them just in a leeture. As said many times in the training: What I hear I forget.
What I see I remember. What I do I understand.
2. We also heard people from the audienee asking a very good question. Then the trainer answered it - and the c1ass went on, the issue was forgotten. Had the trainer asked the c1ass to answer, it could have become a very fruitful discussion.
3. We observbed one dass where one of you sat among the audienee and
answered the questions asked by the trainer. It may be a good thing to hear your colleagues teach. Y ou can learn from one another. However, if you intervene at all, it must be to encourage dialogue. In this case, the answers were alright, the
"correet" answers. But that ment the audienee had nothing to answer. People would think: this one knows so well to answer, how can we who know less participate? So his answers c10sed the discussion, they did not encourage it, but rather discouraged people from paricipating.
4. Such problems can be solved. We can work together to improve teaching. We
wil have to do a new c1ass where you all come togetehr to improve your teaching,
your techniques of stimulating discussion. Y ou may learn new ways of creating a stimulating atmosphere, through role plays, group discussions, and other means.
5. However, there was one problem which is more difficult to tackle, and which concerns us much. That is, we heard already in Addis that a majority of our teachers here were members of one political party. We did not believe it. But to be sure, we went to check. We spent two days discussing with many different people, and unfortunately it appears true: there is the suspicion in this town that a majority are party members.
Now, there is nothing wrong with you being party members. It is your democratic right to belong to any party you wish. However, if our programme is getting the reputation in public opinion that it is not neutral, but a pary affair, then it becomes very serious. We can not teach neutral on democracy if we have such a label.
In our teaching it was said many times that you should not take side in political questions. Most likely, you have been true to this demand. Most of you did their best to avoid taking side. But the coincidence of so many party members makes public opinion believe that the programme has taken side. So the people won't believe we are offering a neutral democrracy teaching.
6. Some people suggested we did not have to bother about public opinion, we could continue to teach in spite of this rumour. But public opinion is very
important in democracy. Public opinion is in fact one of the basic instruments in
democracy. We w ant to make an impact in public opinion, want to bring
democratie values and attitudes into public opinion. We want to make an impact on how a democratie public opinion is formed. If we get a bad reputation in one place, it is very bad for the whole programme, in Addis, in Debre Birhan, in
W olkite, Gambela and all the places we are going to. Already the word has spre ad
to Addis Ababa. In Wolkite, people asked us to teach the same as in Butajira.
They had heard about it. What if the word of political bias spreads there too?
They might say: leave it, we don't need more political propaganda...?
7. if public opinion suspects us, how can we go on teaching? We have therefore
decided to stop teaching in Butajira until we have found a solution to this
problem. At least before the election, all teaching wil be stopped. After that, we wil come back here and decide how we solve the problem. Please understand that this measure is not directed against you personally. We believe you have done your best. But in the interest of the programme, we see no other way but to stop teaching for now.Discussion:
The trainers asked several questions and started a debate on the issue. Some of the major questions raised were:
1. What difference does it make? We tried our best to be neutral, indeed we were told many times. We followed that principle as best we could. Why do you have
to punish us for public opinion?
(I answered that this was not a punishment, but that we had to protect our reputation and therefore, we faced a problem which we could only solve in this way.)
2. Democracy is a term considered political in itself. It is associated with many bad things during the former regime. We have to overcome such conceptions in our teaching. This is difficult to achieve - and we have some problems to convince people of our neutrality.
3. How do you know we are partyy members? Who told you? Is it true? How did you find out? It is only our enemies who tell such rumours...
4. OK - we accept the fact that the majority of us are party members. It is true.
Let us who are members resign, so that those who are not, can continue teaching.
Let them not be punished for us...
(I replied thanking them for such an offer, but refused it on the grounds that it is anybody's democratie right to belong to a party, and they should not be punished
for that. AIso, their resignation would not solve the problem, because only if teaching is stopped altogether wil the public notice our reaction. It would not help
us to continue with a smaller group.)
5. We have been foregoing other job opportunities because we had this job. Now there is no teaching - and we have lost this as well as other chances.
(I replied that we had said many times this was not a job but a civic duty, we only paid them a token amount to encourage teaching, to allow them to devote some
time for this instead of searching other odd jobs.)
The discussion ended in agreement that it was necessary to stop. They expressed their hope that we would come back soon after the election and solve the problem by either training more trainers who were not pary members, or otherwise finding guarantees for neutrality.
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