Robbed
The African Way

Canoe ferries at Kasenyi. Captains not shy of loading 5 tons cargo and 30 (2 tons) passengers, some bicycles hung front outside over the bow beam. When cargo is old jerry cans filled with fuel we just smoke in the petrol stench. No compasses, in fog we simply get lost and wait (but when you drive the road buckle up or you'll have to bribe police).

February 5, 2009

To: Philemon 19:37 We left. GPS says arrival 23:00 hrs (4:00 Kiswahili time) To: Doi 20:07 Put 1 beer in fridge To: Dominic 23:13 Robbed 2km north BANDA, robbers killed, HELP To: Philemon 23:23 Robbed 2km north BANDA. Robbers killed. To: Philemon 23:38 Delay: robber No 4 holds robbed money and cell phones. He is lost in water and searched. To: Philemon 00:10 Search No. 4 given up. We are coming. We have only 4 cell phones left: 3 of robbers, and mine

I arrived at the beach of Kasenyi landing site at 5:30 PM, far too early for my canoe ferry to Kitobo, departure 5 PM, in practice 7 or 8. But today it had left at 2. I was carrying my rucksack, a big sugar factory bag containing shopping, six loafs on top, and a belt bag containing phone, money etc. This is Africa. There was a boat for Mweme. The driver looked dark and wanted 20 000 (8 euro) to drop me on Banda. For reasons of cultural integration (I even plan a crash course cannibalism) I insisted on normal black fee for Mweme, 30% further down: 10 000. He agreed to 15 000 if I would pay in advance, he "needed fuel". I refused and simply entered the canoe, which got seriously overcharged with mainly banana's (the hard green ones for cooking matoke) and drinking water. A "friend of Dominic" came to repeat the request for advance payment.  I told him that we were seriously overcharged and if we would sink and I would have to swim I would not pay.
7:30. The 5 PM boat to Mweme lifts the anchor. I had found a narrow place at the board side starboard bow, comfy because you can lean back. My sack neatly arranged to avoid pressure on the loaf,  my UNHCR motorcycle tarpaulin ready for a nap after dark. The driver left steering to someone else and went round to collect the fare. I refused again. All others had been asked to pay before he asked me, and had paid. Glances of consent from everywhere, though. This advance payment clearly was considered unusual. My GPS measured more than 13 km/hrs, so arrival at Banda should be three hours later, around 11 PM. Dark set in, but we had a nice, almost full moon.
10 PM. One hour to go. We pass a fishing canoe. My side. Starboard 25 m. Nothing special, only this one, though small, of the type normally paddled, had an outboard, a big one. Half an hour or so later I notice some unrest at the rear, stand up and see this canoe following us at 15 m. Our driver tries full gas, which he normally never does. I see the pursuing canoe's bow lifting up and approaching us with great speed. Our gas goes low, then both outboards stop.

Silence.

The stern is far from me. Nobody around me stands up to try following the conversation. Police? Army? Are we smuggling something? Or is our driver just lagging behind in paying his protection fee to our dear esteemed armed government lake officials? I see almost nothing. They seem to wear life jackets. Those could be army clothes. How many are they? 3? 4? Guns? I can't see. Passengers now all go down on an order I failed to hear. Now it is clear. No public robbers with official posture. This is private enterprise.

Simu! They want our phones. Everybody fears later to be caught with his own and hands it backward to the stern. But as a muzungu I can easily pretend not to know what "simu" means. I just keep mine. I do not hide it. This place on the lake has intermittent coverage, on the right moment I could get an SMS out, but I do not know how to switch the bloody Nokia bleeps off. For fear of receiving something I switch off. Little chance my phone will be of any use before the gentlemen have left. The assaulting canoe is pulled to the front along ours. Two men are in. So one or two entered ours. Yes, life jackets. No army clothes. One did not even bother to cover his face. "They killed him", one of them sings softly. Who? I saw nor heard anything. Or is he just singing?

"Muzungu!", they greet me. But the attention of their torch is for what is in our boat.  They pull their canoe back to our stern, from where one of them comes up to collect our money. Passengers are searched after having handed over what they pretend to have. Meanwhile the man makes jokes and the searched victims are laughing.

