global need for food commodities, mixed with the weakening rial added to the overall deteriorating political situation does, does spell a bleak future for most Yemenis. The increased spending by the government comes as revenues have dropped. Some estimates indicate oil production has more than halved in the past months, after oil companies pulled out their staff and tribesmen set ablaze an oil pipeline connecting Marib’s oil fields to the Red Sea earlier in the year while regular attacks on the gas and oil pipelines have been reported.

While Yemen’s powerful neighbour Saudi Arabia has poured tens of billions into Bahrain and Oman to help governments there, Riyad seems to be in no rush to come to Yemen’s rescue. Many take this as a sign the Saudis have given up on the Yemeni government. In one of the ‘Wikileaks’, the Saudis complained that all the money they send to Yemen ends up in Swiss accounts, so they don’t see the benefit of intervening, they appear to be fed up with the current regime.

The cost of Yemen’s uprising and its collapsing economy, many believe, poses the greatest threat to the country’s stability. The government is taking measures to keep the rial stable, but if there is any confrontation, the rial will collapse and with it Yemen will collapse. People already had little access to food and water. And if this will further deteriorate, there is fair chance that more people will be inclined to fight.

But there are considerable differences in the functioning of human resources. In one organisation the human resources is working with incentives; if the right people are found to implement activities it means that HR is doing its job and the company / organisation is making a profit, or it will be able to profile itself as a successful company / organisation enabling it to save lives and in future having a better chance to access funds for new projects.

If a position is filled for a fixed amount of time, it is already known that the person will be leaving. And one would think that alarms will go off well before the temporary appointment will be coming to an end. Unfortunately this doesn’t happen always and a replacement is not identified and not in place at the required time. For a profit organisation this usually means that the profits will drop, resulting in the dismissal of staff as the company will no longer be able to employ people, which could include the human resources people. In non-for profit we still see that that the failure of human resources will only have an effect on the activities and that the organisation will continue employing the same policies, with disastrous results for the population the organisation is trying to support. Alas the human resources are often so far away disaggregated from the operations that they are not aware of the (human) impact of their failure.

Inclusion of the human resources into the operations is essential and bringing them closer to (or even to integrate them in) to the projects. Only by making the human resources department experience the challenges and be part of the achievements of the operations, will non-for-profits be able to get the best results and safe more lives.

Strangely enough you will find agencies who are reporting having spoken to refugees who have told them about the horrors they have gone through to escape from Ivory Coast. Now with more than 100,000 refugees needing assistance one would think that there would be enough refugees who would come forward with stories.  But it is thus even more bizarre when the same person tells her story to two different agencies[1] who both report on how they are assisting this poor person. And of course it is recommendable what these agencies are doing. But with only 3,000 refugees in a certain camp (out of the more than 100,000 refugees in Liberia) it is maybe not so surprising that these two agencies are supporting the same person.

But there are also horror stories involving adults such as the mother of five who lost her youngest seven year old daughter and her husband, who worked on a rubber plantation, as her village came under attack. “The rebels entered our village.  My husband wasn’t involved in politics. We don’t get involved in politics.  I don’t understand why my husband is dead, my spirits are all mixed up; my soul is disturbed. I don’t know why my husband is dead and why my child died”. [3] Or another woman, clearly traumatized by the events of the past week – which saw her husband, beaten to death with sticks and the family forced to flee their home in Tabou city, in the Ivory Coast, and seek sanctuary in neighboring Liberia. “The war made us flee.   I was running with my husband and children, but they caught my husband.  The rebels caught him and killed him. They tried to shoot him but he didn’t die. So they used sticks, in the traditional way.[4]

Will the world be touched by these stories, and will it be able to stop retaliation attacks by the different groups? There is a lot to do in Liberia in the immediate support to the refugees. But the international community has to make up for its failure to foresee and prevent these atrocities from happening in the first place. The efficiency of the UN’s mandate to protect civilians will have to be reviewed. In a time where UN gives NATO the mandate to protect civilians in Libya it has not been capable itself to uphold its mandate in Libya and Ivory Coast.

The conflict in Ivory Coast has put the security of neighbouring Liberia at risk, where the expanding humanitarian crisis caused by the fighting has created 135,000 refugees in Liberia, half of whom are receiving little or no aid.

“It’s a serious threat to the stability of Liberia and, I might say, to the stability of all neighbouring countries,” President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia said during an interview in late March. “There’s been a lot of investment for peace in this subregion; we’re beginning to see the result of that investment,” she added. “If nothing is done to resolve the crisis, all of these efforts will be undermined.” 1

According to insider information and what we hear, both sides have recruited Liberian mercenaries, when people have been used to living on violence, they have got no profession to earn their living on. But officials contended that the biggest risk to regional destabilization was the exodus heading in the other direction. Liberia is profoundly fragile after being consumed by civil war for much of the 1990s, a conflict that created warlords and drugged-up child soldiers. Today, eight years after the end of hostilities, there are still 8,000 United Nations troops in the country. While Liberia’s entire budget is $375 million, the peacekeeping mission costs $500 million a year, according to the New York Times.  And an emergency appeal the UN is now asking for 300 million more for the humanitarian crisis.

