← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
Nov 10, 2011
00:28:08
'Prosperity for all!' That was the Ugandan president's promise as he stood for but as...
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Host
Hello.
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BBC Correspondent
This is from our own correspondent, a download from the BBC. For a sneak preview of our program,
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BBC Reporter
you can join our feed on Twitter.
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BBC Correspondent
And there's a daily airing of from our own correspondent on the BBC World Service. But now the latest edition as broadcast on BBC Radio 4. And it's introduced by Kate Ady.
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Narrator/Reporter
Today, Kyrgyzstan's new leader says he'll tackle the ethnic divisions in his country, which have led to accusations of torture, extortion and persecution. Soaring fuel and food prices are causing unrest in Uganda. The president maintains the place offers prosperity for all. Why Colombians feel their country's no longer a place of drug gangs, kidnapping and violence, and why thousands of British troops have decided not to come home but to stay on in Germany instead. It's a year and a half now since an outbreak of ethnic violence in southern Kyrgyzstan left hundreds of people dead. There'd been long simmering resentment in this Central Asian state between the majority Kyrgyz population and the sizable minority of Uzbeks. There were killings on both sides, houses burned, livelihoods destroyed. The Kyrgyz government says a process of reconciliation is going well, but human rights groups are saying the Uzbeks are still being persecuted. Natalia Antalava has been investigating. In the town of Osh, it took
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Natalia Antalava
Sardor an hour to die. He was bleeding heavily when guards pushed him into the dark, stuffy room. His friends, other prisoners, helped him lie down, crowding around, they listened to his fading voice as Sardor described how 16 men took turns beating him, kicking him around the room, breathing heavily and spitting blood. He then gasped for air one last time. He was 21 years old. Bakhtur's voice trembles as he tells me the story. Memories of the day he spent in the basement of a police station in Osh still keep him awake at night. He remembers the outline of Sardor's face in the dark, the smell of sweat and fear, and later that day, the feel of a plastic bag tightening around his own neck while someone's foot kicked him again and again in his groin. I'm very lucky, bakhtior Sundays. Of the 14 men he shared the cell with, he explains, one is now dead and 13 are still in prison. Among them are Bakhtur's three best friends, who are serving life sentences. Their only crime, he says, is that they are all Uzbek. In June of 2010, Uzbek and Kyrgyz neighbors in and around the town of Osh took up arms against each other. Hundreds of homes were destroyed, and up to 500 people were killed. Today, Osha is being rebuilt. But international local human rights groups say dozens, possibly hundreds of men, the vast majority of them Uzbek, continue to be arrested, tortured and forced to confess to crimes they did not commit. Bakhtior is free only because his older brother, who was arrested at the same time, made made a deal with the police and promised to cooperate with them if they let Bakhtur go. They pulled his nails out one by one, but he didn't scream, he says. He only screamed when he saw how they were beating me. Once Bakhtr was out, his brother refused to sign a confession. He's a hero, a real hero. Bakhtar's mother, Aisha, adds it's her only consolation. Her son is serving a 15 year sentence for for allegedly trying to kill their Kyrgyz neighbor. There is only one kind of justice here, Ayesha tells me. It's money. She says she was told that if she paid out enough in bribes, her son would be set free. But she doesn't have that sort of money. Her family of 16 lives in two rooms hastily rebuilt with the help of international donors. Their old, spacious house with all of their belongings was burned down. Her sons can't find jobs. They can't even leave their street. It's too dangerous for us, bakhtur tells me. If you're Uzbek, you can get rounded up just for walking in the street. Around Osh, Uzbek neighborhoods have turned into ghettos. Many businesses run by Uzbeks have shut down. We are their business now, one man, who didn't want to be named, told me. They arrest us, then they get money out of us just to arrest us again later. The Kyrgyz, too, have suffered in the conflict. They too are trying to rebuild their lives and homes. Enough of fighting the war is in the past, one Kyrgyz man told me. What about Uzbeks being persecuted? I asked him. It's not true, he said. Local officials we talk to also deny that they are being harassed or victimized. But human rights groups tell a different story and have evidence to prove it. The country's new president, Almazbek Atambaev, meanwhile, told me to stop focusing on ethnic issues. You're not helping to heal them, he said. Unlike other politicians here, Atembaev does acknowledge the problem, and many Uzbeks voted for him in the recent election. The Kyrgyz government said that those who claim that they are being targeted should appeal to higher courts. But local lawyers say appeals either lead nowhere or or bring reprisals from officials. Ayesha Pakhtur's mother is running out of options. She recently appealed to the country's Supreme Court and managed to get a retrial. But instead of easing the sentence, the new judge added another year to it. All that my son wants is to get out and leave, she tells me. He has no future here. Thousands of Uzbeks have already left. What about you? I ask Aisha. She shakes her head. My great grandparents were born here, she says. This is my only home. I will not let them force me out.
