Monday, November 20, 2006

Covering Lima...not just its candidates

My students have spent the past month covering various neighborhoods around Lima, investigating what the more pressing issues and needs are in advance of regional elections.They encountered a lot of things. You can see and hear some of them on this page. (I should note some groups ran into trouble as these neighborhoods are not the safest. Equipment was stolen right off their backs. Reporting is indeed more difficult not just for the assumed reasons down here. Some very practical issues often get in the way)


Pachacamac
Report:
Sissy Delgado y Ángel Ilbaguren
¡Escucha!










San Juan de Lurigancho
Report:
Veronica Aliaga
Carolina Maceda

¡Escucha! Listen Here











Villa El Salvador
Report:
MariaJose Ampuero y Gabriel Massei



¡Escucha! Listen Here






Puente Piedra
Report:
Paloma Vergara, Antonio Tello
¡Escucha! Listen Here



Sunday, November 19, 2006

Fool me once, shame on…
Elections day


I would show the pictures I took of election day with my digital camera, but I can’t, because it has been sitting in customs here for 2 months. The local authorities apparently deemed it unnecessary to tell me not just that they have my camera, but where exactly I can look for it so I can actually pay the import tax. I am also currently a fugitive in Perú which sounds more fun than it is. Unfortunately it is not as romantic a life as lived by Butch and Sundance when they ran away to Bolivia to hide out and continue robbing banks. No, I am on the other end of the robbing here as I have been told, with very little explanation, that I cannot renew my visa. I am however welcome to stay as long as I like, I just have to pay a dollar a day penalty. Fascinating. I wonder who made up that policy over a few too many pisco sours. My guess is it is a temporary thumb to the nose until the US government actually signs the TLC, a NAFTAesque trade deal with Perú. To my knowledge no candidate ran on a platform of helping Gringos find their detained properties or actually obtain formal visas, so even if I could vote, I didn’t really have a candidate proposing to fix my particular problems.

For those that could vote today, and voting is obligatory here, there were a few options. 127 thousand candidates seeking some twelve thousand spots around Perú. Yes, I did the math too, that is about 10 candidates per race, a bit of a problem if you are seeking legitimacy with your governance.

I gave an inspired speech to my class explaining to my students that their responsibility as journalists is ten-fold during elections. I explained that without them propaganda gets injected directly into the bloodstream of unwitting voters. They applauded after my presentation, which included footage of the Gore vs. Bush Florida debacle, although I couldn´t tell if they clapped simply because my stump speech was over, or because they liked it. We did get at some interesting issues. While I lamented the low voter turnout in a country, not naming names, that insists on having its elections on non-holiday Tuesdays, my students actually said they would prefer a non obligatory voting system. They said that too many people make up their mind in line, or leave selections blank opening the door for strategically paid voting booth attendants to add some ink. Is there a system out there that inspires instead of requires? (Am I stealing this rhythm from Al Sharpton or is it truly original?) Anybody...? Bueller…?

No alcohol is sold the weekend of elections and candidates are not allowed to campaign in this period either. To fill this void an army of yellow clad ice cream vendors with matching yellow carts head out to line the entrances to voting centers. Democracy never tasted so cold and creamy. But without politics and a drink life here can get a little dull. I can´t wait for Monday when politicians start talking crazy talk and drinking again. My favorite campaign moment happened the other evening while driving through the Barranco neighborhood. Right next to a main square a female candidate for mayor had set up a stage and was putting on a show. Cars were passing during rush hour but nobody was paying any attention to what was a spectacular sight. 7 chicas in yellow jumpsuits with the candidates name and party symbol dancing in unison while what can only be described as a Peruvian Rod Stewart, complete with long puffy hair and a gut stuffed into a tight tracksuit, belted out songs extolling the candidate’s virtues. She clapped along and tried to dance her way into the hearts and minds of the locals.
One word…Awesome.
My favorite two politicians so far are the current mayor of the local district Pachacamac, who in being interviewed by two of my students explained that she wasn’t running for re-election because she didn’t really like her constituents, that they don’t pay their taxes and they don’t care, so, essentially, screw them. I don’t know if she actually expressed as much because she didn’t think my students would get their story on the air, which they did, or because it was time to be honest. My second favorite politician is running for mayor of a district, Los Olivos, that has recently watched as a mega mall was constructed across the street from its district line. You can cross a bridge from the decidedly chaotic Peruvian Los Olivos side to the decidedly sterile gringo looking megamall in the Independencia district, complete with a 20 person deep line at the ATM machine.
This candidate is running on a platform of convincing voters not to shop across the street, “buy local” he says. Something tells me the lady who just passed me with a cheeseburger and a new stereo isn’t listening. I will take the initiative to dedicate this woman’s vote to the late Milton Friedman.

