SOCIAL WATCH E-NEWSLETTER - Issue 25 - February 25, 2011

Issue 25 - February 25, 2011

Revolution in the Southern Mediterranean

If supporting dictatorial regimes like Tunisia and Egypt has been seen as the way to maintain Europe’s security, current events demonstrate the fragility of such strategies, warned three major civil society networks in a letter to Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. In neglecting the interests of ordinary citizens, this strategy was never sustainable. Sustainability can only be assured by genuine democratic processes, according to the Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND), Eurostep and Social Watch. The three organisations also sent a statement to the participants of the international conference on the Southern Mediterranean hosted by Ashton this week.
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Thousands of Palestinian Gathered for Political Conciliation
In a move that can be considered part of the current Arab Revolution, thousands of people took up the call to gather at the Al-Manarah Square, in Ramallah, convened by the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Network and asking for conciliation between Fatah and Hamas.
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The People Who Are Paying for Our Welfare
If poor people were a bank they would have stopped being poor long ago. Not only have they suffered the direct consequences of the economic crisis by losing their jobs, having less to spend and losing their homes, they have also been saddled with increased taxes and pay cuts to meet the costs of rescuing financial institutions. This was the outstanding conclusion in the Italian press, in the newspaper La Repubblica, when the Italian version of the Social Watch 2010 report appeared.
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Social Watch Disclose the Polish Outcasts
“Poverty and Social Exclusion in Poland”, a new report prepared by Social Watch, reveals the reach of unemployment among the older population, the lack of help poor children receive and the insufficient access to the Internet suffered by disabled people.
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Bangladeshi Civil Society Urges to Reject WB Loan on Climate
Leaders of civil society organisations urged the government to reject World Bank’s Pilot Project on Climate Resilience loan for climate adaptation. At a human chain programme, they demanded of the government to place all loan proposals in the parliament for open discussion, to established democratic ownership and to prepare foreign loan taking policy through it.
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From Cairo to Madison
Ian, a pizza parlour owner in Madison, the capital of Wisconsin, started offering on his web site the possibility of anyone in the world buying a pizza to be delivered to the demonstrators who for more than a week have been gathered at the state capital protesting against the anti-union policies of the governor, Scott Walker. The applause died when Ian wrote on his board that one pizza had been sent from Egypt.
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Ruling against Chevron-Texaco in Ecuador
The North American oil company Chevron-Texaco has been found guilty of causing environmental and social destruction in the Amazon in Ecuador. The judge at the court in Nueva Loja, Nicolás Zambrano, ruled that the company must pay at least eight thousand million dollars in damages. This historic decision is a triumph for humanity.
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Social Watch: promoting accountability
We have posted on Youtube a video with testimonies about Social Watch filmed during the World Social Forum in Dakar. This production emphasize on the diversity and the local autonomy of the Watchers and the flexibility of our network.
You can appreciate the video on the Social Watch page (www.socialwatch.org) and on Youtube (www.youtube.com/watch?v=6As5jAe-PXc).

 

EU Must Reconsider their Recipes to MENA countries

ANND, Eurostep and Social Watch sent a letter to the high level international meeting on the situation in MENA countries, held this Wednesday in Brussels. These three NGOs called the participants of the conference, convened by the European High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security, Catherine Ashton, to reconsider its mainstream economic recipes as a means of democratic transition in the revolting nations.

This is the statement:

The initiative of the European High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security, Mrs. Catherine Ashton, to hold an international meeting to respond to the revolutionary changes in the MENA region is welcomed as a reflection of the acknowledgement by the political system in Europe of the need to revisit the political, economic, and social context and cooperation in the region. However, the statements associated with this conference around the priorities of the EU in regards to Tunisia and the MENA at large reveals a lack of understanding of the real factors behind the people’s revolutions witnessed in the region, and the needs of the democratic transition during the upcoming period.

In her call for the meeting, Mrs. Ashton highlighted five priorities of the EU foreign cooperation that might be addressed in Tunisia: electoral reform, support for civil society, construction of an independent judiciary and a free press and media, and the fight against corruption. Statements by EU official in regards to the conference preparations referred to the need to see Tunisia continue the ongoing trade liberalization talks, have a financing arrangement with the IMF and beginning to address balance of payments financing gap.

