'Umuganda' for you and me

KOTA KINABALU — One impressive visible feature of the central African nation of Rwanda is perhaps its widespread cleanliness in public areas. The streets of Kigali, the Rwandan capital, may be said to be almost spotless. You can hardly find on the streets any scrap of waste paper, cigarette butts, used bottles, soda cans and the sort of refuse that line many public areas of both developing and even developed countries. Garbage heaps are nowhere to be seen, and flies that otherwise swarm these warm beds of potential pathogens are noticeably absent as well. And it is not just in the big towns. The Rwandan countryside, too, is devoid of casual littering. The socioeconomic conditions might still be wanting, but the roadsides and lanes are orderly and well kept. So, a first-time visitor to Rwanda, such as myself, could not help but wonder what contributed to this "anomaly," especially in a developing country.

Well, for one, there is "umuganda." The original word refers to the vertical wooden pole used in the construction of Rwandan traditional houses. But umuganda has evolved socially to mean "coming together with a common purpose to achieve an outcome," a sort of community mutual help or volunteering on large and small scales. Apparently, up to recent times, members of a community in Rwanda would call upon their family members, friends and neighbors to help them complete a difficult task, such as building a new house or relocating, as well as cultivating crops. If prompted as such, other community members would bring along their umuganda as their contribution to the collective effort. This gives rise to the saying "gutanga umuganda," which means contributing to an ongoing activity. Actually, after Rwanda achieved its independence from the Belgians in the early 1960s, umuganda was adopted on a national scale in a somewhat different context, whereby it was used as a tool for political propaganda, a sort of national rallying effort.