About the Harmattan, the elections and civil unrest

It is dry season now in Nigeria and it is Harmattan. The Harmattan is a dry and dusty West African trade wind. It blows south from the Sahara into the Gulf of Guinea between the end of November and the middle of March. On its passage over the desert it picks up fine dust particles and drops them on my coffee table. The Harmattan keeps the temperature down. Mornings are cooler and better for sports outside. We also get amazing views. Everything is wrapped in a mystic golden haze. The downside is that we have to put up with dust everywhere and a lot of people are sniffing and sneezing. Humidity has also dropped dramatically from 80% to below 40%. I play music every Sunday with some friends. Tuning the instruments is taking longer and longer each week. One of the houses on the compound comes with a parrot. When I walk past his house with Charlie every day, we have short whistle dialogues, the parrot and I. He whistles (in perfect thirds by the way) and I repeat what he says. But now, with my mouth full of desert sand, I often have to disappoint him.

Temperatures will go up towards the end of the dry season. I am not really looking forward to that but on the other hand, during the dry season you can organise whichever event you want without a plan B for when it rains. It won’t. I still prefer the wet season, though, with its fabulous storms, thriving vegetation and clean air. Only a couple of more months to go.

Election fever is rising fast in Nigeria. In April this year, Nigerians will elect a new president, a new parliament and new state governors. Heated discussions on what the best outcome would be take place on every street corner between people selling mobile phone top-up cards, newspaper boys, people stacking shelves in supermarkets. The hope is that 58 million people (out of an estimated 70 million eligible to vote) will have registered to vote by the end of the registration period. However, there were 2 bomb explosions on 1 October in Abuja during the national day parade. MEND, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta claimed responsibility. Several people were killed and injured (though nobody was targeted and the loss of lives was deeply regretted by MEND). One of the bombs was only 1 kilometre away from the president. Around Christmas and New Year, there was more trouble and whilst the whole world was celebrating New Year, in Abuja people just stayed inside.

A bomb had gone off on Christmas eve in a restaurant area where I had been before which has had a curfew for months, specifically for this reason. Again, people were killed. During the primary elections, we were also advised to stay indoors. None of us is being targeted, but you might end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Schools had closed for the election registration. State school teachers had to help out with registrations, private schools are closed for reasons of equality.

The violence in Jos has also picked up again. Christian and Muslim gangs are fighting each other relentlessly. Some people say it is related to the elections. I will not comment or speculate on that. Norma, our vegetable lady, sends us updates from the farm every week. In December, she wrote this: “By the time we could start thinking of operating the farm again, we had virtually no workforce, the farm was largely destroyed, many of our water pumps and other equipment had been vandalised, the fields had become overgrown with grass. We had to start at the beginning to try to get things back to a semblance of order and production. We are still engaged in this effort, and have by no means accomplished our goals. We have really not yet recovered from the trauma of these events and their aftermath. The year witnessed periodic bouts of violence in the rural areas around Jos, and our workers always came to work full of trepidation. The market situation in Jos has not been normal, and we have had difficulty in sourcing some items that are brought into Jos from neighbouring states because of fear of insecurity. We are about to see the end of the year 2010, and we are immensely glad to see it go. But it is going out the same way it came in -- with violence, killing and destruction.”

A couple of weeks later she wrote this: “We are trying our best to focus on our farm, but nearly everyday something happens to distract our attention. Some of our farm workers who come (via bicycle) to the farm from Wereng (a village about 15km away) were the immediate neighbours of two families whose members were attacked and killed the other night. Only one person survived out of two households. All of the others, including women and children were killed, some by machete cuts, and others by gunshots. Investigations are still going on as to who was responsible, but of course all of our farm workers are quite traumatised by this incident. It is sometimes difficult to understand how people can continue to function normally under such conditions, but unbelievably they somehow manage to do so.”

I wanted to visit Norma’s farms in Jos one day, meet all the workers and help out for a day. I wonder if I’ll ever be able, or allowed, to do so. This has now become their daily reality. I often think of this whilst chopping my vegetables.

Yet, on our way back from a long holiday, on the plane we read an article in the Guardian on Nigerians being the happiest people in the world. One wonders where they get the spirit to keep going from. Or one might wonder why we lose our spirit so fast? In Jos they are working so hard, in the summer constantly fighting the floods, storms and pests and if it’s not that, working in highly unsafe circumstances and insecurity, in constant fear and mourning. In the winter, it is fighting drought and heat. All of this to provide us – the rich moaners - with the strawberries and broccoli we so desperately “need”. It sort of puts things in perspective. Norma has mentioned her despair in a couple of e-mails. She is thinking of winding up the farm and go back to giving lectures. I hope she doesn't. On the other hand, I admire her courage and strength for having kept going until now. I would have given up a lot sooner.

A lot of people might leave Nigeria for the elections, but we’re staying put. Unless I am kicked out, I want to experience this. Our maid, Hope, was not interested in voting. “Mma, in Nigeria, things not like that. Go vote make no different.” I tried to convince her that ‘not go vote’ is not better (especially not when your name is “Hope”). A couple of days later, she asked me for a day off so she could register. She had a big smile on her face. My little democracy pitch had been successful and I see that as my small contribution, however insignificant it may be in the bigger picture. A lot of people are being flown in from all over the world to ‘observe’ the elections. I know some of them and they are rather positive about the way things are going. Let’s hope for the best. The Nigerians really do deserve it.