Saturday, April 7, 2012

DRC #2: The Congo Initiative


Well, I didn’t mean it to take this long, but here is installment #2 about my DRC trip in February:

On Tuesday, February 14, we got started on our work with the Congo Initiative (CI).  We started out with a big meeting between our team and many of the leadership of CI/UCBC.  The overarching NGO is The Congo Initiative, but their main emphasis right now is UCBC, which stands for a French version of Christian Bilingual University of Congo (so I’ll probably use UCBC and CI somewhat interchangeably).  

Dr. David Kasali
The Congo Initiative is really like this BRIGHT LIGHT OF HOPE in Eastern Congo.  Dr. David Kasali and his wife Kaswera, have an amazing heart for their country, and the vision to match.  Dr. Kasali is from Beni (where CI is located), but was educated in Kenya and the US (including a PhD).  He held prominent positions at universities and church organizations for many years and led a relatively privileged life.  (Looking back, he says he realizes that he was letting God have every part of him except his wallet).  After two of his siblings were killed in the war in Eastern DRC, he says he finally let God have all of him, and he and his family decided to move back to Beni in 2001, even though the war continued around them.

To back up a bit, the DRC has been in turmoil since the 1800s.  King Leopold II of Belgium started the colonization of the DRC when he acquired the land has his private property in 1885.  (In the past it has been known as the Belgian Congo and later Zaire).  According to my more-scholarly friends who have read a book about it (“Leopold’s Ghost”), he raised funds from around the world for humanitarian initiatives in the region.  Unfortunately, he misused the funds and basically raped the land of its resources while ignoring, or simply using/oppressing, its people.  When the Belgian Congo received independence in 1960 (about the same time as all the other East African nations), Belgium pulled out and left the new country with very few educated or trained leaders, resulting in what is still considered a “failed state.”  Mobutu, the Congolese leader who ruled Zaire in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, continued Leopold’s waste and selfish personal use of the country’s resources.  It’s all especially sad, since the DRC actually is one of the most resource-rich countries in Africa.  The Congo River alone, which flows through much of the country, has more hydro-electric power potential than all the rivers and lakes in the US combined!  And yet, the DRC is currently the lowest (187th out of 187 countries) on the United Nations’ Human Development Index and listed last (81st out of 81) according to the Global Hunger Index on the list of countries considered to have a serious, alarming, or extremely alarming hunger situation.  (According to the GHI, almost 70% of DRC’s population is undernourished, compared to 10% of China’s and 20% of India’s.)

The Kasalis returned to Beni understanding the need to rebuild the nation after decades of corrupt governance and in the midst of a civil war that has sometimes been referred to as “Africa’s World War.”  They desired to give the Congolese people hope and a determination to invest in and change their nation.  In 2002, the Kasalis decided to gather about a dozen Congolese church leaders for a weekend “retreat” to ask three questions: 1) What is happening in the DRC?  (What is the problem ... and how can people be so evil?)  2) Where is the church?  What impact has it made?  3) What should we do about it?  
 
These leaders prayed and talked and brainstormed and categorized their ideas and in the end came up with six areas of focus – six ways that Christians should “be the church” in a hurting nation.  The Congo Initiative was formed to address these six areas, or “centers:”
1-UCBC (the need for a university)
2-The Center for CI-UCBC Development and Partnership
3-The Center for Church Renewal and Global Mission (training church leaders)
4-The Center for Community and Family Renewal (women’s rehab, child development, health, family counseling, etc.)
5-The Center for Professional Development and Vocational Training
6-The Center for Creative Arts

The Congo Initiative has a unique relationship with its US board.  After coming up with the six areas of focus, Dr. Kasali went back to his contacts in the US and asked them to help flesh out the Congolese’s ideas.  He then took those plans back to the Congolese to make sure they were headed in the right direction.  The plan went back and forth between the US and Congolese teams until it was further developed.  CI now has a US board (in addition to a Congolese Board), which helps to raise funds and acts as consultants to the Congolese CI leaders.  Unlike many organizations where are birthed in the West and then look for local leaders to help lead them, CI was started and initiated by Congolese, and US partners were brought in at the request of the Congolese as consultants.  A pretty exciting model!
EMI checking out the property with Dr. Kasali