"Deep democracy building", as noted by EU officials, necessitates healthy and inclusive national processes towards building a social and economic model that prioritizes economic justice and the people’s rights to any other conditionality that comes from outside. While Mrs. Ashton’s references to electoral reform, support for civil society, construction of an independent judiciary and a free press and media, and the fight against corruption as priorities are welcome, she avoids addressing the economic and social challenges within the transition period, part of which relate directly to the kind of partnership that the EU has developed with authoritarian regimes, like the one toppled in Tunisia.

Indeed, Mrs. Ashton insists on promoting the ongoing models of trade liberalization and financing arrangements from the IMF, which have been long criticized for being short-run oriented, too focused on demand management, while not paying adequate attention to social spending and income distribution. Indeed, these arrangements have failed to deliver for the majority of peoples around the region, and other regions of the world. On the contrary, their rights to social justice have been denied.

By only focusing on mainstream financing arrangements and balance of payment issues, the EU is missing the point again. Indeed, by focusing on growth strategies, the EU avoids the reality that the whole economic and social model in countries undertaking transition needs to be revised, in order to address the priorities of the people and not international institutions and foreign investors. The development process in Tunisia and other countries in transition necessitate a shift in the whole development processes and its relation to production and redistribution functions, and not mere alterations in input and outputs within a growth strategy that is largely detached from the developmental needs of the people. This needs to start from a national dialogue and convergence process around economic and social priorities, which the EU should avoid distorting through enforcing policy conditionalities. Along with the necessary political reforms, the upcoming period necessitates considering the shortterm responses that are needed to address peoples’ economic and social grievances within the framework of medium and longer-term strategies for economic and social reforms and development.

Despite the positive figures about the social and economic progress shown by the toppled Tunisian regime, it has been proved that people were living under harsh social and economic injustices. It is clear that the efforts and policies of the former regime did not lead to equitable growth and broadbased social progress. As a direct result the revolution in Tunisia, as in other MENA countries, started with economic and social demands, rapidly escalating into political mass mobilizations.

The structural adjustment policies adopted by the former regime followed IMF advice. In fact, the review of IMF documents suggests that consecutive governments under Ben Ali’s regimes had faithfully abided by IMF and World Bank conditionalities, including the firing of public sector workers, the elimination of price controls over essential consumer goods and the implementation of a sweeping privatization program. This, combined with the absence of a proper national democratic decision making process over economic and social policies, led to the deterioration in social and economic conditions of the Tunisian people.

It is thus a priority that national consultations in Tunisia agree on a national development strategy, prior to continuing the ongoing trade liberalization talks, and revise macroeconomic policies adopted under the previous regime, including on investment, taxation, and other financial policies and arrangements. Such national dialogue on economic and social priorities as well as short-term steps to address people’s grievances on this front are cornerstones in building a stable, democratic, and participatory governing system in Tunisia, and building the trust between the citizens and the new leadership of the country.

Supporting the Tunisian people and showing enough vision and strength in addressing these challenges, as members of the European Parliament called for, necessitates that the EU contribute to empowering and supporting the national re-construction process on the political as well as on economic and social fronts. It necessitates that the EU avoids suffocating the new governance processes underway with conditionalities that have for too long proved to be inadequate to achieving people’s rights. It also necessitates genuine steps from the EU to acknowledge that the economic and social policies that have been pursued in the name of the EU partnership with the Southern editerranean countries may have helped in achieving economic growth, but have contributed to ncreased poverty, social exclusion, and inequalities. All these models need be critically reviewed.

Ziad Abdul Samad
Director
ANND

Simon Stocker
Director
Eurostep

Roberto Bissio
Coordinator
Social Watch

 

 

 

Palestinian NGOs Ask Fatah and Hamas to End Political Division

Upon the initiative of the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Network (PNGO), thousands of Palestinians gathered on February 18 at the Al-Manarah Square, in the middle of the West Bank city of Ramallah, to express their rejection of the Palestinian internal division and call on Fatah and Hamas to end it.