Farewell sweet prince.

Over the BorderLine:
Dispatch from the North


About a week ago I was fortunate enough to spend a few days in Piura, a town in northern Perú surrounded by desert and near the Ecuadorian border. A journalism contact Luz Maria Helguero, who runs the local El Tiempo newspaper invited me to give a few talks to a group of rural reporters and local University students.

Journalism students at the
Universidad Alas Peruanas in Piura



Luz Maria runs an Open Society funded organization dedicated to training news reporters and editors from around Perú to do their jobs better. Unlike my students here in Lima, most of these reporters have little formal training before they start actual media work. While many have the desire to exude the fourth power, few have the training to understand how to do it well. Luz Maria invites these reporters to workshops around the country so they can get a little slice of how to be better, more complete reporters. While I struggle sometimes to get my students to listen to me, I often find the opposite at these rural workshops, an eagerness and hunger from participants that is heart warming. In Piura I was forced to abandon my planned powerpoint presentation (the nerve of some countries to not have proper technology), and just talk.

I have gotten way too accustomed to visual aids and have somewhat strayed from the real, effective nature of story telling. Spanish Improv Gringo Jesse style, to my surprise, went well. We developed an outline for more creative news coverage, how to find new sources, and how to write more complete stories. One of the participants offered the example of a polluted river in his town for us to use as an example. We worked around the various informative scenes we could create, the people who dump their garbage next to the river, the people who scavenge through that same garbage to make their livelihood, the people whose health is jeopardized by this garbage, etc.. So instead of a simple story that the river is indeed polluted, we came up with a whole week series of stories about the river and its various implications in this town. At first I felt what I had added to this group was kind of pedestrian and simplistic, but the response I got was indeed the opposite. They wanted not just a creative solution, but a framework that they could take back to their papers and radios. They felt that I had helped them with that. I am now hoping to follow up and visit some of them so I can see if and how they have used my suggestions.

The second part of my trip to Piura involved an adventure with some local journalists from Luz María´s paper, El Tiempo. A lazy Sunday afternoon of coverage got a whole lot more interesting when we dropped in a local town, Sullana, to investigate what turned out to be a probable case of human trafficking. After a few hours of waiting, a busload of 31 Chinese nationals arrived at the local national police office. My cohorts snapped photos as the Chinese, most looked twenty something, blurry eyed and decidedly un-showered, were ushered into a room for interrogation. The only Spanish word uttered from the group was baño despite the effort by local authorities to make them speak Spanish. The police captain tried for about a half hour to communicate by getting directly into their faces and shouting, “Ha-Blas Es-Pañol?” They stared straight back expressionless. The scene turned a bit comical as the police tried to figure out what to do and the Chinese began to get restless and started touching everything in the room, computers, file cabinets, photos, etc., I fully expected the 3-stooges to arrive to complete the moment.
Eventually 4 Peruvians, also detained, arrived looking extremely culpable, hiding their faces as my reporter companions snapped photos. One of them helped his case by eating his cellular phone sim card so as to prevent the authorities from tracing his calls. Pretty funny, I am sure that sat well in his system.
Details finally came out that the group was found in a hotel on the beach near Piura. They had no credentials and had not paid for a weeks worth of room and board. The authorities were trying to determine if the Peruvians had stolen their credentials or if this was a case of human trafficking. Apparently the group’s itinerary included going from Perú to Panama to the US eventually, presumably illegally. Something tells me that if people are willing to fly to Perú from China and from there figure out a way into the US, building a wall on the Mexican border is not going to stop them. But what do I know.

Sunday, November 12, 2006


Papa Alan...

