After just 4 full days of work with Ghana Federation of the Disabled (GFD), I was out of the office last week attending VSO’s Inclusion Workshop in Kumasi, approximately 4 hours by coach from Accra. The timing was perhaps a little premature to be ideal, but the week was an incredibly useful professional experience, and a great personal one too.
I went to the VIP bus station first thing on Monday morning where I was meeting Emily, a fellow volunteer in VSO’s Inclusion programme. Emily has been based in Accra fundraising for the Ghana National Association of the Deaf for the last year and is also the VSO Volunteer Representative for the Greater Accra region. As such (and as a generally super lovely and extremely helpful person) she has been a fantastic help in getting to know Accra and how to short-cut what would otherwise be a long and more expensive process! Monday morning was however my first time of doing something for Emily in return. I got to the bus station first and so I got the tickets and located the next bus for both of us. This was a pretty straightforward process I admit, but I did it, for Emily! It felt good, I was marginally self-reliant again, I’ve been missing it!
The VIP buses make you feel like just that. There are only 3 seats across meaning they are brilliantly big, business class big. When they recline, which they do very well, the footrest helpfully moves into position. There is air con. You are reminded that you are in Africa by the long sections of bumpy roads under construction that you follow, by the blaring presence of the Nigerian film that is played throughout the journey, and the far more interesting (and less farcical) real life scenes that I preferred to watch out of the window.
Arriving in Kumasi we were greeted by an incredibly bustling city, one that I hoped I would have a little time to explore. Arriving at lunchtime on Monday, and with the workshop not starting until Tuesday morning, we were gifted a little time that afternoon which Emily, another volunteer Aidan and myself used to visit the Ghana National Cultural Centre. The small museum here provided an insight into the history of Kumasi as the royal capital of the Ashanti State and some interesting insights into the tribal history. Well worth a visit.
On Tuesday morning the attendees assembled in the conference room of the Miklin Hotel for the workshop and we were a mix of VSO volunteers and representatives from the partner organisations we are working for. A little context…. Until earlier this year VSO Ghana was running a Disability Programme. This involved placing volunteers with local partner organisations who were working with or for people with disabilities in Ghana, strengthening their ability to achieve their organisation’s visions and goals. This clearly is immensely valuable work, but VSO Ghana recognised that those with disabilities are just one of the underrepresented groups in Ghana’s communities. To tackle exclusion more holistically, they are moving to a new programme that encourages all of their local partner organisations (in Education, Secure Livelihoods and those from the previous Disability programme) to ensure they are considering the needs of EVERYONE in their communities in the work they do.
Inclusion key word brainstorm
The very first exercise we undertook as a group was to reflect on what Inclusion meant to us. The picture shows the words that came out of this brainstorm and their variety indicates the scope of the topic, and the breadth of perspectives from which it can be viewed. Moving on from defining Inclusion the group went on to attempt to define “development”, a challenge that generated an even greater range of responses. What became clear from the two exercises was that for development to be “good” it needs to involve all members of society and enable their views to be heard. It needs to be inclusive. One of the quotes that has stuck with me is: “Poverty is a form of exclusion, and exclusions can lead to poverty. By increasing inclusion you will reduce poverty.” Discuss…. We did!
Dominica explaining our group's visual representation of development
We worked in groups to consider the dimensions of exclusion (political, economic, social, cultural and environmental), how you can identify the excluded, how you can start to address some of the barriers, and who the excluded groups are in Ghana. This discussion was particularly interesting as it revealed that even amongst this relatively enlightened group of professionals there are some deep rooted (often cultural) prejudices, that despite all the inclusive theorising, will ultimately determine the extent to which an inclusive approach will be applied. I admit that there are undoubtedly some prejudices held by the volunteers in the group, but in this discussion it was those of the Ghanaian partner representatives that were most clearly evident, the strongest being against homosexuals and prostitutes. Another quote resonated with me here “Before we can work inclusively we need to live inclusively”.