The activity was coordinated with political parties and youth groups. PNGO was impressed by the active participation of the people and considered it as a sign of desire to end the internal disagreement that has lead to deterioration of human rights situation in the West Bank and Gaza.

PNGO views the internal division as threat to the Palestinians’ aspirations and national struggle against occupation, and believes that the Palestinian Authorities’ call for elections in September 2011 can deepen the internal gap.

This is not to say that PNGO is against elections in principle, but it sees that under these circumstances the polls would lead to more friction if Fatah and Hamas don’t reach conciliation.

Therefore, PNGO is preparing for other activities as prelude to getting both parties to sit together and reach an agreement that ensures that the rights of the Palestinians, including the right to self-determination and the right to return, are given priority on their political agenda.

Public freedoms in the West Bank and Gaza Strip
Upon an invitation by PNGO and the Public Liberties Committee, several meetings have been held recently to discuss the situation of human rights and public freedoms in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

The meetings came as response to the increased assaults on human rights by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Different participants, including representatives of the Palestinian Legislative Council Blocs and political and civil society leaders, participated in the meetings. They reached clear consensus about the necessity of practical steps to stop human rights violations, especially assaults on the right to expression and association.

All participants agreed to organize a conference in March 2011, whose recommendations would function as a basis for future action to put an end to the violations of human rights and to hold perpetrators accountable.

Source: PNGO

 

 

 

SW Italian Report Launched, followed by FTT stunt in front of Parliament

The Italian SW coalition presented its version of the 2010 SW report the 17th of February in Rome in an unusual site – an open air gallery at a few hundred meters from the Trevi Fountain and the Government and Parliament buildings.

After an overall presentation by Jason Nardi, Italian SW coordinator, four speaches were delivered by testimonies of major areas of concern and analysis that the report covered of Italian society: Youth, Women, Migrants, Roma people. Discrimination and violation of social, human and economic rights in each of these “parts” of society are evident in Italy.

Valentina La Terza (ARCI, Milan) talked about the unemployment of youth, that has reached an average of 29%, and about the so called NEET (Not in Employment, Education or Training) are growing every day.

Merceded Frias (first migrant woman who, after becoming Italian citizen, was elected in Parliament) spoke about the situation for women which has worsened in the last year, since many women work in the fields of education, health and social services, which have been affected by government reforms and cuts of public spending. Women also still make less than men for the same jobs, and have less access to decision-making positions, both in the labour market and in politics. Migrant women have even less rights, and have become a silent labour force for a great part to assist elderly Italians.

Mirton Resuli (Albanian, who aquired Italian citizenship) addressed the issue of the criminalisation of migrants and missed integration opportunities. And finally Giuseppe Salkanovic denounced the institutional discrimination Roma people continue to be subjected to, with segregation of groups in controlled slums, even though many of the young Roma were born in Italy or have citizenship from some European country (such as Romania).

The report launch ended with a colorful demonstration in front of Parliament together with the Italian Financial Transaction Tax campaign that the Italian coalition is promoting with other networks and organisations.

A video of the presentation event is available here: http://www.arcoiris.tv/modules.php?name=Flash&d_op=getit&id=14195

Pictures and video of the stunt are available on the campaign website:
http://www.zerozerocinque.it

This is the article about the report published by La Repubblica, one of the major Italian newspapers:

The World’s Poor Seen from Above
By Rosalba Casteletti, of La Repubblica in Rome

"If poor people were a bank they would have been rescued long ago.” This is the sarcastic conclusion of the Social Watch 2010 report two years after the Wall Street debacle. Social Watch is a network of 400 non-governmental organizations in 62 countries and it includes Oxfam, Amnesty, the Campaign to Reform the World Bank and the World Wildlife Fund. This report, entitled “After the Fall”, was presented in Italy.

“People have been talking about the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) since 2000. It would cost only 100,000 million dollars a year over four years to attain the MDGs and cut by half the proportion of the world’s population who were living in poverty in 1990, but this money is not forthcoming. However, as the Italian Social Watch spokesman Jason Nardi points out, “Billions of dollars are spend on saving a bank.”

