08/08/10 - Chris Kelly MP reports back from social action project Umubano in Rwanda

I recently returned from an entirely self-funded, week long visit to Rwanda in central Africa on the Conservative Party's social action project Umubano (Rwandan for 'friendship'). It was my second visit to Rwanda - I also went in 2008 on the same project and, last summer, I went to Srebrenica on a similar project. The two places have one terrible thing in common - in the mid-90s they were both the scene of horrific genocides and were both badly let down by the international community.
 
So, having spent two weeks in the central African country on a community project in the summer of 2008, I was keen to go back now that the general election is behind us. Project Umubano, now in its fourth year, is unique not only in British politics but internationally. There is nothing like it happening elsewhere and I am extremely proud that the Conservative Party and fellow West Midlands MP and Secretary of State for International Development, Andrew Mitchell, have pioneered this hugely worthwhile form of direct action.
 
Before I talk about some of the things we did on the project this time I would, first, like to pay tribute to my Parliamentary colleagues who made the journey. Everyone is tired after the long and short campaigns and I know that colleagues have been looking forward to the recess and a chance to relax and spend quality time with their families. But I really must record a special mention for Andrew Mitchell, Stephen O'Brien and David Mundell (all of whom took time out of their busy ministerial schedules) and fellow MPs Stephen Crabb, Desmond Swayne (PPS to the Prime Minister), Pauline Latham, Fiona Bruce, Pauline Latham and Jeremy Lefroy for giving up valuable holiday time to join the project, many for the second or third time. I am extremely proud of the contributions made by the whole Project Umubano team in both Rwanda and Sierra Leone but I'm particularly proud of my Parliamentary colleagues for setting such a good example of compassionate conservatism in action. It is now my mission to encourage several more members of the class of 2010 to join the project next year. Parliament undoubtedly benefits having people with experience of the difficulties in continents like Africa and I'm confident that Parliamentarians who come for the first time next year will, to a man, find it a hugely rewarding and enriching experience and also leave with the sense of satisfaction one gets from making a modest contribution in a country with such considerable needs.
 
All that we did in Rwanda this year was set against the unique backdrop of a Presidential election, only the second since the ending of the genocide by (now President) Paul Kagame and the Rwanda Patriotic Front. Every day we would hear the noise of carnivals, election rallies and pick-up trucks emblazoned with Kagame posters & decked out with speakers but, obviously, we Conservatives took no part in the country's elections. President Kagame has met Project Umubano volunteers several times over the last few years (I had the pleasure of meeting him in 2008) but this year, with the election imminent, our projects were, quite rightly, not visited by the President. Instead we simply got on with our project areas including law, health, education, commerce and finance, tourism and sport.
 
The Presidential election itself was set against the backdrop of the 1994 genocide in which up to one million people were butchered. As part of the project, volunteers are taken to the national genocide memorial in the capital, Kigali, and offered the opportunity to visit the Murambi genocide memorial site. It was my first visit to Murambi, the scene of an estimated 50,000 murders. Words cannot describe the numb feeling of looking at the lime preserved bodies in the classrooms before stepping out into the sunshine and taking in the natural beauty that is Rwanda's rolling countryside. How something so horrific could happen somewhere so beautiful is beyond comprehension.
 
Project Umubano has evolved over each of the last four years and the project I opted to be part of, the education project, is a prime example of that. Rwanda is now a member of the Commonwealth (and the British Embassy in Kigali is now the High Commission) and the President has adopted English as the official second language, in place of French. This symbolises the Government of Rwanda's decision to move away from the Francophone sphere and into the Anglosphere. Volunteers worked with teachers and examiners of English to help them to improve their understanding, pronunciation, vocabulary, writing and, crucially, confidence with spoken English. The Rwandan Ministry of Education had arranged for teachers and examiners to convene in several centres across the country for a 12 day residential course. The participants were all being paid and were there willingly - they were all hungry to learn as well as being hungry for the cooked meals provided on site three times a day to sustain them. A detailed teaching programme had been mapped out in advance by the Ministry of Education with lesson plans based around subject areas that would truly be of use to our students such as mobile phone technology (despite being one of the poorest countries in the world, almost every Rwandan has a 2G mobile phone - phone credit is a booming business in any village with a shop). My students were soon talking with me about mobile phone masts and satellites and asking intelligent questions in English such as "Who owns the satellites used for mobile phone communications?" With the course being residential there was also an evening programme for the students, including debates with the subject chosen by the participants. Different districts went head-to-head to debate topics such as "This House believes that education is more important than wealth". The contributions were a joy to listen to, especially given that some of those speaking could only speak Kinyarwanda (their mother tongue) just four or five years ago.
 
At the end of my week in Rwanda I had a real sense that we had achieved something really valuable - an English language transfer of knowledge - and really boosted the confidence of hundreds of teachers who would shortly be returning by bus to their primary and secondary schools all across Rwanda to impart their newly gained vocabulary and pronunciation to the next generation. It is the next generation of Rwandans, born after the horrors of the 1994 genocide and who are currently going through the (admittedly limited) schools system, who give me hope for the country's future. Having met the Ministry of Education's English programme head at Ruhengeri School (where we were based) and heard from him how pleased he is with the progress made across the country in a relatively short time, I am confident that Rwanda will have a better, more stable future. Of course the Department for International Development will need to remain a major donor to such an under-developed country for some considerable time to come but I think it is wonderful that, in Andrew Mitchell, we have a Secretary of State who has founded and led such a pioneering social action project in Africa and I'm delighted that Andrew now has the chance to put into practice in Government that which he has been working on for the entire duration of David Cameron's leadership of the Conservative Party.
 
Soon after I arrived back home I headed out to my constituency advice surgery with a sense that, no matter how bad our problems are in the UK, it's important to remember there are always people elsewhere in the world worse off than us.

 www.conservatives.com/umubano

 View photographs of Chris Kelly MP working on Project Umubano in Rwanda

 Read 'Reflections on a very valuable week in Rwanda with Project Umubano' by Chris Kelly MP on ConservativeHome.com

8th August 2010