What's going on ? "CS" Press release and "CS"-Private sector joint statement

[Meryem Marzouki <marzouki@ras.eu.org>]

Dear all,

1/ I fully support the concerns on the "CS" press release raised by 
Ralf hereafter, and previously by Jean-Louis and Rikke.

2/ I've found on ITU web site, in the list of documents submitted by 
Observers, a document called "25 February 2005 - Observers (Business 
Sector and Civil Society): Joint statement on behalf of Civil Society 
Plenary and the Coordination Committee of Business Interlocutors" 
(http://www.itu.int/wsis/docs2/pc2/subcommittee/Jointcs-ccbi.html).
There have been concerns raised on this plenary list by organizations 
who asked for individual endorsements by organizations, rather than 
attributing this statement to CS as a whole.
Who took the responsability to submit it to ITU secretariat to have it 
on the website, thus ignoring the plenary ?

It is too late to withdraw the "CS" press release, since no one from CS 
had the opportunity to comment on a draft.
But it is still time to ask for the so-called "Joint statement on 
behalf of Civil Society Plenary and the Coordination Committee of 
Business Interlocutors" to be removed from ITU website, and that its 
promoters look for endorsements by individual organizations.

I'm really wondering what's going on with CS at WSIS II...

Best regards,
Meryem Marzouki
--
Meryem Marzouki - http://www.iris.sgdg.org
IRIS - Imaginons un réseau Internet solidaire
294 rue de Charenton - 75012 Paris
Tel/Fax. +33(0)144749239

Le jeudi, 3 mars 2005, à 18:09 Europe/Paris, Ralf Bendrath a écrit :

> Dear all,
>
> I am also not happy about the press release, neither on the content 
> nor on the procedural side.
>
> Renata Bloem schrieb:
> > This was not a statement of CONGO.
> But CONGO wrote it, refined it and sent it out, without any 
> consultation with the plenary or whomever. Right? Given the fact that 
> the final Content & Themes meeting where we collected points for Adina 
> to include was on Friday evening, and the press release only was 
> published on Wednesday, there would have been enough time to send out 
> a first draft for further confirmation. That's how we did it before, 
> like at PrepCom3a when I wrote the final CS press statement.
>
> > In fact we have not submitted a single sentence to it.
> But who wrote it then? The press release does not at all reflect the 
> general discussion we had on the state of the process etc.
>
>  "Despite some concerns about WSIS “losing its vision” and “moving away
>  from the Geneva Declaration track”, civil society entities were
>  generally satisfied with the response by governments to their efforts 
> in
>  making the peoples’ voices heard in “bridging the digital divide”."
>
> Here I fully agree with Jean-Louis: We (any especially the folks who 
> worked hard on financing issues at the Prepcom) are certainly not 
> "satisfied with the response by governments". Quite the opposite.
>
> > Adina was asked to make an amalgam of the submissions she had 
> > received. and in order to avoid any misunderstanding / possible 
> > conflicts she decided not to refer to any specific entity / group / 
> > caucus, but to use more a general language
> That is fine, as long as the submissions are still somewhere 
> incorporated.
>
> BUT: I find no single sentence on Human Rights here, though the Human 
> Rights Caucus had sumbitted language. Nothing on the lack of a Human 
> Rights focus in the summit drafts, nothing on Tunisia as the host 
> country, nothing on accreditation problems of NGOs like Human Rights 
> in China. But then it mentions accreditation problems in WIPO. Why?
>
> And most of the press release is applauding the improvements in the 
> multi-stakeholder process. But were there really any? We had our usual 
> 15 minutes a day like we had two years ago. On the last day we did not 
> even get these. The improvement is only on the substance side: They 
> listen to us, because they either have no clue and need our input, or 
> they have learned to take us serious. So, if we want to applaud 
> anybody for the bigger impact we might have had during this PrepCom, 
> it should be ourselves. BTW: Empirical research done on WSIS phase one 
> suggests that CS impact is bigger in the early stages and gets smaller 
> and smaller towards the end, when all that counts is the government's 
> agreement.
>
> So, to me, this press release looks like somebody (if not CONGO, then 
> who else?) wants to play extremely nice and by doing this is silencing 
> all more outspoken and critical voices in civil society. Fine with me 
> if some groups want to do this, but then they can't claim to speak for 
> all civil society.
>
> I totally agree with Renata: We are lacking a clear press structure 
> and really should work on it for PrepCom3.
>
> But while we don't have an agreed structure, things like these have to 
> be done the most careful and inclusive way. And that normally includes 
> a feedback loop on the plenary list, even more if there are a few days 
> of time. Otherwise, we get a PR disaster like this and enlarge the 
> divides between different groups of civil society in the WSIS.
>
> Ralf
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