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Narrator/Reporter
And that's Natalia Antolava. The effects of the global financial turmoil in Europe have been well documented, but the uncertainty is being felt in many other parts of the world as well. Rob Young's just back from Uganda, where there's been a sharp increase in the price of food and fuel inflation there's been rising sharply, and it's the poorest once again who are finding it hardest to cope.
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Host
The first things that greet you when you leave Entebbe airport are posters left over from February's presidential election. Some are worn. Others have got pieces missing. The unmistakable face of President Museveni smiles out from under his trademark hat. The slogan reads Prosperity for All Jamao. A young, softly spoken woman ignores them. Have you seen the price of matoke? She asks. This is the first of many times I'll hear this obviously rhetorical question. It's just too high, she says. We can barely afford to eat it. Motoke is Uganda's staple food. It looks like a kind of short, fat green banana. It's peeled, wrapped in its own leaves, stick steamed, and then mashed up and served in a food market in the east of the capital, Kampala. I meet Rita, a young, widowed mother, a primary school teacher. It's the tail end of the rainy season, and the ground is muddy with large puddles. We squelch along a path between the various stalls. On the right, chickens crammed into a cage are making a racket. On the left, a butcher's axe hits a thick wooden board with deafening regularity as he chops a joint of beef into small portions. We get to a pile of unpeeled green Motoke in the center of the market. It's tasty, it's sweet, says Rita. Whenever you are without motoke, you feel as if you haven't eaten. The elderly woman minding the stall looks at Rita expectantly. But she won't be buying. She says she could get three Motoke for 100 Ugandan shillings at the beginning of the year. Now just one will cost the same amount. Food prices rose by 45% in the year to the end of October, the cost of petrol has shot up as well. Before this year, inflation had been relatively stable in Uganda. The country was lauded as one of sub Saharan Africa's fast growing open economies. The authorities say a disappointing rainy season combined with a drought in Ethiopia and Kenya are partly to blame for the food price rises on the streets of Kampala. Some have got their own theory. In February's election, Yoweri Museveni won a thumping majority, although the European Union expressed unease about the way the poll was held. Just before the election, the president increased government spending. His critics say he was trying to buy voters and that contributed to the high level of inflation. Although the central bank says nothing, Kampala's roads are clogged with traffic for much of the day. The quickest way to get about, although not necessarily the safest, is on the back of a boda boda, one of the motorbike taxis which weave their way amid the traffic. Leaning on his bike in a street next to Parliament is Seth. He's alarmed at the rising price of petrol. He tells me it's up by about a third over the past year. When he asks me why, I turn the question back on him. He explains he's not all that well educated and doesn't know. He then gives me the clearest explanation I've heard yet about the impact of the foreign exchange markets on petrol. In Uganda, the European debt crisis has led global investors to pull their money out of anything vaguely risky. So the Ugandan shilling has fallen in value, pushing up the price of fuel, which has to be imported. But Seth says he can't increase his passengers fares because people then couldn't afford to use him at all. Have you seen the price of Motoke? He asks. I can now eat only beans. The central bank has now hiked interest rates to try to combat inflation. It is making the shilling a little more attractive to investors. But life remains tough for many and there have been a number of demonstrations. Some have turned violent. Some of the protests are led by opposition politicians. One, Kisa Bezaje, regularly tries to walk to work to highlight fuel prices. He's been arrested several times. Earlier this year, the government described the protesters as drug users and criminals. At Kiseka market in the centre of Kampala, police sit on a patch of grass, eating their lunch. They're pretty much stationed there, armed with weapons that fire tear gas canisters. I've met several people who've suffered the stinging effects of tear gas smoke. Parked next to some of the stalls is a marked police van, a warning to would be protesters. It has what looks like a large gun mounted on the roof. It is in fact a water cannon used to spray brightly coloured liquid at people staining their clothes so they can be identified and arrested later. Nearby is another of those leftover election posters. It has a pink tinge as if it was hit by water from the police truck, sprayed at people protesting about rising prices. Prosperity for all, declares the poster Rob Young in Uganda.
