On June 26, I posted an essay entitled "Egypt's Development: Character and Leadership, mandatory prerequisites." In the essay, I posited that in a global economy, knowing what it takes for development, progress and an improved standard of living is never the primary issue. Instead, a nation's stellar character and its passionate leadership lead the way to development.
Nations survive and thrive but for their character, for if they lose their character they are gone. Such history-proven and common-sense understanding were clear to Khalil Gibran and Theodore Roosevelt: "The true wealth of a nation lies not in its gold or silver but in its learning, wisdom and in the uprightness of its sons," Khalil Gibran; "Character, in the long run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike," Theodore Roosevelt.
A nationwide infrastructure of leaders who are competent, passionate, enlightened, inspired and exceptionally dedicated to the well-being of the people is the only way forward for an overhaul of Egypt's national character. Egypt has gone through generations of shady, incompetent and uninformed leaders at all levels and in all facets of the life of its people. It is impossible to accept that Egypt cannot find thousands of leaders with solid characteristics who will work tirelessly to turn around the nation's character.
It is extremely critical to understand that when speaking of development, it is never meant only for Cairo and Alexandria. With Egypt's rural population at 57% of total population (2010), it is a no-brainer that development must include the village, that most disadvantaged of communities. Village people are the most in need for development; they have been shielded for generations from the most basic of knowledge and understanding of what it takes for a life of health, freedom and fulfillment.
Abu Hummus: A Case StudyIn 1997, the then World Bank president James D. Wolfensohn initiated the Grass Roots Immersion Program (GRIP), a program designed to further educate and orient World Bank managers to the needs and issues of development around the world. I was asked to lead a team of World Bank managers on a visit to one of Egypt's villages. I chose Abu Hummus, a little town located forty miles south of Alexandria, because I was very familiar with it since my uncle, Dr. Shafik Helal, had been the director of its hospital. The team was comprised of one Canadian, one German, three Americans and me (Egyptian/naturalized American). Upon returning to Washington, DC, I drafted a report outlining our observations and how we were affected, my team members reviewed it and we sent it to Mr. Wolfensohn, who in turn acknowledged it and thanked us in a letter. I have reorganized the report for easier reading and included it and the letter below.
In reading the report, you will quickly notice the seriously detrimental effects of the issues covered in my June 26 essay. These issues have more impact on the people living in a small village than in a large city.
The Grass Roots Immersion Program Report
Abu Hummus, Egypt
July 10-19, 1998
Our team, all members of Executive Development Program Cohort 3, went to Egypt for our Grass Roots Immersion Program (GRIP). We went July 13-17, 1998, to the little town of Abu Hummus, located forty miles south of Alexandria, in Boheira Province, where Damanhour is the capital. We stayed in villages on the outskirts of the town, where we were the guests of six different families and their communities.
Our observations and how we were affected:
The Character of the Communities
During and after we completed our week in Abu Hummus, we found that our observations as individuals and collectively were focused on the character of the communities we visited. A nation's character is determined largely by the character of its most common of individuals. Therefore, we agreed to describe our experience and express our views in the report from the point of view of the making of the characters of the people we came across, man, woman, and child. We considered the confluence of life components that shape and dictate the culture of people.
Purpose
Our purpose is to begin to understand what it would take for the communities we visited to grow individually and as a group in order to reduce poverty and improve living standards.
Reliance on Government
We could not help but notice that the vision, principles, and values of the individual in these communities are shaped largely by an almost total reliance on government. We believe that the government, quite deliberately, has taken a gradualist approach to development. This approach has slowed economic growth and consequently slowed progress. To make any substantive and sustainable change to the character of Egypt, privatization is the key. However, privatization is proceeding only gradually and we believe this to be an ineffective approach. While gradualism is safe and protects against culture shock and deep-rooted beliefs and habits, it nevertheless allows for any gains made to dissipate and for existing norms to prevail. Privatization is failing. This is likely due to the enormous bureaucratic resistance at all levels of the public sector.
