I have lived through a two-day decision making nightmare at the Zambian NGO Congress. This congress had been organized by the Ministry of Community Development, Mother and Child Health (aka - given the love for acronyms in Zambia - the MCDMCH) to push forward the implementation of the very restrictive NGO Act. This NGO Act had been adopted in August 2009 by the former MMD government (in power until the elections in 2011), but never been implemented.
To understand the backdrop of the NGO Congress, two rather complex constellations should be kept in mind:
1. For the implementation of the act, two NGO decision making bodies have to be put in place, i.e. (ideally) voted for by NGOs and thus made operational: The NGO board and the NGO council. According to the act, the NGO board would be responsible for the registration and deregistration of NGOs on very vague grounds such as the "public good" and "public security". The crux is that the NGO board is designed to be dominated by state officials: Of the 15 members of the board, six are envisaged to be direct representatives of line ministries, two would be appointed by the head of the MCDMCH and 7 would be representatives nominated by the NGO Congress but subject to approval by the Minister for CDMCH. The NGO Council, in turn, is a twelve-member body consisting only of NGO representatives, that has, however, no decision making powers regarding the registration process, but instead a rather vague general oversight function regarding the implementation of the act. Hence, the NGO Act, if implemented, would lead to a substantial increase of control of civil society by the state. Now, the NGO board has a quorum of eight members, that is, it is able to operate without NGO representatives. So the choice of the NGO Congress was effectively between suicide and killing oneself: Either legitimating the process of state control over civil society by voting for the representatives of the NGO board but maintaining - in the opinion of congress delegates - a good relationship to the government by virtue of a proven will to collaborate and securing access to the decision making process regarding the registration of NGOs *or* not voting for NGO board members and thus refusing to legitimize the NGO Act, but angering government and risking to be further marginalized in the governance of their own sector because the NGO Act could be implemented anyway, albeit without their participation.
2. The new PF government had repeatedly stated, while in opposition, that it would repeal or at least decisively amend the NGO Act when voted into power. After this became reality in the 2011 elections, it has spread the information that the NGO Act would have to be implemented first for at least 30 days before it could be repealed or amended, as it is already law since 2009. This is certainly not true, but an argument that still had some currency among NGO delegates when the congress started. From the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Justice, the congress delegates were further informed that the government has not yet schedulded the NGO Act for debate in parliament for 2013. Hence, an amendement or repeal of the law would be possible not earlier than 2014. This means that first of all, the reregistration of existing NGOs in Zambia would be governed by an unchanged, restrictive NGO Act that allows the government to deny reregistration to NGOs at will and on diverse grounds. The operation of unregistered organizations is, at the same time, punished by the Act with at least three months jailtime. Hence, by the time the NGO Act could be amended, most NGOs that have proven to be a pain in the ass for the government and hence not been reregistered, would be out of operation for at least a year and thus most certainly be very dead. Secondly, once the Act is implemented, many vocal NGOs shut down, the system running smoothly and reregistered NGOs are under the constant threat of deregistration, the opposition to the law would be inexistant and amendments all of a sudden a very unimportant issue on the government's agenda. Sounds like an obvious trap? Yes, but not necessarily to everyone it seems.
So much for the backdrop. But I have lied to you: With this background in mind you will most likely still not be able to understand what happened at the NGO Congress. At least neither did I or any other foreign observer - nor any of the Zambian NGO delegates that I have asked.
First, there was a very vocal opposition to the law - so far, so understandable. Delegates held emotional speeches accusing the government of not being honest with them, they condemned the law to be criminal and to violate their right of speech and association. There was a lot of cheering and applause. The main question was hence not whether NGO delegates liked the law. Instead it centered on how to deal with the Act. Some of the fervent speeches against the law ended with the surprising conclusion that anyway, the NGO board should be voted for and the Act be implemented, because, after all, it was already law and the PF government promised to amend it further down the road. Oha, I thought.
After hours of debate, however, the conclusion seemed to have been reached that the NGO Congress should not vote for neither the board nor the council. Eventually, the moderator asked the crowd: "Do you want to work inside the legal framework by voting for the NGO board and work with the government towards the amendment of the law at a later point in time?" Never mind that this was not a neutral formulation of the question, only six to ten delegates stood up. There was laughter among the delegates and quite some relief among the observers. The situation seemed clear: This is the end of the NGO Congress, at least in the way the government planned it. However, this is not what happened. The moderator proposed a short break and some traditional dancers came on stage with many and very loud drummers. After 15 minutes or so, the moderator came back, said that there had been a consultation among "all the stakeholders" and this was the conclusion: Considering the fact that the Act was law since August 2009 and thus should be followed and that in the invitation to the congress, delegates had been asked to come to vote (he stressed that fact several times as if it would explain anything), the decision was made to continue with the voting procedure. Wow, I thought. Now people will jump up from their seats in protest. But nothing happened. Nothing. Every single delegate kept quiet. Two employees of the Electoral Commission of Zambia came on stage and started to explain the rules that were to guide the following election procedure. They asked for suggestions regarding how many supporters a nominee to the board should have. And the crowd started responding, shouting "three" or "five" or "ten". Eventually, the first day of the conference ended with the nomination process.
There would be much more to be told about this first day of the congress and the following second day. But this short episode shall suffice to give an idea of the extent of surprise that interactions in Zambia evoke in me. What to do with it? It is not the first time I have encountered situations in Zambia that (at first sight) seemed to be marked by a tendency to circumvent rather than confront, a strong willingness to agree and a wait-and-see mentality. I am continously trying to sort out what I encounter and here is what I have come up with so far:
In Zambia, there is a strong conflict aversion among peers and especially with authorities - with the following outcomes:
1. Consensus is extremely important, i.e. debate goes on and larger groups are perceived by members to be split as long as there are vocal minorities, no matter how small.
2. Redress will be sought by solving conflicts "legally"/according to pre-established rules among those that have the educational background to understand legal institutions, as legal institutions provide individuals with rules according to which they "have to" confront each other (i.e. rules legitimize confrontation).
3. "Dialogue", no matter how monologous in actual practice, will always be favoured over confrontation by non-verbal means such as symbolic actions or violence etc.
4. - and following directly from 1. - decision making processes in groups are prone to be captured by vocal individuals that may keep a debate going by simple objection, and because there is a strong will to reach consensus, those individuals will be able to shift the "middle ground" in a bargaining situation decisively towards their position.
5. Verbalized individual reasoning is shifting quickly to accomodate group outcomes to release the tension between the perceived will of the group and individual (momentary) point of view.
And here some more far fetched conclusions:
All this is not to say that the same individuals are not able to be confrontative etc. - I assume that once group cohesion is established and a leader agreed upon (mainly by self-appointment), this leader is able to provide followers with a legitimate space for (even violent) confrontative action by solving moral or even simple decision dilemmas for the group. This leader is further able "to work with" the unreleased tension that larger groups quickly develop by not being able to act due to their strong consensus orientation.
At the same time, those (few) individuals that are ready to insist on their personal opinion quickly ascend into leadership positions and as there is a relative dominance of politics over other sectors of society in Zambia this is where these people flock. Hence politics shows a much stronger tendency to be confrontative (and sometimes even violent) - and followers expect strong and decided leadership positions and strong confrontative action by politicians.
Like the article Wolfgang!
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