The second day of the workshop brought a fascinating first session where individuals shared their personal experiences of inclusion and exclusion. A lady spoke of how she was personally supporting a young girl through school after she witnessed the girl’s parents denying her food so that her brother could go to school on a full stomach. The girl is now preparing herself to start a master’s degree. The boy is trading in the local market. Another lady, who has a physical disability, explained how she travelled with a group of her organisation’s donors to Kumasi last year to visit the Ashanti King. She was approached in the queue and asked to leave as the King would not see anyone with a disability for fear that he may develop a disability as a result. Shocking. Even worse, the donors were apparently upset with the lady for having brought them all that way for them not to be seen. I can’t imagine just how horribly excluded she must have felt.
On a more positive note the group then worked through the steps an organisation can take towards becoming more inclusive in their work. From an Inclusion Audit, to developing and Inclusion Strategy, performing sensitisation activities where they raise awareness within the organisation on the reasons for, and benefits of, being inclusive in their approach, to how to review policies, workplace systems and programmes accordingly, and how to influence others to do the same.
Picking up on the importance of influencing others we moved on to look at the Rights Based Approach, ie the fact that development is all about the greater fulfilment of everyone’s rights. Power dynamics have a huge role in different people’s abilities to access their rights and so we then considered these, thought through times when we have felt more and less powerful and what lay at the heart of these feelings. Ultimately they seemed to be determined by our abilities to access our rights, or our ownership of knowledge, both of which are affected by how involved individuals are in a situation. Linking it back to inclusion we discussed how you can help to increase the power of previously excluded groups, enabling them to become champions for change themselves.
Despite this being an exceedingly long blog entry (I hope some of you are still reading!) this merely touches on the range of issues we spent 3 whole days (and chunks of the evenings) discussing. Being part of the workshop was a fantastic learning experience for me. I had the chance to get to know some people working at VSO’s partner organisations and hear from their personal experience. I met a number of other serving volunteers who will no doubt be a useful professional (as well as social!) network for me. And I got to see how VSO works so well in bringing these groups together, expertly facilitating the open exchange of knowledge, experience and understanding to enable all involved to leave with a more informed perspective on the issues at hand, and armed with the shared experience the representative and volunteer as a strong combination through which to ensure the follow up.
Group photo of the workshop participants
I was at the workshop with my colleague Doris from GFD. Doris is in charge of GFD’s gender programme ensuring that the rights of women are fully represented in the work of GFD and its member organisations. For our follow up we discussed and agreed that we would provide an overview of the workshop at GFD’s staff meeting on Tuesday next week, asking all staff to consider how their programmes might be exclusive and ways in which they could be made more inclusive. We said we would work with Fred (the acting Director) to identify who should lead on the undertaking of an Inlusion Audit at GFD, and Doris will be presenting the key themes of the workshop to GFD’s Gender Committee. Together those activities will certainly “sensitise” the organisation to the issues we discussed at the workshop, and will open eyes to the ways in which even GFD can be more inclusive in it’s working. Doris informed me that GFD does not currently support the needs of children with disabilities, so that will be a good place to start!
After the close of the workshop late on Thursday I took my chance on Friday morning to explore Kumasi’s Kejetia Market, apparently the largest open air market in West Africa. It was fantastic! A feast for the senses. The sounds, sights and smells varied as I passed through the different trading “zones”, meat and fish, vegetables, fabric, machetes (I didn’t hang around in that one!), household goods, baby wear…. The market is like a labyrinth, but everywhere you pause for a moment and interact with a stall holder you instantly see that the same friendliness and warmth radiates throughout. My brain was buzzing, watching my feet (you don’t want to twist an ankle on the uneven floor or step in a muddy puddle), watching my bag (with one wrong turn I could wipeout an expertly stacked pile of chillies affecting the trader’s takings for the day…week…) watching my head (obstacles are often at head height as traders hawk their wares around the market, or simply move their stock, on top of their heads), and be prepared to respond (if I felt like it) to the countless calls of “abruni” (foreigner). Wonderfully, I was the only westerner I saw in the market. It was an invigorating experience in so many ways and the perfect taste of Kumasi which I hope to see more of on another trip.