Security and People Control
Obsession with security and control over the people is a hurdle that we witnessed and experienced first-hand as local police frequently singled us out for questioning, wielding their power and authority on one occasion into the wee hours of the morning. The grip security people hold over the community shows no signs of relaxing, denying people the freedom of thought and decision-making, as well as preventing people from taking independent action.
Health, Community Leadership, Press, Organization
Basic information and understanding about health and cleanliness are missing at all levels of the community. Places and individuals, particularly children, reveal the need for individuals to improve the cleanliness of themselves and their immediate surroundings. As an example, a typical village scene was one of grime-covered children, in tattered clothing and often without shoes, playing in streets littered with garbage and animal excrement. This situation poses significant health consequences. This in itself seems a simple problem to address; however, in order to distribute the basic educational information, there needs to be community leadership with the desire, drive, freedom, and accountability to spearhead such an effort. Unfortunately, we could not identify any intention or incentive for such action to materialize. Furthermore, there was no indication that there is local press interested in or even capable of carrying the torch on behalf of the community. It is our understanding that the press in Egypt is heavily controlled, and freedom of expression and organization are restricted. Yet, this is exactly what is needed in communities like Abu Hummus to mobilize the people and enable healthy change to occur.
In many homes we visited, women were cooking on small Bunsen-style burners fueled by kerosene, a known carcinogen, thus unknowingly poisoning their families.
In public housing projects, we found apartments that had no glass or screens in the windows. Flies and mosquitoes flew freely about the apartments, biting families, landing on food, and spreading disease. Corruption may have played a role here, where glass and screens were budgeted for but never procured.
Education, Knowledge, Information
Knowledge seems to be in short supply. Too many people end their formal education prematurely, they get busy with quotidian lives that have no connection with reading, writing, or knowledge. They lose touch with the necessary information required for progressive lifestyles and enlightened life, where the individual is aware of contemporary needs and how to go about fulfilling them. This is particularly true of women. In Egypt as a whole, about 600,000 girls aged 6-10 are not given the benefit of schooling. Formal education is a stated national priority. However, even the modest fees associated with education act as a barrier to entry; and when families can find the fees, the boy children are the selected beneficiaries. We could not detect how grass roots learning could take effect or where the individual in such communities could become generally well-informed, be convinced of the value of seeking better information with regard to everyday life, or learn to be more accountable for their own lives.
Religion, Birth Control, Unemployment and the Role of Women and Children
Other components that influence life in Abu Hummus include religion, birth control, unemployment and the role of women and children. Religion is the dominant factor in shaping the community, the family, and the individual. The force of religious beliefs is ubiquitous, invading even the smallest aspect of people's lives. There is very little separation of mosque and state at any official or social level. While we recognize that there is no right or wrong here, we noted that there is prevailing resignation when it comes to facing life's challenges. Common wisdom is that God will take care of it and that life is but a transitional period in one's overall journey. Religious beliefs may be a factor in people's ability to try harder to get answers to life's issues, to improve one's lot in life, or to consider increasing their productivity.
Overpopulation and its impact have the most significant effect on the people of Abu Hummus. In the face of an ever-increasing population, the absence of economic growth makes it even more difficult to feed one's family, never mind the bigger goal of escaping poverty! In a country where population growth rate is excessively high, the trade-offs between health and the environment take their toll as evidenced by the lack of nutrition, poor health, unclean air, and an inconsistent supply of potable water. In an attempt to manage population growth, the government has funded some educational programs on birth control, but the success of the programs is seriously hampered by religious beliefs. One example of this is the cultural acceptance of men having up to four wives. One of our hosts had taken a second wife because the first wife had provided only girls (nine!). On one occasion during our brief stay, a father told us that one of his sons would have to take a second wife because after eighteen months of marriage, the wife had not yet borne a child.