The poor are paying the cost
The world’s poor are suffering the direct consequences of the crisis in lost jobs, lower incomes and even losing their homes, and on top of that they are also being made to pay the cost of saving banks, which is charged to them through tax increases and pay cuts. Not only is this socially unjust but, as events in the Middle East and the Maghreb have shown, it is also unsustainable. The Social Watch report measures progress towards the MDGs not in terms of economic performance but in terms of access to basic human rights. Furthermore, it lays bare the paradox that the year 2000 – when governments the world over committed themselves to a whole range of targets in the Millennium Declaration including reducing poverty by half – was precisely the year when this decade of serious regression began.

Development that does not bring social justice
The evidence for this regression can be found in the Social Watch Basic Capabilities Index (BCI), which combines three indicators: infant mortality, reproductive health and education. Income per person in the world increased by an average of 17% in the 1990s and by 19% in the first decade of the 21st century, but BCI improvement ratings fell from 4% in the 1990s to 3% in the 2000-2010 period, so it is clear that increased resources and economic development are not synonymous with greater social justice.

Conclusion
These contradictions between economic development and social development have come to the surface now in street demonstrations and social upheaval in North Africa and the Middle East.
In its conclusion, the Social Watch report states that “Greater financial support and better conditions of trade for developing countries are an ethical imperative today more than ever.”

Source: La Repubblica, of Rome.
Italian language version: www.repubblica.it/solidarieta/cooperazione/2011/02/17/news/i_poveri_del_mondo-12558873/?ref=HREC2-7

 

 

 

Report Reveals Extent of Social Exclusion in Poland

Unemployment among older citizens, insufficient help for children from poorer families and an internet divide between able and disabled people are the main findings of a new report from the Social Watch NGO.

“Poverty and Social Exclusion in Poland” consists of over a dozen articles prepared by academics from various fields of expertise.

According to Pawel Kubicki, of the Institute of Social Economics, by 2035, the percentage of senior citizens in comparison to the rest of the population will have risen from 13.9 to 23.2 percent.

Nevertheless, he notes that the level of employment for elder citizens is lower in Poland than in other EU countries, especially with regards to women.

In his opinion, delaying the age of retirement could be crucial in increasing the possibilities for women (in Poland, the age of retirement is 60 for women, 65 for men).

Meanwhile, Professor Elzbieta Tarkowska, from the PAN Institute of Philosophy, says that poorer families are not receiving sufficient help in making the most of the educational system. Amongst various problems, she noted that the lowest level of attendance at kindergartens was in the countryside and small towns, namely in areas with the greatest poverty.

Piotr Olech from the Forum for Combating Homelessness holds that 35.5 percent of people in Poland live in bad or very bad conditions. He called for major investment in new housing blocks, not least with regards to social housing.

Finally, Dominik Batorski from the University of Warsaw, has accessed that those without internet knowledge are in an increasingly weaker position. Amongst several factors, Batorski noted that firms are recruiting staff through the internet to a much larger degree.

Likewise Batorski drew attention to the fact that the number of disabled people that use the internet (19 percent) is disproportionately low compared to the rest of the population. He postulated that improved access for the disabled could extend horizons for finding employment.

Source: Polish Press Agency (Polska Agencja Prasowa, PAP)

 

 

 

Dhaka Urged Not to Take WB's PPCR loan

Opposing the government's position on climate financing, civil society organisations Saturday 19th termed it imprudent and self - contradictory as only 9.0 percent out of the total amount would be given to Bangladesh as grant.

They urged the government to refrain from taking the loan as they thought it to be a conspiracy of developed countries and their legitimate institutions like World Bank (WB) or other international financial institutions to avoid the multilateral process of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in respect of climate financing.

They said this at a human chain formed in front of the National Press Club which was organised in protest against the Pilot Project on Climate Resilience (PPCR) fund under WB's Climate Investment Fund for which Bangladesh had applied in September 2010.

