FIRST STEPS OF AN SDI-WISE PROCESS IN MOZAMBIQUE?

(Inhambane 19-24 March, Maputo 25 March)

Team from South Africa: Lawrence Mlanjeni, Plettenberg Bay; Cynthia Nonhlahla Mbatha, Piesang River; Kenny Makobe, North West; Stefano Marmorato, SDI Secretariat in Cape Town.

Essential Summary

The trip to Mozambique was comprised of two separate initiatives:
• supporting an enumeration exercise under way in a pilot neighbourhood (Chalambe 2), City of Inhambane (Southern Mozambique, about 500 km North Maputo), organized by a professional seconded to City Council by the German Government Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ), Ms Umut Duyar, in close collaboration with the Residents’ Committee,
• meeting two active communities in Maputo (Mafalala and Urbanização), apparently suitable for exposure to the SDI rituals and methodology, then supported in case they require this for a community empowerment process.

In neither case there had been any influence from or agreement with SDI, but both processes seemed coherent enough to justify this double attempt.

The team worked well, I believe, especially if one considers that they found a completely different set from the federation-style similar initiatives. We adapted to the ongoing situation and tried to give the Mozambican counterparts as much as possible, including:
• in Inhambane: a friendly database tool which the people involved are able to use,
• some training on settlement map drawing and a useful final product,
• feed-back on how we thought things had to be organised in the future,
• both in Inhambane and Maputo: the clear message that savings could strengthen their development efforts.

So, though the overall result is not really a success
• (in Inhambane: the enumeration is not completed and is not being run by the community itself since its active Residents Committee’s members seem “busy with work commitments”, but by a group of “internship” university students who proved not keen at using the enumeration as a tool to mobilise the community, or to make it more aware of its own features and priorities, capable of subsequent coherent decision making,
• both in Maputo and Inhambane: the wider communities have been given very little the opportunity to be exposed to the savings approach (our team was presented to a group of representatives/ delegates),
• there is not yet a clear idea of how now and in the future the relationship between authorities and communities should or could be improved, even if all the people involved are aware of this urgent need),

at least we have identified what it is that the process lacks the most:
• (in Inhambane: the community on the driving seat, with more responsibility in “doing” and direct access to exposure, especially with regards to women,
• a “revolutionary” fully new role to be assumed by City Council,
• a durable support by the development agency, which is now threatened to slow down when Ms Duyar leaves the country,
• in Maputo: a more careful approach with local and National Government,
• a deeper meaning of sustainability,
• a wider vision of the communities to partner with in order to achieve improvements for all neighbourhoods, maybe countrywide).

We have possibly also verified how (little) far the process goes when it is not undertaken under certain conditions and approach, which usually feature in the SDI process.

Now it is not just to SDI to decide whether to support (heavily) or not a Mozambican real start up, because first of all the communities in Maputo, their stimulating agencies (UN Habitat and the Ministry for Environmental Action), as well as the City Council in Inhambane and the supporting GTZ, should clearly express interest in strong partnerships, understanding what it would mean and imply.

Some potential is there, anyway:
• City Council in Inhambane is flexible (though rather resourceless) and committed to a process of the kind promoted by SDI,
• The Residents’ Committee seems after all comprised of committed people who eventually promised to launch their own savings scheme to showcase it to the rest of the community,
• The students’ group on internship got anyway some capacity to collect and capture data and elaborate them in useful (and fancy) reports, though on semi-professional terms, they can be employed when expanding the process in the country,
• The enumeration will be sooner completed and will be very rich in contents,
• GTZ in Inhambane declared interest and commitment to continue some support after the current seconded professional leaves the project,
• in Maputo the two neighbourhoods have a pragmatic incremental approach to upgrading and have already delivered, with external support,
• they are followed up by UN Habitat, whose principles actually applied in the field are highly coherent to the SDI core ones, and whose action spans to other cities in Mozambique and can put them in contact with similar initiatives across the country.

Contacts will be maintained to follow up with GTZ, Inhambane City Council (CMCI), UN Habitat/Ministry of Environmental Action (MICOA), the communities themselves in both cities.

Background, details and acknowledgement

Inhambane

Previous contacts had been running between the SDI secretariat and the architect Umut Duyar, consultant seconded to the City Council by GTZ (the main German Government aid agency, which is running other programmes in the Province and across country).
The Municipal Council of the City of Inhambane (CMCI) was applying to SELAVIP for aid to build new affordable houses for people meant to be relocated from Chalambe 2 to another area, about 7 km far away.
The main problem identified was the lack of space for infrastructure: roads (ambulance, funeral cars…), electricity and water pipes; plus a subsequent fire risk (all houses are made out of reed and palm leaves, except a small number with cement floor and/or walls). A number of houses are placed on land stolen from the sea: garbage was dumped in the tiding edge of the neighbourhood and sand thrown on it. Floods are almost regular.