Many of the adults in Abu Hummus are unemployed. This is interesting given that the vast majority of women do not work outside the home and thus do not compete for jobs. In many cases it is the young children who are the breadwinners. Daily, we observed large numbers of men sitting around smoking water pipes while their wives cared for the household and the young children worked. In one of our host families, nine of the ten members of the household were unemployed. In another family of eleven males and two females, the fourteen-year-old boy worked in a vehicle repair garage; the fifteen-year-old boy worked in a bakery; and the mother worked part-time in a clinic. The remaining members of the family, all adults, were unemployed. This is the norm.
Another cultural norm is that both boys and girls may go to school in Egypt but it is commonly understood that the girls are not being prepared for a job. We visited a vocational training school just outside of Abu Hummus, where the government had funded a program to provide much-needed job skills in the areas of electrical work, plumbing, bricklaying, and house painting. Boys and girls participated in the program; however, it was made very clear that while the boys were being trained for the job market, the girls would use their skills only at home. The relationship between males and females even in the schools is impacted by religion. In one instance, a teacher refused to shake hands with the women in our group – to touch a woman would soil his hands and he would not be able to pray until he washed away her touch, exactly the same as if he had touched an animal. One wonders how such beliefs and behaviors impact the teacher / female student relationship.
The culture is very strongly oriented toward the male and his needs. The stereotypical view of women in Arab countries is that they are second class citizens, existing only to bear children and serve men. When we raised this issue with men in Egypt, their stated opinion was that women have as much control over their lives as men. Men believe that the limits placed on women are for their protection and that women prefer to stay home, be taken care of, and raise children. Our observation of a woman's life in Egypt were very different.
Our first observation was the difference in the way men and women dress. Men wear western clothing (shirt, with short sleeves in summer, and pants) and women dress more traditionally (long sleeves, long skirts, scarves covering their hair). At the extreme, there were women who, except for their eyes, were completely covered, often in black. This must be extremely uncomfortable in a country where the temperature is commonly 100-110 degrees Fahrenheit (38-43 degrees Celsius). Once again, religion is at the center of how women are treated. This modesty is traced back to Islam and accordingly men must "protect" women. In keeping with their religion, it is very important that both men and women pray, although in separate areas of the mosque, women seated behind and above men, further from the cleric leading the service. A man who prays more than a certain amount is considered more holy. Women cannot achieve this same holy status. It does not appear that women have any influence on life's issues. Control and decision making rest solely with men. Although women take care of the home, and some work hard, even beside their husbands in the fields, they are not seriously consulted in life decisions for the family and there is little opportunity for their views to be aired or heeded. There are very few females who have been liberated and could act as role models for change. Based on our observations of and discussions with women, we are not sure that at this time Egyptian women would want to change their role, as the risks are great and rewards unknown.
Conclusion
It is very important to conclude this overview account of our GRIP week in Abu Hummus by reporting that we found the people in and around Abu Hummus to be extremely generous and kind. It would be hard to match the hospitality, warmth, and sincere friendship extended to each and every one of us. People in Abu Hummus seem happy and content, they handle their lives and their roles in a simple way. They treat the outside world as just that, the outside, with no intention of or means to linking up to it. People put little demands on themselves and couple that with little in the way of expectations. If they are physically secure, have enough to eat, and are socially acceptable (by conforming and doing the right thing), they are happy. We saw resourcefulness in getting basic needs met through combining of family resources, where different generations and brothers and cousins live together. We sensed no outward expression of dissatisfaction or hostility toward the environment, either political or social. In general people were content with their lives… men prayed, got together and smoked their water pipes, sharing stories; women worked hard to keep the house and family together; children studied, worked, or played in the streets, cheerfully calling out to passersby. It is quite possible that if people in Abu Hummus are left to their own devices, they will not miss development at all or ask for any significant or meaningful change in their lives or environment.
