World Social Forum's first day

This morning we met Nancy and Duncan. They are two members of Karasani Integrated Youth, a civil movement born on the initiative of the young people from Karasani, a poor neighbourhood north of Nairobi. The World Social Forum (WSF) opening act started with a call for a collective demonstration in support of one of the most impoverished neighbourhoods of all Africa, Kibera. Due to the fact that poverty creates delinquency, we needed, for security reasons, somebody to watch all over us during our march. And there they were Nancy and Duncan, sharing with us their experiences related with their daily struggle with the inhabitants of the place. There are no words to describe the conditions of the public services we saw when we get there. Once there, although we were obviously surprised by the countless crowds living there, and the total degradation of the houses and the people, what attracted our attention the most was the strong motivation of those without a job and a roof above their heads, who were there with signs reading “homeless is not helpless”. How can activism and social implication be made without a single piece of bread to eat? Only time will tell if our call to attention to the authorities on the situation of these people has been effective or not. One makes so many different contacts and gets in touch with so many different sensitivities that it’s completely impossible to imagine something changing or transforming for better. The demonstration started there, and ended at the Keniata International Conference Center, one of the WSF major sites.

During our walk back and forth, Nancy and Duncan told us how their association was born. They both belong to a social class that can’t afford the expenses of their basic education, in a country where most of the schools are private. When Nancy saw herself with almost no other future than a life in the streets or becoming a prostitute, she started to organize herself, along with others in her situation, investing their time in something that could bring something positive to their lives. Duncan told us that never, in his twenty-something years of life, has had the chance to work, so, as his only option, he started to pick the garbage from the streets for the Kasangani Integrated Youth. That is, young persons like Nancy and Duncan ideated and developed a program with two main objectives: to deal with the generalized unemployment of their generation and to keep their community clean.Right now they have 200 clients who, for a monthly fee of 500 kshs (1€ = 87 Kshs) have their cleaning and garbage service covered. The members of the association don’t get more than 100 Kshs a week (have in main that a pack of coffee costs 400 Kshs), but they spend their time in the company of some fellow mates in their same situation, sharing their problems, preventing each other from falling into the wild side and evading from the thought that it is impossible to have a better life.

The fact that a group of people decide, from their own needs, to organize themselves and solve at the same time specific situation which affect the entire community, shows us thesuccess and, therefore, the importance of self-management and civil organization. On the other hand, it’s very common to see how the actions made by independent organizations and/or the authorities solve a specific problem, generating at the same time a strong dependence on such organizations. Nancy and Duncan gave us a lesson today of the famous “think global, act local”.