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Narrator/Reporter
This is the moment to lay down your arms. The alternative is prison or the tomb. That uncompromising message has been issued by the Colombian president to the FARC rebel movement after the killing last week of Alfonso Carnot, one of its most senior commanders. While the rebels defiantly say peace will only come when the social issues which led to their revolt are addressed, Hugh Cordy tells us their battle with the authorities is not having the effect on daily life it once had.
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BBC Reporter
In 1993, while working in South Dakota, USA, I met a rancher who said, so you're from Britain. Isn't that where gangs are killing each other with machine guns? Sure you're not thinking about somewhere else? I replied, no, it's definitely England. You know, it's like a religious war, Catholics killing Protestants. Do you mean Northern Ireland? I asked. Yep, that's it, he said. As it happened the week before this conversation, I'd read an article about gun crime in the States. According to this report, three times more people died as a result of bullet wounds in Wichita, Kansas, an ordinary town in the Midwest, then in Northern Ireland, then at the height of the Troubles. My point here is about perception. It doesn't take much to form a negative opinion about a place. And so it was when I started to plan my trip to Colombia. Ask what Colombia is famous for, and the most likely response would be cocaine. Farc, the left wing guerrilla group, and Pablo Escobar, the notorious drug lord, now deceased. It's a country that's had an almost permanent presence on the BBC's hostile environments list. I imagine in a light hearted way that when the Hostile Environments Committee meet, they start each session with the words, so apart from Colombia, what else have we got? I'd been told by people in Colombia that things had changed. But how much I wondered as I tentatively emerged from Bogota's airport while waiting for Francisco Ferrero, my contact. Would I be bundled into the back of a car filled with gun toting kidnappers? Or would somebody come up to me and say, eh gringo, you want drugs? Someone did approach me, but only to ask politely whether I was looking for a taxi into town. It was all very normal. And when my lift showed up and we drove into the city and to a local restaurant, that seemed pretty normal too. Is this typical? I asked Francisco. Sure, he says. Of course, there are places I wouldn't want to go on my own at night in Bogota. But isn't that true of any city? The following day, we were the guests of Jorge Londono, a wealthy Colombian businessman, at his private nature reserve, an hour's flight from Bogota. It was my first insight into Colombia's troubles. Before taxiing onto the Runway, we were required to check in with the anti narcotics police, who inspected Jorge's plane and examined our ID cards against the submitted paperwork, which doubled as our permit for where the plane was overnighting. Once in the air, we would be tracked by radar and possibly spotter planes as well. Later, the pilot pointed out the plane's transponder, a device that sends a continuous signal back to a control tower. I was relieved to see it without one, the air Force is legally entitled to shoot the plane down. All this security has one goal to stop the free flow of drugs across the country. And it seems to be working. Increasingly, drug operators are moving elsewhere. To understand just how much Colombia has changed over the last few years, you can't do much better than ask Francisco and Jorge. Francisco is head of Google in Colombia, and while satisfying his passion for photographing Colombia's wild places, he's travelled to the country's most remote corners. Jorge, on the other hand, owns and manages hotels in 21 cities, which he visits regularly, and business is beginning to boom. He's also something of an adventurer himself, having just jet skied hundreds of miles along undisturbed jungle rivers to the mighty Orinoco. So with their combined experience, I give them a map of Colombia and ask them to mark areas I should not venture into. They draw just three small circles on Colombia's borders, two with Venezuela and one with Ecuador. They represent less than 5% of the country. Admittedly, this was hardly an in depth analysis of Colombia's security issues, but it does seem to express what many Colombians are beginning to feel. Ask the new generation what the country's biggest export is now, and they're more likely to say the global singing sensation Shakira, she of the gyrating hips, than cocaine. And what of farc? Well, it appears that they are on the retreat too. Not just the group itself, but in the minds of Colombians. In a national survey, only 3% of respondents expressed any sympathy for the cause. Could it Be that in the near future, the BBC's hostile environment list will not actually include Columbia. It'll seem like the passing of a loyal and faithful servant.