Also thanks to Joel’s opinion (at the end of August 2005) that CMCI could wait and proceed per steps, the Council and their consultant were not keen to force the situation, since they consider this project as a pilot one, to be conducted in a participative way (and they admittedly have no such experience). We all agreed that, had they embarked on a (recommended) community survey exercise, SDI would help. A second recommendation had been to wait the following year to ask for the housing grants from SELAVIP, which was in any case already the intention of the applicant.
The exercise was organized but SDI was not ready for some months to send a team there, so they waited until February and we agreed that we would come to support them in March.

The community expresses clearly (98% of the questionnaires administered so far) the need of upgrading in terms of enlarged roads, and is clearly aware of the connection between the survey and their future development. When asked about their possible involvement and front role in it, they do not really consider the possibility (colonization, State-party rule and centrally planned socialist system, development NGOs’ aid have discouraged such a thought, I guess).

A workshop on participative interventions was run by the consultant for some community members, some City Council officials and a group of students from the State University’s Faculty of Tourism based in Inhambane. They had been selected by the Faculty for an internship period and they seemed the best option to administer the questionnaires to the people, especially because the Residents’ Committee members indicated that they would be too busy to perform this demanding task. As an incentive, the interns would be paid 1 million Meticais per month (almost R 300).

Unfortunately the abovementioned choices were reasonable but proved unsuccessful, according to the team. We do not blame the Council or the consultant, but we assess that a different option would be more effective:
• though the consultant protested with the Faculty, the list of students selected included only males;
• 1,000,000 MTC is the minimum salary in Mozambique (not so bad for a Mozambican student from the economically depressed Inhambane, in any case) and the agreement between University, CMCI and the students was possibly not clear enough in terms of prolonging the payments in case they finished the job “too” quickly;
• though some students even refused to participate because the remuneration was considered too small, we felt that some of the remaining students were motivated (not just encouraged) by this payment, lowering the empathy with the community itself and at the best creating a “professional” relationship with them;
• the hot temperature, the other school commitments of the students, and the Mozambican low pressure lifestyle, I argue, motivated the decision to have them work only until 11.30 a.m. every day, but they started looking at the wristwatch with concern from 10-10.30 on;
• the questionnaires included a technical part of measurements of every plot and its houses (a whole independent form), which the students could fill in well, but which takes much time. The information coming out of the exercise is very useful and rich, but the speed of the gathering is slow and the feed back to the community is delayed;
• though some community representatives are educated and skillful, the technical component, as well as its time consuming feature, prevented the full participation by the Committee’s members, let alone of the community ordinary members.

When the team arrived in Inhambane from South Africa on a Sunday morning, was briefed by the consultant, then met directly the community of Chalambe 2 in the afternoon.
Already about 130 questionnaires had been run and their data captured in an Excel spreadsheet by one of the students. So our possibilities to change the process were very limited. nevertheless we tried to influence and –at least– to propose a gradual shift for the continuation.
Nobody knows yet the exact number of families of the pilot neighbourhood, but it must be around 300. We divided ourselves according to the 3 teams constituted by the students at the beginning of the survey. On the first day we reviewed the questionnaires, adding some questions which could give a full account of the socio-economic situation, but caring not to make the form longer than one double-faced page.
Kenny would draw the maps of the three sections of the area in various days, thus offering a learning by doing learning experience to all of the 3 sub-teams of students. Nonhlahlha and Lawrence would strengthen the other 2 teams, rotating every day (almost all the students could speak English: this was an important advantage of course).
I worked on the data system, building and showing the Query & Report functions of an Access database. Some questions were transformed from open into closed ones with some options (using the information got from the first 130 questionnaires), many into “Yes/No” ones.
I tried to teach all the students (not just the “gatekeeper”), the consultant and one City official, at filling in the database (actually 4/5 times quicker than before, besides letting the data be used for all kinds of query), as well as changing its structure and features, if necessary, and at using its friendly functions to elaborate reports.

The field work allowed the completion of a map for 2 of the three sections (the simplest and smallest was left) and the students seemed really benefiting from the exercise. The correct mapping of the narrow streets and lanes is crucial to avoid an unnecessary number of evictions.
The teams filling in the questionnaires were helped in order to have a more empathic relationship between surveyor and answering household (having an Zulu-speaking woman was often better than a Bitonga- & Portuguese-speaking guy).
Lawrence, Nonhlahla, the consultant and myself tried every day to involve community members and have the teams escorted (at least), but this did not meet enthusiastic response. Despite the (sincere) promises to be open and welcome us as brothers, and the students (as professionals?), the commitment did not include their own entering each other’s yard, considering this as an unbecoming intrusion. A lot of work should be done on this issue.