Mzungu! The front pocket of my belt bag, has, money and coins, may be 120 000 (45 euro). In the back pocket is the rest, may be twice that amount. I clear the front and hand it over.
"Inatosha?" (Is it enough?)
"Inatosha" (It is enough)
So I regard myself permitted to keep the rest. If he changes his mind and starts searching me I can say "You said it was enough! Do you want more?", and give it still. But no searching. The man gets finished collecting and returns to the stern. Their canoe is again pulled forward. They see the many boxes with drinking water. They take some. Then attention goes to a 50 kg sugar bag deep down next to my feet. Passengers are ordered to lift it on the board: "Beba...BEBA!!". They do. At the moment the sugar bag falls in the assaulting canoe I hear the toneless short sound of a heavy hit. In the back men seem to stand up and head for the port side where the assaulting canoe is. Around me people rise. I wait. But no shots. The boat rocks. Sound of heavy hits. People standing around me start cheering. I stand up. 20 m behind us a man with a life jacket floats in the water. Hit number one? The only man with a gun? Did the others turn their heads to that incident forgetting they would have a bar of wood in their necks the same second?  The two men in the assaulting canoe now lie down in it and are beaten full power on their heads, with a heavy long paddle and long beams that are used to stow cargo. Their skulls must have been crushed on twenty places. But, either because they still move a bit or the anger of the counter attackers resumes, every now and then the full force skull hitting starts again, and the beaten thug is again verbally addressed in a clearly unkind way. Now I am told there were four. I assume another corpse in the making is somewhere in the assaulting canoe.
The African victory cheer, in which the women foremost are specialized, sounds: a shrill high sound muted and released in a high frequency (say 10 per second) by the tongue.
23:13 We now have four cell phones left: three of our robbers and mine (the floating robber holds the money and the other cell phones). Intermittent coverage. Dom sends me the phone number of Kitobo police, who, he says, is already under way. I call and let the driver talk.
The floating robber got lost. Our boat and the captured robbers' canoe - the dying or dead corpses still in - separately start the search. I care little but to shorten the procedure I give my torch to the robbers' canoe. A half hour search fails. We head for Banda. The atmosphere is exuberant. Gin and beer (I do not know whose property) gets opened at the stern and one shouts to the front starboard side: "That is how we catch robbers muzungu!". The robbers' canoe is pulled at the side of ours. One counter attacker is in, who every now and then puts down his beer to eloquently deal some more full power skull blows with the paddle. One of the counter attackers digs up a dinosaur camera with flash to take his friends with their drinks next to the dead bodies. Having thought I would have no pictures to make, I had put my camera down in the sugar bag under six loafs. And this boat is too crowded to unpack something. This web page will have no pictures, I decide. I ask a young mother with a baby whether this is her first time to be in a robbery. No, the second.
Arrival at Banda West side, the fishermen's village (Dom's camp side is at the East side, Banda is 2 km long East West 800 m wide North South). Villagers echo the African victory cheer and come running with panga's. No, no, we have only dead corpses here! That, I later heard was a tactical lie. We had two dead corpses, one robber was captured and kept alive to tell the story, one got lost in the lake.
Muzungu you have to join us to Kalangala to report!
No, no, no, I will report here.
I ask my torch and give it to our driver. Present! And if you find my money, keep it!
I board the canoe of Philemon and Doi.
The driver shouts: you pay!
I am robbed!
The driver resigns.
Home on the dhow. 60% of the money and the phone saved. The loaf badly crushed in the stampede.

• One counter attacker suffered slight hand injury. Everybody else was unhurt.

• The floating robber got picked up and arrested.

• The issue was stressful but nothing compared to the misbehaviour of Mwanza (Tanzania) government officials against me in 2006 ^{[surfboard: Immigration]} .

• Dominic's staff Kito estimates that this failure will deter robbers for two years

• This page is of course password protected and confidential. Remember in the Banda area are no robberies, no armed army or police extortion attempts, no low flying girl peeping army helicopters, snakes, crocs, tsetse flies, poisonous spiders, allergenic caterpillars or bilharzias. Moreover all local hippos are intelligent and friendly and do not walk over tents.