[WSIS CS-Plenary] Summary of the Briefing for NGOs on WSIS outcomes (7 december 2005)

[Ralf Bendrath]

McTim wrote:

>> Mr. Utsumi <snip> mentioned the participation of civil society
>> steadily increased throughout the process, so that at the end
>> stakeholders fully participated in the final negotiations.
> 
> I want some of what this guy was smoking !
There was more like this, already in Tunis. I attended the closing plenary
session on the 18th, and Adama Sammassekou, the president of the Geneva
phase of the WSIS, even was so bold to state that "all stakeholders have
adopted the Tunis Agenda and Commitment" - though there was never such a
decision, and clearly will not be, by any civil society body, and AFAIK
also not by the CCBI.

This has two interesting aspects:

1. They obviously see a need for getting us more and more on board and 
enhancing our participation in order to have a legitimate outcome.

2. If we participate in these processes and not cleary and openly 
disassociate ourselves from the outcomes (like we did in Geneva with the 
statement at PrepCom3a and the CS Summit Declaration), we are considered 
supporting them.

Therefore, I felt like many others that it would be important to have an 
independent statement from civil society, and that was one of the reasons 
we started the drafting process. (By the way: I will try to send out a 
last final version on Sunday night.) But there are more aspects to this, 
and we need to think how to use this strategically in future occasions.

Best, Ralf