But with all these millions the UN has not been able to deliver; The world food program (WFP) has so far delivered food to little over 35,000 refugees and the UN consistently maintains that refugees will only receive assistance if they relocate to villages and camps away from the border. Something the refugees are not adhering to in masses, leaving them with little or no assistance at the border. They are accommodated in these border villages by host families with whom they share family ties, cultural habits and ethnic links. And these host communities themselves have been living in abject poverty for decades, without adequate access to health care and clean water. While recent nutritional surveys have shown much lower nutritional levels among the Liberians on the border than among the refugees, with higher malnutrition rates for Liberian children as a result.

The Red Cross in a press release asked to support the host families as well. The growing number of refugees puts a heavy burden on Liberian host communities. Even before their (the refugees, sic) arrival, there was a shortage of safe drinking water, adequate sanitation facilities and access to medical care in some of the remote border villages. “The host communities have received the Ivorian refugees and generously shared their limited resources,” says Karin Hofmann (Head of the Liberian Delegation in Monrovia, sic). “They should not be forgotten when it comes to humanitarian aid.”

No support to host families and limited assistance to refugees, with the added angry young men in the form of militia’s and mercenaries finding their way (back) to Liberia, gives an enormous potential for fomenting further troubles, ahead of presidential elections in Liberia scheduled for October 2011.

The conflict that was triggered by a power struggle between Gbagbo and Ouattara, has now killed about 1,500 people, uprooted more than 1 million and forced around 135,000 refugees to flee into neighbouring Liberia alone. Despite these large numbers of refugees and displaced, a $160 million U.N. appeal for Ivory Coast is severely underfunded while the $146.5 million U.N. humanitarian appeal for Liberia has received just less than one third of the funds requested. The UN appeal came out only a few days ago, so I guess that we did pretty well and anticipated things better than the UN. But that is old news. The UN has been consistently missing the boat as it has been consistently wrong in its assumptions that refugees in Liberia would be leaving the border areas and move to camps and relocation villages 50 km away from the border.

We are now having the required staff and vehicles coming in and can finally scale up the activities, hopefully in time for the rainy season that is expected to be in full flow by the end of May.

On Thursday morning at ten o’clock I have my bags packed and am then being driven to the airport, together with the communications manager who has spend time in Liberia to get some good stories that will accompany the release of the appeal, to draw further attention of the international (donor) community to the plight of the refugees and the work our organisation is doing. It is nice to be travelling with somebody and we have plenty of things to talk about.

The first leg of the trip takes us to Accra, where we have to change flights. Strangely enough the luggage has not been checked through to Dakar. So in Accra we have to go into transit, which means that we are required to take our luggage from the belt first. We are then escorted all through the arrival section, trough the customs, outside the building and then go back into the departure hall. And all this without our passport being stamped. We merely had our e-ticket checked together with our passport. It would have been very easy to just leave the escort and go into Accra if I had wanted to. But there is no need, not for me anyway!

After another check-in procedure where they weigh the luggage again we go into the departure lounge. It is a good 3 hour wait and there’s not much to do or see. Accra international airport isn’t one of the most exciting airports I have seen so far.

The flight Dakar takes us first to Banjul in the Gambia where we have to wait some 30 minutes in the plane while passengers with destination Banjul disembark while new passengers get onboard.

Arrival in Dakar is delayed and we arrive at around 2h30 in the morning, what a time! But the driver is duly waiting for us and we’re taken to the hotel. I have to say that I am pretty tired, when we reach the hotel just after 3. A nice hot shower before I’m off to bed, because the next morning will be start of a busy weekend I imagine.

The meeting with the donor is scheduled at 11 am on Friday morning, and I had assumed that there would be a briefing beforehand to ensure that we’re all on the same line and that the objectives of the meeting are laid out. But the briefing starts well too late and we only have about 10 minutes, in which several things are discussed that do not really have anything to do with the application to the donor.

We arrive at the donor just before 11 and are being asked to wait in the meeting room, where we sit for some 15 minutes before the regional representative of the donor enters the room. She doesn’t look very happy, a bit stressed to say the least. I almost have the impression that she isn’t very happy to see us. But then again, I was told that the relation between the organisation and the donor in Dakar wasn’t all that good.

But we do our story, explain the backgrounds of the appeal, plus the plans that we have. The donor listens and then asks a few questions. She wants to know what is new in the appeal. Has she not been listening or has she not seen the previous appeal? Her questions are rather rude and aimed directly at the regional office team. I try to help them out and answer one or two questions for them, but the donor representative is not really interested. My answers are pertaining to the work in Liberia and not so much to what we plan to do in Ivory Coast. “Are you here to explain to me the program in Liberia? You should discuss the Liberia program with our representative in Liberia and not with me” she snaps back. We know that they have already committed a fair amount of money to the programs in Ivory Coast and that money has not gone to our organisation.  Then why would we waist our time on Ivory Coast. There is obviously a solid misunderstanding! The meeting ends and in the car on the way back to the office the two guys from the regional team are bitching and moaning that this woman is unfair and that she keeps saying different things. Come on … where there is a misunderstanding, there are two parties involved! And both parties have probably their own understanding of what was discussed before. We should learn a lesson from it!

