Saving Fred!

I don't know where the last two weeks have gone but I have had a lot of editing work to do, so there is one excuse. Sorting out electrical issues... yes still... has taken time and patience although we are having the house re-wired next week and that is expected to resolve the battle between the generator and the inverter which has made us even more power-less than people tend to be in Malawi at the best of times.

The other issue this week has been saving Fred the gardener. Birgitte came to say that Fred had been sacked for selling plants. I went downstairs and Pawadee came across and we asked for the story.

It seems Fred's boss had seen him selling plants in Area 43 and had sacked him because the plants were taken from our complex. We asked to see the plants and no, they were not from here.

Fred looked dazed and his grasp of English seemed to have disappeared in the trauma so Limited was translating for him.

I rang Fred's boss who said he had not been sacked but suspended because the contract he had signed when he took the job prevented him from selling plants which might prove to be competitive with the nursery!!! I found this a little hard to believe given that the nursery is one of the largest in Lilongwe.

I was then told there was a scam involved the theft of soil and water from properties in order to grow cuttings which were then sold.

I have to say I did feel like saying: 'Well it is their dirt and their water,' but that would not have helped so I merely said; 'They are poor, they look for other ways to earn money,' all the while thinking it sounded a bit fanciful given that they can dig dirt up from anywhere and Malawi is awash with water given that Lake Malawi is one of the largest freshwater lakes in the world.

Fred would be suspended to punish him, I was told. That seems a bit harsh, I said, given that he has worked here for eleven years and this is his first mistake! But I wasn't getting far, the Fred's of the world, poor Malawians with a family to support - in Fred's case seven kids - had no right to try to do some extra work on the side to benefit themselves.

It actually seemed innovative to me to take cuttings and grow plants and sell them. I found it hard to believe that even if all of the workers did this it would bring the company down but, as with all of these things, there was more at work and the most important thing was to keep Fred in his job.

I was told he would be suspended until a decision was made. No, they did not know how long. Weeks, months, I asked? Not that long, I was told. Poor Fred, yes, he had signed a contract saying he would not do what he did but options are not great in Malawi and what choice did he have but to sign? None, zip, zilch! That's if he even understood what he was signing. It really did seem all a bit severe but I tried to be as diplomatic.... while being honest... with his employer because I did not want to make it worse for him.

And it is not that I cannot see the point of view of his employers, to a degree anyway, but it just seemed so counter-productive. You employ locals and teach them the basics of gardening and then you deny them the opportunity to use those skills beyond the company. Why couldn't they have a system whereby there is an official scheme which helps employees to grow some plants for themselves, trusting them not to use work time to do it, and then those plants are sold by the nursery at the end of the year and the gardeners get a percentage of the profit?

Fred went off looking shattered. I left it for a week and then rang to ask what was happening. I was told that Fred had been removed from Area 43 and moved somewhere else. I had a feeling this might happen. At that point I did speak out and say such a decision seemed vindictive. One mistake in eleven years and you get this!

Anyway, I went on to say, as calmly and as firmly as I could that we all wanted Fred back and since we paid for the gardening service as a part of our rent we believed we had a right to have a say!

Again, I was trying to be as polite as I could but it really did seem mean-spirited. Yes, I can understand that examples need to be set and there have to be rules and regulations in place but saying a gardener has no right to grow and sell plants privately is like saying a cook can't make cakes and sell them!

I also know the 'story' is that they end up working on company time for themselves and using company materials but I don't believe that has to be the case. In a place like Africa you should encourage people to work for themselves.

On the one hand people point the finger and say:'They are lazy!' and then when they actually get up and do something to help themselves they are punished. There's a lack of logic here.

One of the things I did say to his employer was that it is too easy to forget that people in England and Europe were doing exactly the same sorts of things one hundred and more years ago. A lot of them ended up in Australia because of it... lucky for them and their descendants.

But the point is that people who are poor will try to help themselves and if they are gardeners they will grow plants. I am sure Fred has more than enough dirt and water at his place for that job.... he just needs the time to sell the plants he grows from discarded cuttings. But of course he can't!

However, at the end of the day all that matters is Fred appeared for work this morning and his employers wrote a polite note saying they had responded to our request for him to continue working in our complex. And that was good of them and lucky for Fred.

I did impress on Fred this morning, as did Birgitte and Pawadee when they saw him that he must not do what he did before because a second offence would mean we could do nothing to help him. His English had returned to form this morning so he was obviously less traumatised. Limited said he understood what we were saying. I hope so. It isn't fair, not in my book anyway, but it is the way it is and he has a good job which he likes and he is paid reasonably well by the nursery for which he works and we top up his salary as well.

I know I have the justice gene in me but I am sure I also respond to such situations because my ancestry research has revealed to met that pretty much across the board my mob were poor, poor, poor, poor and I am sure more than one of them faced similar situations in their lifetimes.

It's hard to buck the system when you are poor and in a place like Africa, even more dangerous. There are too many people waiting to take Fred's job to make it worth his while. I can only hope he knows that.