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Narrator/Reporter
And that's Hugh Cordy. Thousands of British troops currently based in Germany are being brought home. The Prime Minister confirmed a year ago that they'd all be out of Germany by the year 2020. It's partly because of cutbacks in the armed forces and partly because with the Cold War now over, it's no longer the most strateg sensible place for them to be. Today, some 20,000 soldiers remain there and many, it seems, may not be coming home. They've opted to stay on in Germany and will join thousands of other former British servicemen already living there. Chris Bowlby's been tracing how they moved from being post war conquerors to pillars of the local German community.
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Chris Bowlby
My name's Owen, but call me Ossie if you want Owen. Ossie Smart's dual name's an indication of a fascinating dual identity. This engaging 80 something is what I call a British German. One of the thousands of former British servicemen who've settled in Germany, he's proud of his British background, but lives mostly in a German speaking world, in a small town near Bielefeld in Westphalia. That's why he offers the name Ossie instead of Owen. As Germans struggle with the English W sound. I sympathised when I lived in Germany. Locals attempting to get their tongues round my surname. Bowlby sounded as if they were drowning. My bank manager summoning me to collect, say, some foreign currency I'd ordered, used to give up in tongue tied desperation and simply shout Englander across the room. That might seem familiar to those brought up on the idea that Brits and Germans never really understand each other and tend to communicate in brusque stereotypes or keep a wary distance. But Owen Smart and all the other British Germans prove that people can gradually come together from the least promising of pasts. Owen's first impression of Germany was of an enemy. He was part of the invading British army in 1945 and his hostility deepened when, just after the war, his army unit was given the horrific task of clearing the site of the Belsen concentration camp. Asking him about that is one of the few moments when I see him lost for words. He moved on to be part of the military administration of the city of Paderborn, which was, he told me, mostly just rubble. But working there, he met the German woman who became his wife in defiance of what was then the strict British policy of non fraternization with Germans. Owen was Told by his commanding officer that the marriage would end his promotion prospects. But he went ahead. Never regretted it, he added, as he wistfully took down a picture of his wedding day. We've beaten them, he recalled saying to his wife as they emerged from the church in defiance of the British officers. I headed on from his flats to see what today's Paderborn, still home to a large British army base, is like. It's unrecognisable from the bombed out city. Owen knew the town displays on street corners pictures of what the view ahead looked like in 1945, so you can marvel at the transformation from ruins to beautifully restored architecture. However, the suburb where the British army is based has none of the city centre's charm. It's a reminder that, unlike Owen, many British soldiers stationed here since the war seem keen to stay in a kind of British bubble. The so called Sennelaga strip, just outside the barracks boasts a bizarre mixture of pubs and clubs offering British TV and food. There's even a grocer run by one ex soldier called Little England, where you can stock up on brown sauce or haggis. But even here, there's been more integration than you might think. Simon Hogburn, a former army tank driver who hails from near Leeds, showed me where he'd run a pub with his German wife. It had brought soldiers and Germans together, He said a combination of tongue loosening beer and pursuit of local German women had made many a British squaddie suddenly lose linguistic inhibitions. And there are more substantial reasons why so many have decided to stay on. In Germany. Better health care was frequently mentioned, as was good schooling for those with children. And in a recession. Another former soldier told me it's noticeable how German companies cope without sacking as many of their staff as British firms might. Among those still serving in Germany, it's expected that many more will opt to stay. And as British bases close, some will integrate more than others. I was told of a few former British soldiers who've forgotten how to speak English altogether. Owen Ossey, smart, hasn't gone that far, though I did notice that every now and then he'd drop German words into English conversation without noticing. And his identity? Oh, it goes back a long way, he told me. I'm really an Anglo Saxon. So if you hear news in the next few years of the British finally withdrawing from Germany, think of the Anglo Saxons or British Germans who'll remain. They're living proof that personal links can defy national boundaries, regardless of politics and armies that come and go.