The final report back and discussion with the “community” (almost only Residents Committee members) was positive and at least they committed to start their own savings scheme to showcase it to the rest of the community. I believe that they understood what we meant by wider and more active participation, and they will probably improve in the future.

The overall relationship between the South Africans and the Mozambicans at all levels was certainly friendly and strong and we can build on it in the future.

Besides the interaction in the community, this is true for the CMCI officials and head: both the Mayor and the Director of the Urbanisation Department (the latter came and participated actively to the first meeting with the community and the area representatives, secretary, etc.) were particularly open and encourage flexibly further engagement, accepting the idea of a mature community to be strengthened for an adult dialogue with them.

The socio-economic parts of the questionnaires will be probably finished by Easter and the data captured. We insisted that a double verification phase follows. Individual data sheets are produced easily by the computer programme, general reports should be presented to the community gathered immediately afterwards.
Recommendations from the South African team members have been gathered and summarized in a written a document for all the involved people in Inhambane.

CMCI Town Planning and Topographic Office (about 4 technical staff under the Director of the Urbanisation Dept.) is not even equipped with telephone, adequate stationery or more than one socket, only through GTZ’s project they have now a desktop PC. They should devote more to the poor neighbourhoods, but are so busy with “urgent” and better presented applications from richer investors for the other coastal areas with a lot of potential for the tourist industry.
The office staff seems able to play the required role, but without pressure, stimulation (and economic encouragement?) by NGOs, will not be as proactive as it is needed. A constant dialogue and a more “demanding/aggressive” community leadership should and could maintain some balance and promote the interests of the poor. CMCI can in fact dialogue well with the community itself and removed the top-down approach of the past.

GTZ’s head in Inhambane also received us and declared himself keen to support “somehow” the process even when Ms Duyar leaves Mozambique (with no replacement by GTZ). A lot of clarification and agreement on principles and methodology is still needed, anyway, before committing SDI in such a process, unless we go there with a “heavy” presence, which is not in the plans and possibilities of SDI.

GTZ immediately agreed on and authorized the financial support to one City official and one Residents’ Committee member to go to Maputo and participate into the meeting scheduled on Saturday between the SDI delegation and the two communities there.

Ms Duyar proposes the following areas for further support by SDI:
• promote savings as a tool for raising a community contribution and smooth the problem of enlarging roads with economic damage for some families;
• SDI to give recommendations for focused submission of application to SELAVIP;
• conflict resolution [?intervention by coming and participating? I do not see SDI organizing workshops, of course].

Maputo

In Maputo both Mathias and Jaime were absent for commitments in Zimbabwe and East Africa respectively, but Titus (UN Habitat programme officer), together with Mafalala leaders Mr. Magaia and Mr Narciso (from Dambo association, a CBO) helped organize the meeting with their community’s representatives [actually, just from their organisation] and some from the neighbouring Urbanização [atually from the A.D.A.S.B.U. association/CBO].
Differently from Inhambane’s Chalambe 2, these two relatively old areas had [before the recent interventions] all the features of other urban slums across Africa (overcrowded, heaps of garbage everywhere, houses and shacks on white and black water channels, lack of proper sanitation and toilets, etc.).

We could have a deep exchange for about 4 hours, followed by a quick walk in Mafalala to have a look to the infrastructure situation and to their headquarters (where some thieves had broken in during the night, creating a lot of confusion and reducing the participation in the meeting itself).
A large number of women were volunteering in one of the weekly clean ups of the roads, when we arrived, but later only one woman participated in the meeting. This was our only reason for complaint. We agreed in any case on future exchanges with more time, more depth and range of people.

After the explanation of DAMBO e ADASBU of the activities carried out in the past years (we were especially interested in the evolution of their membership contributions, sustainability, spontaneous response to community needs, accountability attitudes and systems, dialogue or conflict with local and national Government), the South African highlighted some main features of a movement based on the savings mobilization tool and on experience exchanges, the usual amandla-imali-nolwazi stuff. I was pleased that the few questions before the closing of the meeting were hitting the viability and details of the savings systems. In fact, the key through which especially Lawrence and Kenny presented our experience was mainly one that could complement the Mozambicans’ efforts and strengthen them, instead of simply stating that “they must save and federate the groups”.
Despite little time left to our presentation, Nonhlahla had the opportunity of showing how simple it is to compile the record book and how small the amounts were, in the beginning, on her “ID”, in comparison with the results that she could achieve.
The City Council technical staff and the community representative from Inhambane were exposed once again to the savings issue and above all to the amazing work done by their colleagues in Maputo. We hope this could stimulate understanding and motivation, since if some upgrading was possible in worse off slums, there is no reason not to hope the same for Chalambe 2.
Listed below are just a few elements emerged from the two presentations.