So about two weeks ago Peruvian president Alan Garcia reveals nonchalantly that he has a one year old kid with a woman who is not his wife. The details are that during 2005 he separated with Pilar and found himself in the company of a wonderful and intelligent other woman with whom he had a kid. Then he got back together with Pilar just in time to enter, run and win the presidency on a platform that championed family values and his “five” now “six” children.
I could take this in a number of directions…so I will.

I am told otherwise, but this photo looks like Alan is touting some lucky lady's undergarments
I will start with the good and save the bad and the ugly. This is obviously big news and in my opinion highlights a tendency towards deception by Garcia, a tendency that will undoubtedly rear its ugly head more as his term runs on. I will compliment the Peruvian press in that this was front page news the day it broke, and then that was it. Nobody discussed it too much after that. There was no Monica Lewinskyesque scandal where rival political parties burned Alan at the stake and impeachment proceedings precluded actual important governance. Part of the reason for this is that other candidates probably have kids out of wedlock too, infidelity is accepted here. Not quietly accepted mind you, no this is an out in the open frank acceptance on both sides of the ball. I initially was somewhat taken aback in talking with local Peruvian women that they had very little problem with Garcia’s revelation. Most pointed to the fact that he was separated from Pilar, why shouldn’t he be free to date other women? Let alone have a child.
In fact, Alan actually came out of the whole affair as chivalrous because he had acknowledged his child and signed papers at its birth that he was indeed the father. Perú has a problem with men not taking responsibility, legal or otherwise, for their out of wedlock children. In fact recent president Andres Toledo had a similar situation as Alan and was discovered to have not acknowledged his extramarital kid.

That is one happy looking couple

I find it fascinating that Alan had time to date and have a child as he was preparing to run a presidential campaign with his actual wife, Pilar, by his side. That takes talent. It is not like this is a case of a mistake made years ago by a young married guy who has since grown up and learned the right path. This happened a year ago…when the dude was 56 years old. But it is not like Peruvians can’t trust Alan…they already had him for 5 years in the late 80’s, and it went pretty well…he left the country in economic ruin with a national debt of 900 million dollars.
No biggie. Local bets are that Pilar is as ambitious and crafty as that gringa extraordinaire Hilary Clinton, and will keep her mouth shut with the promise of power and internal influence.
The most curious turn in all of this is that his wife has kept by his side. In fact she has publicly been lauded for standing by her man and maintaining her dignity. The two appeared in public at his infidelity announcement. It was like marriage counseling being broadcast across the country. An awkward moment and photo shoot. Lets just say she didn’t look so happy.
I finally found one Peruvian woman who agreed that the reconciliation photo and general acceptance of this event is horrifying for women around Perú, especially those in rural areas. This Peruvian said in essence it is telling women that this kind of act is not only acceptable, but that if it happens, they should stand by their man.
The big question for me in all of this is you cannot tell me the press didn´t know Alan had an extra kid when he was running for president. I don´t buy it for a moment. Locally people assume that nobody published anything about Alan´s fling because people were afraid it would aid his opponent, Humala, who many, mostly in Lima and the North, were afraid might be elected with a strong support from the more rural population.
Like most things here that I question, I generally get a return shot from Peruvians about my own country, which is generally warranted. So this time around it is about Bill Clinton and Monica, who by all accounts appear to not have been as friendly as Alan and his mistress. The questions are not, well, Clinton was worse. The questions are, why was it such a big deal? Why did it paralyze your government and why did it stay in the press so long?
All I can say is touché.

