A POSITIVE DISCOURSE

As a retired person, I must admit, I have plenty of time on my hands.  To pursue many of the reflections raised in my mind during my working career that I did not have the time to develop, explore and appreciate that are coming back to me now.  A good time, and a good thing.

A few weeks ago I decided to write about a supine personal experience of management, one that benefitted me in particular, focusing on three women that have had a permanent impact on me: Ana Lyria Franch (Spanish lady). Marjon Kamara (Liberian lady) and Liz Ahua (Nigerian lady), all in UNHCR.  You can read it here.

I was saying in that article that if someone should praise you, let them praise you while you are alive, you want to hear.  That reminds me of the reverse of the coin, which is an African tradition and culture: never speak ill of the dead.  Let me start with this last concept with a small event.

You see, I had this cousin of mine, permanently broke (permanently broke cousins tend to be closest to you!)  He would appear every end of the month to say hello at home, particularly near dinner time.  We got used to him and dismissed him as a minor inconvenience.  One day he was lucky because in Malawi there was a huge famine, and people rearing chicken did not have enough soya for chicken feed.  He happened to have borrowed money from another cousin and had enough money to deliver three hundred bags of soya to a chicken farm in Malawi, just near the Mozambique border.

So he came back singing how he had come into a lot of money and wanted to impress us “did we want to borrow?”  We said “no, cousin, you need money more than us”.  So, he jumped onto another cousin and managed to convince him to take a loan, to open a roadside cigarette kiosk (buy a packet of cigarettes and sell stick by stick plus some cheap sugary drinks).  He had managed to erect the shop and to buy a few supplies, his first stock, but unfortunately after two  weeks he was run over and killed by a car.

Family solidarity requires, we went to is funeral.  While we were silently praying and making time, the nouveau-riche cousin kept saying: “he died and took my money!  He died and took my money! he died and took my money!”  We tried to calm him down and his response was: “he was even a lazy cousin”.  Speaking ill of the dead.  Totally contrary to our culture.

In our tradition, we praise the dead and outcompete each other in eulogizing, especially where some form of legacy is left behind by the departed.

If the poor idiot was so good, why not sing his praises while he is alive, so he can hear, bath and bask in it?

I made exactly that case on a publication I made a few days back on facebook.  Lockstep, a few of the old colleagues came out of the woodwork to affirm that I was a good guy while in public service.  Of course they all kept their counsel regarding my shortcomings.  C’est de rigueur.  And I thank them for that diplomatic tact, especially on social media.

Suddenly this week, one of my supervisors sent me the text below, which she said she forgot to read at the appropriate time.  That time was in November 2021 when I was celebrating my entry into retirement in Dar-es-Salaam.  She had travelled from Kinshasa to celebrate with me and my family.  For the occasion, two other colleagues travelled from Pakistan, one from Ethiopia and two from DRC, one from Cameroon.  That was expensive air travel, just to me and my family on that day!

I thank my family for having had that brilliant idea of celebrating my entry into retirement.  It gave a positive spin to retiring from public service.  It is a healthy thing to do.  Social renewal all round.

Why just go silent, after a fulfilled career?

The text sent by my boss is singing praises to me and I wish to share.  Not just to put Vaseline on myself, but more, to pass the message: after all is said and done, let us appreciate each other. But let us do it while we are alive.

Here is the text

QUOTE

Jose António Canhandula - November 2021

Dear Jose,

I was one of those who felt that you must not slip off the UNHCR Ship silently. I was convinced that those of us who felt like it should join your nuclear family as well as the UNHCR family in Tanzania to say good bye. I am happy that you and Maureen accepted to do this. So today we have come from the corners of the continent and beyond, to share these moments with you. 

Very importantly to tell you simply that we care. Yes we have come to give expression to the relationship that has developed between us over the years. As human beings, many if not most find it difficult to say out loud that we care. We wait and wax lyrical when friends are gone to the land beyond. Then we either speak or write epitaphs that our friends will never hear and will not even know that we cherished the bonds that we have nursed and nurtured over time. Seemingly, expression of love or esteem does not come easily to the African, especially to the African African. 

If you are like me, you must have received some video clips on WhatsApp of two sets of children, one African and the other White. They are playing but very quickly the African set begin to exchange slaps over an issue that just required a simple gesture of sympathy, empathy and love. But what happens to the White set of children ? They embrace, hug and kiss kiss. 

So for your last farewell from UNHCR I chose to do it differently. And I received the blessing of my husband to come to Dar. By coming all the way from Kinshasa, DRC, 3500 KMs away, I have opted to share with you, your wife, children present physically or online and our colleagues in Tanzania, the special relationship that has developed between us - my husband as well as those of my family that you have met. 

I know that many will talk during this gathering. I should be short and give others a chance. I will strive to be short but what I have to say needs to be said. 

I first met you in Geneva where you were assigned to PCOS (which I believe stood for Programme Coordination and Operations Support). Right ? At the time you were assigned to review some of the country operations in West Africa. From time to time your outreach was extended to cover the two Congos. This was with the contexte of the ORB( the Operations Review Board - the redoutable process by which money was allocated to country programmes). It was in that context that we ended up on a joint review mission to DRC - a rather chaotic time. But the operation was challenging enough so you took a special interest in it that led you to become the Assistant Representative for Programme, in DRC. 

Our paths parted - yours to DRC and mine to Kenya. As I struggled to establish myself in Kenya - in the backdrop of a government of coalition and a beehive of multiple colliding interests, I reached out to the Bureau for help. My appointed deputy’s health situation did not permit him to help me carry what became the biggest refugee operation on the continent. At the time. The bureau director, Marjon Camara, identified you and you left DRC for Kenya in 2009. We worked diligently and well together. 

Our paths headed off again in different directions in 2011, me to Geneva and you to Sierra Leone. We kept in touch. And regrouped again in Geneva where you worked with me once again. This time as Snr Operations Coordinator. Rotation sent us back to the field, I to Dakar and you to Chad and to Nigeria, my beloved country. 

As circumstances (read God) directed my footsteps to DRC, yours brought you back to your country of destiny where you have served twice and married three times. I am not letting out any classified information. This is a fact that holds no prejudice. 

Were I to be prejudiced it would be to pay homage to my sister here - that you, Maureen, have palpably made Jose a happy and satisfied man. We see it. We feel it. And the man has confirmed it himself several times. So my sister, receive my appreciation. 

Back to the man: 

- Jose in the three times that we have worked together, not just collaborated, I have found you to be authentic. I have found you to be humane. And despite the hard exterior that others may see or have seen, I have found that at core you have a delicate soul - God fearing without dramatization, faithful and steadfast. I have found that in that delicate core where God sits in you, He gives you an opportunity to serve and love his creation in a uniquely Jose-way. 

- Another trait that I have enjoyed is your disciplined intellectualism. This is not a UNHCR EPAD so this is to say that I have seen you apply discipline and high intellectual enterprise to your work and life. For those of you younger ones, pls know that Jose was the principal author of chapter Four in the UNHCR manual. That became the so-called Bible of programme officers. Ask me what has become of that chapter at the appropriate time. I shall not digress. 

- So, back to the man and finally - I want to thank you, Jose, for sowing plentifully in my life. You have been generous. While in Nigeria, you gave to me and mine so much more - respect, esteem and brotherly love. You rolled out the red carpet for me. For us. On behalf of my husband and myself , I thank you and Maureen. I wish you 

• a happy 10th wedding anniversary.

• Happy 65th birthday 

• God bless you as you leave this ship and sail on to the next path that will open up for you. 

Liz Kpam Ahua.

UNQUOTE

Canhandula

Tete, July 2025