36 BBC FoCus on AFriCA

“The wind of change is blowing through this continent and whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact.”

When i look back over the years, the words of British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan to the parlia-ment of apartheid south Africa

in February 1960 come to mind. indeed my own career always seems to get caught up in the wind of change. i suppose you could call me ‘windy’ – but in a polite context, of course! Certainly my teenage daughter has no reservation telling me i “chat so much breeze” when she feels i am blowing too much hot air.

still, it is true to say that i have been either physically present in the field or in the studio to capture and report on historic events just as the gust of change was storming by.

in July 1991, i was a windswept young television journalist in south Africa’s east coast city, Durban. i was there witnessing and feeling the excitement and celebratory mood of south Africans at the first African national Congress (AnC) confer-ence on home soil in 32 years. it was the first party conference since the unbanning of the organisa-tion in 1990. Power was within reach.

not long after this, another blast of air found me floating around hotels in the Kenyan capital, nairobi in early 1991. Here i was trying to catch a glimpse of, and hopefully an interview with, President Mohamed siad Barre, who had fled somalia to Kenya after the fall of his government. This would be the beginning of the end of the somali state.

in April 1994 i felt a new tragic gust, this time in Bush House. As i went on air in the BBC Kiswahili service one morning, with sketchy news of a plane crash in rwanda, little did i know this would be the spark of the genocide. Five years later another tornado found me again at Bush House

reporting on terrible events in sierra Leone. As the revolutionary united Front rebels invaded Freetown in January 1999, slaughtering and abducting people, raping and looting, this was a turning point in the nasty and lengthy civil war.

on a brighter note, and almost a decade later, a chilly, drafty Chicago night was not enough to deter me witnessing and reporting on a once-in-a-lifetime event. This was, of course, the election of Barack obama as the first black president of the united states on november 4, 2008. History was made.

i arrived in Bush House in June 1992 as a second draught of revolution was blowing across Africa. After Macmillan’s wind of change speech in the 1960s, which predicted the end

of colonial administrations, many African govern-ments were now in the path of a new gale as their people launched protests to demand more open democratic political systems. i reported from the streets of Zambia and Kenya on this agitation for pluralistic democracy that was gaining momentum right across Africa. it was to challenge parties many of which assumed office after independence but had now turned into authoritarian regimes, led by people who had personalised power and turned their countries into either de facto or de jure one-party states.

Today as i prepare to leave Bush House, i have been busy again document-ing and reporting on a third typhoon of political change – this time blowing across the northern part of the continent and sweeping

away two presidents in Tunisia and Egypt.The story of Africa has changed quite a bit

over the last 18 years. in the early 1990s it was about the clamour for political pluralism. Then we moved into a period of coups and height-ened conflict – some new, some old – in places like sudan, Angola, Liberia, sierra Leone, the Democratic republic of Congo (DrC) and somalia. This was followed by a time of politi-cal transition. The military finally left power in nigeria. Majority black rule became a reality in south Africa. And long-serving presidents retired or were recalled by their ‘maker’; Togo’s, Gnassingbé Eyadéma, DrC’s Mobutu sese seko, Guinea’s Lansana Conté, Ghana’s Jerry rawlings and in Kenya, Daniel arap Moi.

Today, as i switch off my BBC microphone for the last time, i am proud to report that there are far fewer coups and conflicts than when i joined the corporation back in 1992.

The telling of the story of Africa has also evolved with time. When i first arrived at the BBC, my typing skills had been polished on manual typewriters in Kenyan newsrooms. There were, however, still a handful of electronic typewriters around Bush House to soothe those who found the transition to computers rather traumatic. radio programmes were recorded on magnetic tape and editing required deft hands with razor blades. reporters in the field quite often filed their stories via telex machines which were then edited and read in the studio by London producers. Today as i tidy my desk one last time, it is possible to open a satellite phone, the size of a small laptop, and broadcast live from the centre of Tahrir square in Cairo with crystal clear quality. it is possible too to file pictures and video via the internet.

The storytellers of Africa have also metamor-phosed in the last two decades. in the early days, London had to despatch correspondents to different corners of the continent to capture the unfolding narrative. This was done for very good reasons. Given the political repression in many countries at the time, it was almost impossible for local journalists to carry out their professional duties without risking jail, harass-ment or worse. Foreign journalists enjoyed a measure of immunity. Today as i log off, we have a network of professional African journalists on

the ground, and in London. They are telling the story of Africa in their own words, as seen with their own eyes and interpreted in their own national, cultural and historical contexts.

so where next for me? or as my son would ask: “Papa Joe, what are you doing with your life?” i might just resort to the most profound and thoroughly annoying answer ever given by a journalist:“…only time will tell”. But there’s this wind that…ah, never mind.

Joseph Warungu, editor-in-chief of Focus on Africa, says farewell to the BBC after 20 years

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Goodbye Bush

Warungu steps out of Bush House

Warungu in 1992... ...and 2011

Joseph_FF.indd 2 28/2/11 17:34:41