How could we use the experience we have gained? We could try whenever and wherever possible to assist our colleagues working for and in Egypt to gear their programs and projects to address the components of Egyptian life listed above. We believe that development would be greatly facilitated if the character of Egypt – that is, the character of the Egyptian individual – would adjust to allow it. Therefore, the World Bank would need to direct its programs specifically to needs at the grass roots level in a given community. We understand that the challenge in such an approach is huge, dealing with religious, cultural and governmental issues; but we believe that it is essential if development is to occur.
Dear......
I was thrilled to receive your report of your visit to Abu Hummus in Egypt from July 10th to 19th. It really sounds as though it was a very fulfilling experience, and I am grateful to you for sharing it with me. I remain convinced that these immersion programs are critical part of the educational process in the institution, and I am truly grateful to you for taking it so seriously.
I was fascinated by the observations on the communities' reliance on government and your conclusion that privatization was essential. I was also interested in the role of the police which no doubt reinforces the dependence on government. I was familiar with the problems of the role of women. There is certainly much to be done on this subject, so too with the subject of overpopulation.
I hope that you all feel that you got something from the experience.
James D. Wolfensohn
The Road Ahead
Above report was of Abu Hummus in 1998. Thirteen years later, with the Mubarak regime and its harmful repercussions, it is logical to expect that the conditions in Abu Hummus have worsened.
For Egypt as a nation to experience development like other nations have achieved in Asia, in Europe and in South America, every Abu Hummus all across Egypt needs to develop. A nation is the sum of its parts, and for its people to fulfill their God-given rights for liberty, prosperity and happiness, its weakest link, the village, must see progress in all facets of its daily life.
The devastatingly sad and most alarming fact Egypt faces today is that its current leadership, rather than tackling the ultra-pressing needs of villages, is busily working on:
- Preoccupying the citizenry and distracting its attention.
- Spreading lies and innuendos and conducting continuous misleading campaigns.
- Delaying and postponing necessary steps and actions.
- Inciting divisiveness throughout the communities.
- Accusing the revolutionary forces for change of working for external entities' agendas and interests.
- Instilling the culture of fear and disproportionate attention to threats to national security.
In many countries, including the United States, small towns are often out of touch and resigned to lack of opportunity. In China, which has shown recent dramatic development, the villages are still very poor with improvements being put on a delayed schedule.
Every country has its own circumstances, its own needs and priorities and its own culture. It is my unwavering contention that Egypt's leadership at the national level must reach out, uncover, discover, and encourage leaders of village communities, and help them to attain a respectable level of knowledge, as to the requirements of progress and the need for change of character to get there. These community leaders must not have their jobs guaranteed, they should be held responsible, with assistance, incentives and encouragement, at the village, town and province levels, to affect the following:
- A solid belief that reliance on government for everything is unrealistic and baseless, that the individual can and should care about and deal with basic community needs.
- Committed and inspired training within respective public sectors to reduce bureaucracy and increase work ethic.
- An entrepreneurial spirit of for jobs, services and entertainment.
- Men believing that no job is beneath them, that improving one's lot in life and providing a better life for their families is the noblest path to take, one that leads directly into God's graces.
- Men comprehending that women should not be held prisoners in their own families and should contribute to the workforce, their participation would be unique and immense.
- Enlightened reliance on God, not expecting God to do the work, God smiles upon those who face and conquer life's challenges, life is worth living.
- Children's first priority is to learn, they are the key to a brighter future.
- Better schools, motivated and qualified teachers.
- Reduction of corruption in public projects.
- Reforming the role of the police, eliminating fear tactics and intimidation.
- Emergence of dynamic local press, of freedom of expression, association, assembly, and organization.
- Unrelenting campaign for knowledge about good health and sanitation.
- Unrelenting campaign for knowledge about the benefits of smaller families.
Granted it is an alien concept, one that has not crossed the minds of leaders in Egypt for generations, but I submit to you that it is time, more than ever, for leadership in Egypt, wherever it may be, in the smallest of villages or in the highest office in the land, to heed these words from John F. Kennedy: "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
Hussein
© Dr Hussein A Amin 2011
