[WSIS CS-Plenary] Summit speakers

[Tracey Naughton]

Hello all

My two Rands worth.

The CS speaker nominations were called for by the end of PrepCom 3.  
Robert is right that we should have begun a long time back but no  
one, including Robert in his role as a CSB member,  chose to take the  
lead on this prior to the PrepCom either before or after the  
information was posted by CONGO. This isn't surprising as there are  
few CS members, if any, able to make WSIS their life and time between  
meetings is consumed by 'rest of life' activity. WSIS activity is  
left to the designated meeting times.

The ITU are aware that the phase one selection process involved a lot  
of work on the part of civil society and that there was widespread  
disenchantment with the results which did not reflect that work.

The ITU seemed during PrepCom 3  to be genuinely approaching speaker  
nomination from civil society with goodwill. This was confirmed by  
the liaison work done by Toru Nakaya of the ITU.

However, the ITU is the lead agency for the Summit and the Summit  
isn't far away. They had set a deadline and have made clear that they  
reserve final decision making on speakers. They have a broader set of  
considerations - ones that match Michael Gurstein's views '..... then  
the identification shoud be done with one eye on credibility/ 
visibility to this larger universe....' The selection will not wait  
much longer and that's just a logistical and realistic fact. Content  
and Themes did not offer any criteria when the subject was discussed.

The ITU is developing a speakers list of its own. Civil Society's  
nominations will be considered in a compiled list from all sources.  
We were never in a position to negotiate who, when, how much time,  
though general guidelines were provided to us to assist our  
nomination process. These were posted to the plenary list.

Here are some early prospects from the ITU list:

Mr. Oliver Segond, Secretary General, Digital Solidarity Fund
Dr Robert Khan, Founder Corporation for National Research Institute
Mr Swaminathan, President MS Swaminathan Foundation
Mr Jimmy Wales, President WikiMedia Foundation
Prof. Muhammad Yunus, Grameen Technology Centre
Mr Tim Berners Lee, Director World Wide Web Consortium

Aside from the fact that the above list is not gender balanced (which  
is directly connected to the 'highest level of the organisation'  
criteria) Toru Nakaya did assure us on several occasions that in its  
final list the ITU will be sensitive to region, gender, age, language  
and state of national development. That of course does not mean the  
final list will reflect all these considerations because the  
paramount criteria will be putting out key messages to the citizens  
of the world on the Information Society and all its components  
including but not limited to principles, Internet Governance and the  
digital divide.

I think that the process has not been perfect but has been reasonable  
given the time constraints and process decided upon by the content  
and themes meeting - which was to set up a committee and not to work  
through the nominations as a whole group (albeit without the off site  
people who could have been consulted). The latter was a process  
proposal developed by Bertrand. It would have taken time and been  
laborious but would have distributed the decision more widely.

Realistically, I think we should acknowledge the shift in approach  
made since phase 1 by the ITU  and understand the current limitations  
of our sphere of influence here.

Having said that I would be quite happy to see people drive a new  
selection process, though not confident it could unfold before the  
decision is made by the ITU.

Tracey Naughton