So the meeting with the donor was not a major success, I will have to review the Liberian part of the program and meet up, once again, with the donor’s representative in Liberia.

In the office the two are having difficulties to remain objective and they continue to complain about the attitude of the donor representative. It bothers me that I have come all the way from Liberia for a meeting with this donor to find out that she wasn’t interested in listening to Liberia planning and that she also (more obviously) wasn’t interested in the same story of the organisation trying to get funding. And my frustration gets worse in the afternoon. When we are discussing the next steps to scale up the operations I propose to spend time on Monday with the team in Dakar office that is supporting the operations in Liberia and the whole of West Africa.  Then I find out that Monday is Independence Day in Senegal, and the office will be closed!! Aaargghh! “What about Saturday?” I ask. “No, Saturday is a day off, we don’t work on Saturday, but we can meet!” is the answer.

Excellent! So I wasted the Friday morning in a meeting that I wasn’t supposed to be in and I can’t work with the team on Monday to brief them on the plan etc …? It certainly sounds like it is supposed to be a four day holiday here in Dakar for me. I can tell you … I am not a happy camper at this moment, and I wonder if I shouldn’t have done the stress training that I missed just before leaving Holland.

Good thing is that the hotel is OK, with WIFI network and satellite TV in the room. So I can work day and night and have continuous access to internet. Talk to friends and family via SKYPE and spend some time with my regional manager and one of his regional team who is a hardworking guy and very cooperative. It is nice to be bouncing ideas off him exchange plans. This gives my trip some good input and in the end makes it worthwhile. But I guess it is more because of our flexibility and improvisation skills rather than the planning beforehand. I take note of the poor planning as a bottleneck in the efficiency.

I spend the Saturday working on some documents; terms of references, timeline for the project, work some more on the strategy. We have another meeting on Saturday evening with the regional manager and my colleague.

When I came here, I had received different briefings about the national partners. One person was very positive, while another talked only about negative experiences. There was talk of a young organisation that had been decimated during the long civil war, with a core of motivated people, willing to take the organisation forward. But I was also warned about the bureaucracy and the need to do things by the book; staff not willing to take any decisions because of fear to lose their job; a mixed bag of information.

In my time in Liberia I have now witnessed a bit of both. I have met some really good people that are motivated to do the best possible job; in many cases these are the volunteers, with the occasional paid senior staff member. But I have also met some who are more often than not, taking things easy, coming to the office at nine o’clock in the morning and then hanging around, going in and out of their offices and taking the first opportunity to leave when there is another electricity cut and the lights go off. And there are also senior staff members who are apparently quite content to be in the capital and in their office, without the urge to see what is happening in the field. On the other side there are the directors who are pretty keen to go out; to the field, because it entitles them to a per diem, or abroad, because not only will they receive a per diem, but it brings them a certain status in the organisation and among their family and friends.

It is the few that are trying to put the organisation in order that are always willing to listen and are always ready to go the extra mile. Whereas the others will not be bothered to make an effort to improve themselves, let alone listen to criticism. These are the ones who do not answer mobile phone calls after working hours and during weekends.

But of course it is easy for me to criticise them. I have no idea under what conditions they are living, how many mouths they have to feed at home. And with my international status, being here for a few months, I can easily work 24 hours per day 7 days per week and go home, tired but with the possibility to rest.

I have heard however stories from other foreigners about work ethics and efficiency in Liberia. The best one is of an agency that had been funding rice farmers to improve their production. Several methods to increase the harvest had been tried and when production started to go up, the agency thought the time to leave had come. In an evaluation visit a year or so after they had stopped funding the farmers they found that the farmers were just producing enough rice for their personal needs, with very little to sell. Discussions with the farmers revealed that the funding from the agency had been used by the farmers to employ local workers who would do the bulk of the work for them for poor wages, but allowing the farmers to produce well and sell rice. When the funding stopped however, they no longer employed labour and just returned to farming the little plot , giving enough rice for personal needs. Does that make the rice farmers lazy or unwilling? It doesn’t, it just shows a different sense of what is necessary and what to prioritise.

Taking the example back to the organisation; it does reflect in to how I look at the national partner. The sense of what is necessary does not echo the urgency of the operations. To take a week off for due holidays at a time when important decisions are to be made, or not answering the phone on a Sunday when you know that you are expecting a request for assistance are just some of the things that I have run into. Another one that had me steaming was that we had been planning  a field visit for a few days, only to find out on Friday afternoon that my counterpart was leaving the country for a regional meeting the following week! Arrghh …

The same applies when it comes to profiling; a national partner showing more involvement in the project and be more active in getting things done and making the right decisions would attract external interest and be a magnet for future funding to support them, allowing them to grow and become self sustainable, rather than depending on the one time support in funding projects that the national organisation will never considered to be their own.