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SELF-RULE IN THE TIANGGE OF CAUSES |
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Written by Samira Ali Gutoc
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Thursday, 29 January 2004 |
Some 20 local rallyists in their saris and khudduts were already sloganeering for the Dalit’s (untouchables) cause and it was only registration time at the World Social Forum at Mumbai on January 15. I was on a line, feeling the Indian heat and dust along with Caucasians, who might have been as excited as I to attend THE big event of the NGO world. After all, this was the perceived people’s counterpart of the World Economic Forum being held simultaneously miles away at Davos Switzerland. A paradox of the North and South divide – the former hosting prime ministers and other heads of state, the latter spoken to be NGO leaders and masses.
As I walked to the exhibition center receiving pamphlets of whatever cause there could be – Save Energy, Dream for a Tibetan Peace Zone, No to Privatization, bumping into all sorts of nationalities, I just had to ponder at how far off other young people are from realities. Here were people who had spent years or even decades committing to their cause, what they call “for the masses” and withstood pressures from their governments and police. The 1st Muslim Nobel Laureate awardee and activist Shirin Ebade of Iran spoke to thousands about globalization’s ill-effects on majorities of the world. Other non-mainstream intellectuals found a platform here. Bestseller Ayudhanat Roy called on people to make a stand against the “occupation of Iraq.” Seems fence sitting is a no-no, the assumption here being -We vs they is US vs the world’s masses. At the other side of the gate was the Mumb ai Resistance, a counter-forum to the WSF, calling for revolution as the only way to address poverty and criticizing the WS as the "trjan horse of imperialism."
Indeed there were crisis in many parts of the world and authorities’ policies weren’t getting their constituents any better. Privatization (a trend that started in the 80s) especially of basic service providers for instance “hasn’t made the State deliver well”. Prof. Leonor Briones in one forum blames the structural adjustment programs on debt by developing countries. Governments in the end had been cash-strapped. “Privatization negatively impacted on the poor because basic services such as health and education were put on the market.”
In the end, it comes to the basic rule taught by Mahatma Gandhi - SELF-rule, people to become the focus, for them to be given control to decide . A lesson to avoid faiolures like Cancun (mexico in the future) –listen to the plight of people - addressed to the World Bank, US and other “hegemonic institutions.”
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