• The Association for the Development of the Urbanização Neighbourhood was born in 2000 after the floods in the South of the country, including the slums of Maputo: cholera was rife and Medicins Sans Frontières (MSF) decided to intervene here exactly because it was the worst hit.
• They insisted that a participative support group had to run the activities, and Women’s League, Youth, teachers’ Union, Churches and the Sangomas’ Associations joined in the effort.
• Water and Sanitation was identified as the most urgent priority.

• Garbage had to be removed first. They organized and realised with City Council an ad hoc campaign.
• Maintenance was necessary and they started volunteering, then with a salary, by means of tchova (“push”), manually operated carts. Each household used to contribute with the equivalent of 10 cents of Rand per week.
• In 2001 City Council started charging all citizens for garbage removal (actually always very weak if existing until today) on their electricity bills. ADASBU and MSF asked for a solution to the duplication: they were charging the households and the City was doing the same (but the work was performed by ADASBU only). Government asked for 6 months time to decide. In the meanwhile ADASBU did not charge the families and the salary of the three operators was paid by a donor. Only in 2004 the City Council came back and accepted to cover the service provided through a part of the tariff charged [which of course was a general tax, not a specific one/tariff, when no service was given].

• Drainage is needed because when it rains all the water comes from other areas and keeps here for as much as 5 months. With the external financial support they dug 1,000 mt of secondary drainage ditches, later some tertiary channels completed the work and today the water does not stay any more. Instead of the 120,000 US$ as per first quotation, they contributed in labour (not on a completely volunteer base, but via a food-for-work scheme) and the works cost only 60,000 US$.

• An enumeration exercise was conducted on the 2,380 families (about 15,000 people). Improper latrines were identified as the next serious problem to solve. Starting from the poorest latrines [not always in the poorest households, they discovered], improved latrines replaced the hole+tyre system in 100% of the families. A service of cleaning through two sucking machines is now provided at a low price. One of two machines was offered by UN Habitat, which had come to know one specially thought in Nairobi for crowded slums. The first machine was offered again by MSF.

• Other initiatives include water taps which had to be lowered in height due to the water’s low pressure. British WaterAid helped financially and the management committee of the CBO organized once more the work.

• A youth group is busy with education on hygiene and sanitation problems. 2 monthly meetings with community sections are held and report back keeps all updated.

• The management committee is comprised today of 6 women and 9 men.

• A similar (even older) story is the one of Dambo in Mafalala (about 22,000 people), helped in its early steps by the French NGO Essor. A home-based care system was put in place and a lot of vocational training initiatives have been organized so far in favour of the adolescents (tyre and motorbikes repair, basket weaving…

• As per the drainage channels, in this case Essor paid only for the materials and the community contributed with free labour. UN Habitat offered 5 collection bins/containers, UNICEF gave 6 tchovas.

• Latrines were also distributed during the years. Dambo, too, organizes clean ups on Saturdays.

• Titulos de Pobreza (“Poverty titles”) were obtained after lobbying by the association for the poorest households, so that the families could go and register their children and get the right not to pay school fees. Before this, efforts had been made to support children who could not continue school due to the fees themselves.

• Dambo submitted an upgrading project to National Government (since the latter said it was the only level at which they had to seek approval). Instead of consulting them back before any action, Government “stole” their project and implemented it roughly, hardly, also with evictions and house bulldozing (rarely heard of in Mozambique). This makes them more careful and possibly less keen to devise and submit new such plans. I think that SDI and UN Habitat should work on this.

• Savings: both in Mafalala and Urbanização people use to participate in stokvels (xitique), the only alternative proposed some time ago by an external aid agency failed allegedly for fears of theft and assault. No other experience of the kind we suggested has ever been heard of.

Despite some misunderstandings and difficulty in satisfying us completely in terms of arrangements which had the real SDI approach, all the people who intervened to organize the mission on the Mozambican side must be recognized as highly committed and effective, since we have been helped and allowed to get in contact and work with the most active members of the communities involved. I hereby sincerely thank Umut Duyar, the Mayor of Inhambane and his Director for Urbanization Dept. (Natu Aly), Mathias Spaliviero and Jaime Comiche (UN Habitat-MICOA).