In Eastern Chad night security guards, often quite qualified formally, welcome the chance to have some electricity and to study at night for the courses, often at university level, they attend during the day. They pay for it all themselves despite the miserable salaries they get from the security companies*.
In Abidjan I was talking to a guard just now who, like all the others here, never seems to read anything. I asked him why he doesn't use his time to study and he said 'because madame is not here'. I was puzzled by this and asked him to explain. He said that he will study if Madame (the one he guards) gives him a book. I suggested he buy his own, which never seemed to have occurred to him.
How come that a very poor and officially highly illiterate country like Chad produces highly motivated people while a rich country like Cote d'Ivoire actually has a quite high illiteracy rate but I am sure the guard I was talking to could read). It is to do with motivation, of course and, I think, mutual support. In some countries a boy who opens a book while he has free time or on a bus say is ridiculed by his friends. At least among the southerners of Chad studying for yourself is supported and understood by your friends.
There is a cultural element, certainly, but it's not as simple as it seems. In Chad they are usually southerners ie 'African' and often Christian, but not always. In Cote d'Ivoire it is not really clear what is going on, as there are plenty of night schools (cours de soir) and plenty of people filling them.
*Often run quite fiercely by French ex-soldiers on behalf of some shadowy 'big person'. We pay about 400 dollars a month to the company; the guard gets 100 dollars if he is lucky. Thus the UN shucks off its responsibility to be a good employer.
