Tonga Vs. Niger ~ Role of the PCV

The rule in Niger is that communities must apply for a volunteer as well, but as I watched Peace Corps Niger place three groups of volunteers after me, the “application” process grew fuzzy. Staff targeted acceptable towns so as to cluster PCVs, and after all was said and done a community very rarely refused. The Mayor’s Office in Falmey brought me in as a source of funding and outside work, expecting autonomous community development with little effect to them. The men did not welcome outside opinions and were not interested in conducting an internal review of their practices and efficiency.

My Peace Corps Response position was set up as a job to which I applied like a typical candidate. My qualifications were reviewed in accordance with the needs my office ladies specified in their announcement. As a result, the Women Affairs Office welcomes me as someone who will provide to them what they requested. My ladies in Tonga (at the direction of their boss) want to make use of me for their own capacity-building and encourage me to respectfully present plans or suggestions for improvement.

I am here to work with my local counterparts, not for them, in spite of them, or around them. My main purpose in this office is not the development of Tonga’s women, but the development of the Women Affairs Department women. I am delighted to work on their projects: develop business trainings, plan home gardening campaigns, energy saving projects with women in mind, and attend stakeholder consultations. I love doing the work that they do, but the point is to do it with them so that they profit from my input and develop their own abilities to do this work. I am mainly helpful in: correcting/editing memorandum, grant proposals, personal essays, annual reports, and work plans for English grammar and for clarity, feasibility, comprehension, and accuracy. In short, it’s all in the details. Unfortunately, the detail is what is lacking in this office…