Ujima (pronounced: oo-GEE-mah) means cooperation in Swahili, an East African language spoken by more than 50 million people. In a traditional sense it applies to working for the good of a local community, such as working in the fields or building for a common benefit. Ujima principle of the Collective Work and Responsibility is also celebrated on the third day of 7-day Kwanza, an annual African-American celebration of the seven principles of communal tradition and wisdom. However, when ujima is transported from a traditional local community forum into the international sociopolitical arena, the original communal intent is often lost and benefits just a selected few.

Have you ever wondered how come so many times man-made disasters, such as in the case of Rwandan genocide of 1994, seem to appear surprisingly late on the radar of the international public opinion? The reasons of that are often complex, but one of them is that politics and money are always interconnected and old-fashion pay off is an integral part of any political and economic game of a great majority of countries in the world.  That is also the case in the US:  large corporations, such as Enron and AIG, easily prove that rule. Financial leaders and politicians throughout the world know well  that manipulating the public opinion works wonders. In the case of Rwandan genocide the powers in-charge paid substantial money to hire experts to misinform and numb the public opinion in Rwanda, Africa and in the West. No experts are immune to greed – they often pose as legitimate businesses and provide function of international lobbying working hard to make things appear better than they are.  That routine activity always contains three integral components: creating lies, withholding the truth and exchanging favors.

It is quite easy to understand why in some African countries which, as others all over the world, often face legitimate and overwhelming socio-economic problems, so many individuals in power, while acting within a secretive and highly vertical power structure, would be tempted to manipulate the system to benefit themselves, their families and business partners. After all, “sinking ships are always full of rats”. As of today, we all can just wonder about how many international activities in the world are kept off the international public opinion’s radar by paying off the lobbyists and bribes. See PBS News Hour segment video below, detailing example of an international corruption case involving Nigeria and USA, aired in April 2009.

That takes us directly to the Ujima Project, an investigative reporting and research initiative for African journalists, and any others, who cover the continent. Ujima Project is an initiative of Ron Nixon of New York Times and his colleagues at the non-profit Great Lakes Media Institute in Kigali, Rwanda. The idea is based on a principle that Ron calls “reverse transparency” which allows to track some of international public money flow back to Africa. The Ujima Project is simply an online access point to the database that contain the public data sets that normally are not easily accessible to the public. The data base is reflecting the spending of African governments, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), agencies and businesses operating on the African continent.

The roots if the Ujima Project are practical: Ron Nixon turned his attention to lack of sufficient data coming from officials in the countries where he was reporting, including Nigeria and Rwanda. A practical remedy was needed to deal with insufficient legal regulation controlling  access to the government-held data in many African countries. Luckily, the related international deals were taking place often with countries that require that information to be retained by the law. That law is in effect in the US, the European Union, and many other countries, that do business with Africa. Unfortunately, that alone, could be also responsible for a sudden surge of some African governments in expanding their collaboration with countries that are not known for its public openness, such as China, or certain former soviet republics, and others, including some other African countries as well.

That rule of reporting by law does not mean, however, that all the money flow information is fully transparent and reliable. A precise accounting and allocation of the money is difficult to track because it requires independent and objective auditing. The audit function also, as often is the case when the all-mighty greed is involved, can be  a paid-for and corrupted service.  As we know from the US alone, greed is traditionally the most clever force corrupting the system.  Nevertheless, it must be stated clearly that any tool that aids transparency, however imperfect, is always a good initial step in fighting corruption especially when it is supported by a good investigative work on the ground and on both sides of transactions.

The corruption may also involve foreign aid activity. In the US, for example, the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the US State Department, and a handful of other American agencies must approve and vet such international public money flow arrangements. These agencies have open records policies for key relevant information on international aid groups and the African nations which do business with them, and, by using Freedom of Information Act requests, open records rules, make data from American and participating EU nations available online. Related Ujima Project data sets are being constantly expanded and, even if available with delays, provide still very helpful information that can not be necessarily useful upon direct reading: sometimes, an illegal activity looks best when it can pose as something completely innocent such as a charity.

If you are an African blogger or journalist then make Ujima Project, or other similar websites, your home. If possible, commit more of your time and effort to get in touch with good-will partners in the West, and together coordinate some investigate work of your own countries or politicians which, when combined with citizen reporting, may reveal some important truth especially about those who have most to hide. African public opinion deserves access to all the information available anywhere because, so often, those who benefit most from the corruption are also withholding the most information from their own fellow citizens.

Below is the video of Ron Nixon’s presentation about Ujima Project during the 2009 TEDxKampala conference in Kampala, Uganda.

Written by Mark Bajkowski.

Mark, born in Poland, is a Jack of all trades, master of none, who lives in New York since 1979. Mark has an unusually wide range of interests and is known to relate well to the people half of his age. Since his early childhood, he felt a curious relation to Africa, which unavoidably brings up the controversial subject of multiple-life experiences.