Equity and Justice Working Group (EquityBD) organised the human chain where representatives from Unnayan Onneshon, Campaign for Sustainable Rural Livelihoods (CSRL), Bangladesh Krishok Federation, Coastal Association for Social Transformation (COAST), Lead Trust, On Line Knowledge Centre, Uddipan, ARPON, IEE, Distressed Children and Infants International (DCI), Coastal Development Partnership (CDP), Kishani Shobha, among other civil society organisations, were present.

A paper, prepared by EquityBD concerning the climate fund, disclosed that the government was going to take $ 50 million as grant and $ 60 million as loan from WB's PPCR from the total loan package of $ 515 million of Asian Development Bank and WB.

"In reality, only 9.0 per cent of it is grant and the rest 91 per cent is loan. The money will be utilised for coastal embankment, food security, water supply, and research on climate resilience housing," the paper revealed.

Rezaul Karim Chowdhury of EquityBD mentioned that the key policymakers in the government had several times mentioned it in Parliament and in different events that they were not going to take any loan on climate adaptation as the developed countries were the climate polluters and they had to pay compensation.

"But the loan taking process, initiated by External Resources Division of the government, is self-contradictory and such a decision is also imprudent and premature as the multilateral climate financing process of UNFCCC is going to take shape by 2012," he said.

Prodip Kumar Roy of CSRL said that it was not a climate fund; rather it was a spider's web of debt and exploitation.

"In fact it is the conspiracy of developed countries to avoid the multilateral process of UNFCCC and also to continue exploitation by debt and domination through WB including other international financial institutions," he added.

Meanwhile the speakers urged the government to reject WB's PPCR loan immediately and also uphold the interests of the LDC countries as Bangladesh plays a leading role among them.

Source: The Financial Express

 

 

 

A pizza from Cairo

By Roberto Bissio

To demonstrate in the streets of Madison, Wisconsin, is not as dangerous as facing bullets in the squares of Tripoli, Libya, or Manama, Bahrain, but it is no cakewalk either, with snow and freezing temperatures.
Thus, Ian’s pizza parlour started to offer the possibility of anyone in the world buying a pizza over the Internet to be delivered to the demonstrators gathering each day for more than a week at the state capital protesting against the anti-union policies of the governor, Scott Walker.

Ian set up a board and wrote up for all to see where the pizzas were coming from: forty of the fifty states of the union and dozens of other countries. But the biggest applause erupted when one came from Egypt.

There is a stark between poverty-stricken peasants on the banks of the Nile who make less than two dollars a day and public employees in Wisconsin who earn an average of 58,000 dollars a year. People with no rights were helping citizens of the most powerful democracy in the world through the Internet, which both groups use to organise themselves.

And it is not just the people on the streets who understand this connection: the conservative press in the United States does so too. The same press that maintains that President Barack Obama should not have abandoned his loyal ally Hosni Mubarak sees subversive similarities between Madison, Wisconsin and Cairo, Egypt.

Governor Walker has not been in power for thirty years like Mubarak. He has only just arrived to power, riding on the wave of public discontent with unemployment and the financial crisis: a crisis which began during the Bush administration and which president Obama has not been able to resolve speedily.

Walker wants to implement pay cuts of ten to fifteen percent for public employees by increasing their contributions to social security, and his justification is that this will help ease the deficit. But at the same time he is increasing the deficit by reducing taxes on the rich, who are already benefiting from federal tax cuts for families that make more than a quarter of a million dollars a year. Instead of bargaining with the unions about how to share the burden, the Governor is proposing legislation that will ban collective bargaining for state employees.

The situation in Wisconsin is being monitored by Ohio and other states now governed by Republicans that have similar anti-union measures on the agenda.

There is widespread debate in the country about what public policies would be most suitable to handle the crisis. On the one hand, there are neo-Keynesians calling for more state spending to compensate for shrinking markets, and on the other hand there are neo-monetarists who want to cut state budgets and balance the books. Some Republican extremists are even saying there should be a return to the gold standard, which would stop the government from printing more dollars. This is the last tool the Obama administration has to stimulate the economy without resorting to Congress, which is currently dominated by the opposition.

