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Africa in search of deeper dialogue beyond Addis and Bamako - February 2004
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8. What should have been done?
Since we had many people from Africa attending WSF for the first time in Mumbai who were not sponsored by ASF, it would have been prudent to give them a brief history and organisational structure of the ASF on the first day of the seminar.
And for those who were not privileged enough to have a continental picture of ASF activities but were involved since Bamako or Addis, early interventions in this area would have helped those present to appreciate the context in which one section of the Forum was demanding a change in the programme and requesting that the meeting deals with ways of enhancing accountability on the part of the Secretariat and the Steering Committee.
These are not new issues in the history of the Forum.
If we look back to the July 2002 Report of the Steering Committee of the African Social Forum meeting held in Port Shepstone, South Africa, some of these issues were raised and an action-oriented programming guideline was spelt out.
The meeting spelt out criteria and governance issues the ASF is supposed to deal with and how the thematic representatives are expected to feed back to their respective constituencies.
In the hosting of the pan African meeting before going to any World Social Forum, several criteria were outlined for the selection of the organising country and these were stated as:
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"The existence of an organised and dynamic local civil society
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Possibilities for the African Social Forum to interact with the local social movement and strengthen it.
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The existence of good quality logistic conditions
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Access facility by air and affordable transport costs
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And favourable political context that will facilitate, in particular, the organisation of peaceful public events."
On financing the Forum and participating in World Social Forum: the Secretariat will continue to deploy efforts to mobilise the resources necessary for the organisation of the African Social Forum and support participation to the World Social Forum. However, sub-regional and thematic representatives should take the responsibility of mobilising most of the funds required for that purpose.
Those serving in the organising committee should report on the state of mobilisation and use of funds before rank and file members, their organisation and their financial partners. They should also provide the same information to the Committee.
On organisation of the Forum, it was reiterated that this should be highly decentralised at the level of sub-regions and networks. The sub-regional and thematic heads within the Committee should take their responsibility in the organisation of the next Forum. At the same time, the local social movement should be largely associated with the various preparatory phases.
On mobilising participants to the Forum, this should be done on the basis of an enhanced balance between actors of social movements, sub-regions, and the various thematic networks.
The parameters spelt out here set the foundation for the positions that sealed the 2003 Addis Ababa consensus document where it is acknowledged, "the Charter of Principles and Values …will be the philosophical and moral basis of our movement. It (The Addis Forum) has also proposed a number of organisational mechanisms with the view to building a more democratic African social movement."
It is on the basis of these vague "organisational mechanisms" that the Southern African Social Forum almost failed to resolve how to deal with the "delinquent" Addis Ababa six who were nominated to serve on the continental steering committee as the engine of mobilising the region.
The Addis meeting deliberated on a document entitled "African Social Forum - draft operational framework" which was meant to stimulate broad discussions on the frequency of the Forum, governance through a regional committee, which in turn would be serviced by an organising committee backed by a Secretariat.
Among other things, it was proposed that the African Social Forum would consist of:
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Conferences: to be organised by ASF structures
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Thematic workshops and seminars: to be organised by stakeholders
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Cultural events
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Events for specific groups: e.g. youth, women etc.
It would be greatly appreciated if the Secretariat could circulate a full report from Addis or at least portions of it relating to this discussion because this will help us root our post-Mumbai Africa-focussed discussions to articulate what we deem constitutes "organisational mechanisms" referred to in the Addis Ababa declaration.
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