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And attention will shift to the question
how much of all said and done at the people’s forum
will be considered by the heads of state.
A hectic week of meetings, a peoples market and networking
ended in a statement from the forum warning the Commonwealth
that it needed to make itself relevant to the world by matching
its principles more closely with practice.
Follow-up needs to be much more rigorous by mandating the
 Commonwealth
Secretariat to audit the pledges made by heads of government.
And, in turn, civil society began to look inward – what
did it need to do to ensure the peoples sector was accountable
and responsive to those it claims to represent?
The Forum was vital to showcase how civil society has begun
to make a difference: at the meeting were representatives
from 45 countries who also came to display what they do at
the parallel Commonwealth Peoples market.
It was a market with a difference: in addition to selling
the usual market fare of flowing fabrics, intricate basket
ware and books, it also showed how to do solidarity, gender
equality and grassroots work by bringing together NGO’s
to learn from each other.
The Country Woman Association of Nigeria, faced with a banking
sector blind to the needs of rural women, has begun to pack
a female financial punch. Its African Traditional Responsive
Banking project takes deposits as small as one naira. Members
save and borrow. “It works,” said Alhaja Agoro,
“these women could not talk and look someone in the
face before, now see them, they are talking confidently with
hands on their hips because they know who they are, what they
are worth – they don’t beg anybody”.
Everyday, NGO’s met to discuss how to merge the twin
imperatives of democracy and development. The theme of the
CHOGM is democracy and development and the peoples’
forum began to put the meat on the bones the concept.
For democracy to work in development’s favour, it was
essential to deepen its principles by ensuring that the concept
went far beyond putting a tick next to a candidate you barely
know on election day. This is where the forum was vital: it
began to flag the next generation of democracy essentials.
These included gender equity, the right to information and
more effective civil society work where repression is acute
in countries, not only in the countries suspended from the
Commonwealth like Zimbabwe and Pakistan but also in countries
regarded as functioning democracies.
As the forum got underway, Human Rights Watch issued its
report on Nigeria which found that political tolerance was
low. “President [Olusegun] Obasanjo’s promises
of democracy mean little as long as people are being detained,
tortured and shot simply for expressing views critical of
the government,” said Human Rights Watch representative
Peter Takirambudde.
At the meeting’s close last night, over 50 civil society
leaders wrote a stinging open letter to the CHOGM to keep
up the pressure on Zimbabwe. “We express grave concern
at the Zimbabwean government’s continued violation of
the Harare Declaration and Commonwealth principles reflected
in its continuing repression of civil society, the media,
human rights defenders and the opposition,” they said.
They called on the CHOGM to “give renewed priority”
to repression in Zimbabwe; to ensure that the legal armoury
President Robert Mugabe’s that assembled to give the
veneer of legality to his action is repealed; and to persuade
the government to enter into “genuine dialogue”
with the opposition to begin talks toward a transition.
But is anybody listening in the place where power sits? A
theme that ran through the peoples’ forum and one which
bubbled tensely beneath its surface was the growing conviction
that civil society is cut off from the main heart-beat of
the Commonwealth because it has no direct interaction with
the heads of government.
This sense of alienation was given a physical form when it
transpired that civil society access to the CHOGM will be
limited. Responding to secretary-general Don McKinnon’s
statement that access was determined by member governments
and that the issue needed to be aired in each country, a civil
society leader said: “the truth is, Mr. Secretary-General,
is that I find it easier to meet my government at meetings
like CHOGM”.
McKinnon promised that he would compare civil society’s
representation in the core decision-making structures of the
Commonwealth with other inter-governmental forums.
Earlier in the week, leaders of the forum said that they
were granted far more access at institutions like the World
Trade Organisation and the World Bank. The Commonwealth has
fallen behind in keeping up contact with people, they said.
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Compared with the stiff politeness and tight policing
of the Commonwealth Heads of Government, the peoples forum
has been a far more organic, dare we say, democratic affair.
The Yar ‘Aduar centre has been filled with a cacophony
of voices; a rainbow of colours; a palette of styles and
one thousand opinions.
A picture from afar, shows the easybreathing centre with
its bright and airy dome that stands out on the Abuja
skyline nestled next to the Commonwealth Peoples market,
a constructed space of round African huts and thatched
roofs.
In the distance, all the flags of the Commonwealth fly.
At the market, representatives of 53 nations have been
a breathing cultural exchange. The old Commonwealth hand,
Derek Ingram, is captured taking a breather at the market,
while a young Nigerian watches the photographer.
At another stall, two images – one strikingly modern;
the other tradition - of Nigeria’s cross river state
organisation are reflected in the afternoon sunshine.
The Young woman tending the stall sits exactly as the
image of her forebear in a natural photograph: their hairstyles,
dresses and ear-rings almost exactly matching.
The chair of the forum, Nkoyo Toyo, has cut a notable
image, all week long as she’s ensured that this
assembly of Commonwealth peoples goes according to plan. |
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