Social Watch E-Newsletter - Issue 318 - November 3, 2017

In Morocco, the Social Watch team informs, the kingdom's supreme auditing body has reported a systematic lack of compliance with their contractual obligations by private providers of public services in water, electricity and sanitation: In the city of Tangier, the ”Amandis” Group, affiliated to the French group “Veolia”, carried out less than one third of its commitments during the first five years of its operations. In Casablanca, only 45,806 'social connections' (benefiting people in poverty) were carried out in 10 years (1997-2006) out of 90,000 promised by the French company Lédique of the Suez group. Labour productivity did improve under PPPs (locally known as 'authorized concessions') in the water and power distribution as well as the wastewater management sectors. However, the increase in productivity was mainly due to the layoffs of about 20 percent of the workers, thus reducing the number of employees per 1,000 connections. In contrast, independent agencies have been able to achieve greater improvement in labour productivity compared with companies under 'authorized concessions' without resorting to layoffs, thus undermining the claim of greater effectiveness of PPPs. Read more

The lack of any substantive cohesion in Malta between a number of policies, such as education or health, with sustainability is a worrying factor, according to the Maltese Social Watch report. The general absence of statistical data, particularly of disaggregated data by various social and economic criteria, resulting from a lack of collection or from the prevalent praxis of not making it public makes the reporting difficult. Yet, there is an obvious lack of coherent and comprehensive approach to the legal and policy framework relating to the SDGs. This also belies a weak vision both on the action required at a national level and in terms of Malta’s role within the international community and its contribution (despite it being a small country) at the global level. Read more

Social Watch coalitions around the world are contributing their assessments and reports to the global Social Watch report 2017 on the national implementation of the 2030 Agenda in its first year. Stalled, or slipping back, is the theme that appears in many of the contributions. Natural and un-natural disasters, some of them of catastrophic proportions, appear again and again not just as an obstacle to faster progress towards the agreed goals, but in fact setting the clock back. Part of the reason for lack of progress has to do with an over-reliance on public-private partnerships, urged by the World Bank as a way to finance implementation of the SDGs.

The Social Watch national platforms are independent coalitions of civil society organizations struggling for social and gender justice in their own countries. The Social Watch network has been publishing since 1996 yearly reports on how governments implement their international commitments to eradicate poverty and achieve equality between women and men.

A recently launched report by the Arab NGO Network for Development aims at defining the gender dimensions of informal labor in the region. The study on the gender dimensions of informal labor, written by Dr. Howaida Adly, Political Sciences Professor at the National Center for Sociological and Criminilogical Research (Egypt), focus on commonalities between all Arab countries in terms of labor and gender, and on the differences among them. The analysis is based on national reports received from the different Arab countries. A common limitation is that data is lacking to allow for a comprehensive assessment of the gender dimensions of informal labor. Read more

The Global Justice Center, the Eyzidi Organization for Documentation, the Iraqi Al-Amal Association, the Iraqi Women Network, Madre and Yazda sent an open letter addressed to Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, to the chief of High Judicial Counil and to Mr. Ibrahim Jaafari- Foreign Minister regarding the Terms of Reference for UN Security Council resolution 2379 (2017) on Daesh accountability. The CSOs demand that those ToR, which are currently being drafted, have a gender justice and a victim-centered approach. In particular, the recommendations stresses the need for identifying an applicable legal framework for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, legal reform, ensuring investigative efficiency, gender expertise, due process, victim and witness protection, community outreach and civil society engagement. Read more