Wednesday, November 08, 2006


Sea Change
Politics in Perú

While election fever is raging in the United States and taking global headlines by storm, Perú is quietly in the midst of its own pre-election fervor, anticipating the arrival of November 19th, when people go to the polls to elect new mayors in districts around the country. Now before I analyze, I would like to take a moment to appreciate that elections are on Sunday here, so everybody can vote. Voting happens to be obligatory, as does hanging the Peruvian flag from your house or building on election day, but that is besides the point.
Luis Castañeda is the official mayor of Lima, but all 30 districts within Lima have their own mayor as well. Castañeda has an approval rating close to 80% and considered running for president last year. Indeed by some standards he is more popular than the current president, Alan Garcia, or simply ¨Alan¨ as he is know here. (my next entry will be dedicated to insane Alan. Stay tuned)
Castañeda has chosen not to speak to the press or engage in any debates in the run up to the election. This is a common practice all over Perú for incumbents. He is not interested in answering questions knowing it would be difficult to improve on an 80% approval rating, which in a country where voting is mandatory, that is a pretty decent indicator that you will win again whether you open your mouth to reporters or not.
The press often does not help the matter of politics here. El Comercio, the most relied on paper, published an article on the front page recently that marveled at Casteñeda´s approval rating.
Lima is covered in a colorful array of political wrapping paper at the moment. Walls and billboards are plastered and painted with a variety of symbols and slogans for candidates. There are few regulations on where propaganda can go, so people take to painting names of candidates wherever they feel like it, including over the names of other candidates. Propaganda also can be found prominantly displayed on the front page of newspapers. (One editor explained to me that to keep his paper operating he needed the fat revenue only wealthy politicians can provide)

Please note in the upper right hand corner of this paper there are 3 ads for candidates. I also like the headline,
¨Death at Sea¨

My students have been given the task of visiting some of the less developed outer lying areas of Lima to talk to citizens about their needs and hopes for their districts. Most journalists don´t visit these neighborhoods, so it has been an interesting exercise to engage with a public that is not used to seeing microphones and being asked their thoughts. Our goal was to interview candidates too, but many have taken a shine to Casteñeda’s strategy and refused to talk. So we turned our focus to investigating some of the more pressing themes in these areas. We have encountered everything from security concerns (one group of students interviewed a hair stylist who had a gang rip a whole in his bathroom to get to an ATM machine in the next building over), to no sewer system, to unregulated bus systems, to packs of wild dogs, to a tuberculosis pandemic. Many of these issues are directly related to a political system that does not serve the people, instead serving themselves. Less you think I am sounding a bit Socialist, one must spend some time in Perú to understand what a frustrating place it is for the majority of citizens. As pointed out in a prior blog entry, people call the national radio network to ask for help instead of their local representatives.
Returning to my staple straw poll of cab drivers, most drivers begrudgingly admit they will vote for Casteñeda, but few feel inspired to do so. They appreciate that he has rerouted traffic and made the highways more efficient, but he has not done a whole lot else they claim.
The big word used by politicians here is ¨Obras¨ or public works. They love to build bridges and expand roads and occasionally new parks. They equally love to have somebody paint their name and the name of their political party on said public monuments. Many voters are conditioned to talk about Obras as well, thinking that is what politicians do, build things with concrete. I am trying to get my students to understand that by covering issues like health, finance, security, etc., they can help turn the attention to what life is like for most residents.

One of my students out in the field, literally...

My favorite example of Obras comes from a visit I made to Villa El Salvador, one of Lima´s largest and most destitute districts. It is where part of a major battle with Chile occurred in the 1800’s and soldiers are claimed to still be buried in the sand dunes around the area.
Enrique, my doorman and cub reporter, invited me to visit a part of Villa El Salvador where many migrants from Perú’s mountain region start out. I brought my tape recorder along and explained he would be playing the role of civic journalist. The guy was a natural…hands down. He convinced locals to talk to us about life in the barrio which sits on a tall sand dune that is covered in houses made from mostly recycled materials. We documented a local recycling center, latrines made out of old olive oil canisters, a two room shack inhibited by a family of four who have to lug barrels up their hill in order to have clean water for cooking and cleaning, and even some budding micro enterprise entrepreneurs who were advising locals on raising pigs. The coup de grace was a house that stood at the foot of a concrete stairway, an Obra from the aforementioned mayor Castañeda. A stairway could be a great aid to a neighborhood that sits on a steep sandy incline. The problem is that this stairway serves exactly two houses. The city stopped building it after a block, but not before they took the time to paint Casteñeda on the stairs and install an arch with the mayor´s name. Lovely.
Enrique giggled at the monument. He understands what is wrong here and knows that it is nothing short of a Garcia Marquez short story. Now if I can only overturn hundreds of years of ingrained inequality here so Enrique can run for president…I think we might sow some seeds of change.