But it is not economic doctrines what is in play in Wisconsin, but rather the political future policy of the country. The unions that Governor Walker wants to liquidate – since without collective bargaining they have no reason to exist – are not only the organizational base of the Democratic Party but also its main financial contributor. The Republicans, on the other hand, base their finances on donations from businesses. A short time before the elections last November the Supreme Court overturned legislation limiting the contributions businesses could make to political parties and advertising campaigns during elections. Millions of dollars immediately flooded into the coffers of the Republican Party and helped them considerably towards their victory at the polls.

If Governor Walker wins his battle other legislative bodies will follow his example and thus ruin Obama’s chances of being re-elected in 2012. For this reason, after a week of demonstrations in Wisconsin, the President abandoned the conciliatory stance he maintained since the Democrats lost the November elections and entered the fray by saying that “Public employees are our neighbours, they are our friends” and that the proposed legislation in Wisconsin “is an attack on the unions”.

Democratic representatives in the Wisconsin congress are in a minority but they still have the power to leave that legislative body without a quorum. They voluntarily went into exile in the neighbouring state of Illinois so as not to be forced into a vote.

However, none of this really explains the indignation, determination and euphoria of the tens of thousands of people who have been out on the streets of Madison for more than a week, the hundreds of people camping inside the congress – they cannot camp outside in the winter – people offering demonstrators from out of town accommodation in their homes, spontaneous strikes and stoppages in the education system. One teacher explained in a blog, “I told my students there were no classes today but they were going to learn an important lesson in civics”.

Diane Russell, a Democrat representative from Maine, said “This is not a war against the unions; it is a class war and it affects every worker and every member of the middle class”, and she undertook to drive halfway across the country with three friends to bring solidarity and hot chocolate to the demonstrators.

This bellic reference is not a Marxist quote but a refrence to something billionaire Warren Buffett, who famously said in 2006: “Yes, we have a class war; we the rich started it, and we are winning”. Perhaps Madison will become, like Cairo, a turning point.

Source: Agenda Global

 

 

 

A triumph for humanity

By Alberto Acosta*

Nicolás Zambrano, the judge at the court in Nueva Loja (capital of the province of Sucumbíos), ruled that the North American company Chevron-Texaco caused environmental and social destruction in the Amazon region in Ecuador during the twenty-six years it was in operation there. The destruction it wrought is far greater than that caused by BP in the Gulf of Mexico.

The judge ruled that Chevron-Texaco must pay at least eight thousand million dollars in damages and make a public apology in Ecuador and in the United States to the victims. If it does not comply with this ruling within fifteen days the amount will be doubled to more than sixteen thousand million dollars.

The indigenous people of the Amazon region in Ecuador met Western civilization in its worst possible guise, an oil company, and this completely changed their way of life and even caused deaths. In this region, above all in the oil-rich provinces of Sucumbíos and Orellana, the problem of poverty is worse than in the rest of the country.

These communities struggled against the oil company, and eighteen years ago colonists and indigenous people began legal action which has come to be called “the lawsuit of the century” and is tremendously important internationally.

This resistance on the part of the inhabitants has led to calls for a moratorium on oil exploitation in the centre-south of the Amazon, and prompted the Ecuadorian government to make a commitment to leave 856 million barrels of oil underground in the Yasuní National Park ecological reserve.

Chevron-Texaco was directly responsible for the impact of its oil exploitation activities, which damaged the environment and harmed people’s health.
Whatever the final outcome, this ruling sets a precedent in that one of the most powerful oil companies on the planet has been prosecuted. The enterprise worked to exploit the Amazon region in Ecuador from 1964 to 1990 and in that period it drilled 339 wells in 430,000 hectares and extracted around 1,500 million barrels of crude oil, but it also dumped thousands of millions of barrels of production water and waste and burned billions of cubic feet of gas.
Source: Agenda Global

Read the complete article at http://www.socialwatch.org/node/12725
* Ex-President of the Constitutive Assembly of Ecuador and ex-Minister of Energy and Mines.

 

 

 

 

 
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