Dr. Kasali shared that the Congolese are often wary of NGOs, as they are seen as outsiders and not a part of the people.  CI decided to focus its initial efforts on the university in order to gain credibility with the local community.  They have a vision for the CI campus to feel like a village, where people are welcomed into it and feel like they’re a part of it.  In 2006, CI was given 85 acres at a very low price, and in 2007, UCBC was opened. 
A UCBC class in session



The new Community Center under construction
It will contain an auditorium that seats 3,000!
Using every possible space - even unfinished ones!
UCBC currently has several hundred students enrolled and is utilizing one existing building plus parts of a very large community center, which is still under construction.  UCBC currently has four degree programs: Applied Sciences, Communications, Economics, and Theology.  Dr. Kasali shared that the Congolese culture is very community-oriented except in the area of education, which has become very competitive and individualistic.  UCBC has a strong focus in community learning and believes in raising up leaders who do not consider themselves better than or separate from the less-educated members of their communities.  One way they address this is by requiring every student to participate in two hours of manual labor (grounds keeping, construction, etc.) per week.  They also hold service days in the community, where even the professors and university president (Dr. Kasali) are out on the streets picking up trash, etc.   As part of the communications program, students are already running a radio station on campus.  [An interesting side note: Ben Affleck (yes, that Ben Affleck) has a heart for the eastern DRC, so he formed a foundation to help.  He actually wanted to name it the Congo Initiative, but he couldn’t because this one already existed, so his organization is called the Eastern Congo Initiative.  But they have friendly relations, as Ben, his mom, and some others have visited CI, and his foundation has helped to fund the radio station and other parts of the communications program.]

The UCBC Radio Station
CI’s vision for their 85-acre campus is to accommodate 3,000 university students, dormitory housing for half of them, some staff & faculty housing, a childcare center to allow mothers in particular to be able to attend classes, a primary & secondary school to demonstrate quality education techniques, vocational training spaces, and the necessary spaces to run the other five centers of CI.  It was such a great experience to get to work on this project and get to know the people at UCBC.  They are all such wonderful people, and I was especially struck by all of the educated, capable, intelligent Congolese who were giving of their talents and time to be part of this vision for an improved DRC.  It is very exciting that this whole thing was started and is still run by local Congolese.  


One of the US Board members, Mary, was there while we were there – she was our wonderful, helpful, and gracious host.  I also really appreciated meeting the two American women who live there full-time, Bethany and Chelsie.  There are such beautiful, humble people, who I look forward to seeing again, since they occasionally come in to Kampala (their nearest major city).  It really made me appreciate all the conveniences we have here in Kampala when I realized these women have to drive for 10 hours just to get here so they can get some chocolate.  =)  There are NO grocery stores in Beni, which pretty much means nothing imported.  The only place to shop for food is at the outdoor local market.  Now, I’m happy to shop in the local market for produce, but I still go to the grocery store weekly for things like yogurt, milk, butter, cheese, bread, apples, pasta, powdered sugar, cat litter, meat, olive oil, flour, toilet paper, etc.  Since there is NO electrical grid in Beni, everyone runs off of generators.  Petrol (gasoline) is extremely expensive, so these ladies get three hours of power per night at their house (fortunately they can use their computers and internet during the day at the university).  Three hours of power per day = no way you can have a fridge.  Yikes!  And they don’t have an oven at their house.  No baking?  That’s when I realized I have NO cause to complain about the few conveniences we’re missing in Kampala!  Major props to these ladies for their willingness to give up Western conveniences to help support this awesome university!

The ladies of our trip: Chelsie (CI), Eileen (eMi Volunteer), Mary (CI-USA), me, Lise (eMi Intern), Bethany (CI)

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