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Narrator/Reporter
Chris Bowlby and he'll have more about this on Friday of next week here on Radio 4 in a programme called the British Germans. Now, visitors to the American city of Philadelphia will tell you there's lots to see. And why wouldn't there be in a place which declares its famous as the birthplace of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? You may recall Sylvester Stallone charging up the elegant steps of the city's huge Museum of Art and punching the air triumphantly in the film Rocky. But there are many more cultural institutions there, and Vincent Dowd's been finding inspiration at a place with a compelling story to tell about American history.
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BBC Correspondent
South Philadelphia was never the wealthiest part of town. It grew as a place apart for Irish and Italian immigrants mainly, and then for the dirt poor blacks who headed north after America abolished slavery in the 1860s. South Martin Street, a row of two storey brick built houses, would be easy to miss if you didn't know about the window it offers onto history. In 1924, Marian Anderson moved in, just as she was having some success as a singer. She'd been born nearby 27 years earlier. In the 1890s, black women couldn't use the city hospitals to give birth. A doctor came around once a month to record the latest arrivals. The little museum in the house on South Martin street has a copy of Marion's certificate of birth alongside other memorabilia chronicling the life of the girl who grew up to become, many believe, America's greatest classical contralto voice and who in 1939 made an early stand for civil rights. Though she spent the rest of her life insisting she didn't much care to discuss it, most days it's Phyllis Sims who will show visitors around the house. I doubt, however, they're all treated to the fried chicken and cabbage which she insists on serving me first. Phyllis my progress doubtfully. Round here, honey, we use our fingers to eat our chicken, she says. But she's too good a host to linger long on my odd table manners. As I eat, Marian Anderson's clear voice fills the house Schubert leader, her famous recording of Ave Maria spirituals and American folk songs. By her mid-30s, Anderson was a much admired concert singer in Europe. Music lovers in America admired her voice, too. In a partly segregated nation, the problem was her color. Phyllis Sims tells me she's disappointed when, as so often, Philadelphians know little about Marian Anderson and her achievements. Sometimes it seems we get more visitors from Europe and Asia, she laments. But Marion was a treasure, one of the mothers of civil rights. In 1939, Marion was barred from giving a recital at Constitution hall in Washington, which had a white performers only policy. The venue was run by the Daughters of the American Revolution, whose members have to prove a family link back to the early days of the Republic. The nation's first lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, resigned from the DAR in protest and with her help, Marian Anderson gave an open air concert at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. There were 75,000 people on the ground and countless others heard it on the radio. Gingerly, Phyllis clatters down the wooden steps to the basement filled with yet more photos and memorabilia. There are pictures of Marion with Paul Robeson and of visits by Harry Belafonte and Gregory Peck. When Marion moved here, black Philadelphians weren't allowed into most bars and clubs, so for many the basement became a sort of min speakeasy, a place to invite friends. I ask if it surprises her that Marion never really had an operatic career. Phyllis reminds me that as late as 1955 Marion was the first black person ever to appear on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera, New York. It was the Times and the racism. She says she would have loved to be on the opera stage. This year the Anderson House was entered into America's National Register of Historic Places. Phyllis tells me she's proud of that, but she's critical of how little financial support they had to start the museum in 1998 and to keep it going since. I suggest how hugely America has changed. But she tells me if theirs were a white group, the cash would be pouring in. I hate saying it, but we've got to struggle for every little crumb of bread we get. She gives a wry smile. Maybe one day we'll get a sugar daddy. Phyllis plays me a video of a white haired Marion interviewed not long before she died in 1993. She's dignified and even perhaps a little stern. It's clear she didn't much care to be a campaigner for anything. She was never overtly political. But there is an inspiring tale nonetheless in the little Museum Museum on South Martin street, or to give it its alternative name these days on Marian Anderson Way. Phyllis locks up behind us and we head for her car. She's offered to drop me at Philadelphia's grandiose 30th Street Station. En route, we stop off at an upmarket hotel bar and Phyllis settles down to her favourite vodka martini. It's a pleasant place, not one she could ever have entered in 1939.
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Narrator/Reporter
Martinis, chicken and cabbage. It's tough being one of our own correspondents. Vincent Dowd there brings us to the end of another edition. More dispatches from around the world on Saturday morning. Do join us. Goodbye.