As promised, Correa v El Universo was to be continued. In fact, already the week after the Supreme Court's ruling in the case, president Correa invited the whole crême de la crême of the international diplomatic community present in Quito, to assist his pardoning of the condemned directors and editorialist, as well as the authors of the book El gran hermano. The Ecuadorians, the actual target audience in this case of their democratic system and press freedom, were invited to watch the screening of Correa's speech outside the presidential palace.
Mostly, it was a self-congratulatory speech, highlighting the righteousness of his own position and pointing out the lack of journalistic ethos of the international media, who hadn't bothered asking him for his version of the facts when reporting on the Court's ruling. At the very end of his speech, Correa took an interesting turn countering the accusations of disrespecting press freedom and freedom of expression. "Our answer," he says, "are the kids going to Millennium schools, disabled people accessing well-functioning health care facilities, and first class highways connecting our cities." In short, socio-economic well-being trumps democratic principles, an argument not unfamiliar with some other rulers across the globe. (Did I hear you say Paul Kagame or Lee Kuan Yew?)
In the weeks following this mediatic show, huge billboards in support of the president and his policies appeared across those very same highways (paid for with public money, needless to say). Conveniently, this coincided with the start of a huge march of indigenous peoples in defense of water, protesting against the reckless public policy to promote huge mining investments across the Andes. Even before the protesters made it to Quito, Correa didn't leave an opportunity go by without disqualifying the protesters' motives and arguments, arguing that the march has blatantly failed.
As the protesters were about to march into the capital, the president tried to cut their roads of access and means of transport. In the meantime, he started rallying his own supporters with the same buses he forbid the indigenous people to use to enter Quito. From all over the country thousands of pro-Correa protesters marched to his palace to express their support for his government. Ironically, if these people already knew why they were in Quito (except for the free transport, food and drinks, that is), most answered quite vehemently that they were here "to protect our democracy".
Yes, the very same democracy that their star had put to the second stage just a few weeks earlier. In defense of a democracy that delegitimises and impedes the exercise of the constitutional rights of its citizens to gather, use public roads and present individual or collective protests and proposal to the competent authorities. A democratic system in which a governor sends a letter to the president with the names of public servants who did not attend the pro-Correa protests, recommending he shows them the door. Shouldn't this democracy rather open the debate on how to finance social progress (c.q. whether or not mining is the most adequate economic policy to generate sustainable economic growth) in the face of the constitutional rights granted to nature?
Monday, 30 April 2012
Friday, 6 April 2012
Overwhelming history at the sound of a theorbo
It's Semana Santa, and Quito has a wonderful way of celebrating this week before Easter. At several sacred and less sacred locations in the city centre, top notch artists are performing several performances as part of the XI Festival de Música Sacra. Here's to living in the historical centre! I just have to walk a few blocks down the road to enjoy these musical delights. And the best part is, it's all for free!
The other night, I attended a performance of the Colombian 'early music ensemble' Musica Ficta, in the magical Iglesia de la Compañía, just a block down the road from the presidential palace. This baroque ensemble is renowned for playing Hispano-American baroque music, with scores dug up from archives in Bogotá, Quito, Cusco and other cultural centres of the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. By default, these historical notes beg for equally historical instruments such as the baroque guitar, the vihuela, the shawm, the dulcian and the theorbo.
As the church got filled with the warmth of guitar strings, graceful puffs and flaring chantings, Carlos Serrano shared with his audience how thrilled they all were to be playing their baroque music in that church, the perfect setting given their historical coincidence. That comment of his made me think back at some of the texts from The Peru Reader that I had read on the Viceroyalty of Peru (stretching from the Carribean beaches of Colombia to Potosi's ore-filled Cerro Rico in present-day Bolivia), the geo-political framework of the very same period in which that music was written and the Jesuit church built.
All of sudden, history came alive. Realising I was listening to 16th century music in a baroque church in Latin America, it daunted to me how alien all of this experience was to these lands. Back in the day, locals didn't compose such music; they weren't catholic; and their concept of a fun night out most certainly wasn't attending a baroque music ensemble. Those who did attend such nights out (or, more likely, afternoons), were the nouveaux riches, the local elite seeking social acceptance among the Spanish colonialists, who had imposed their rites and customs on these promised lands.
Nothing else symbolised in a better way this cultural imposition and ignorance of the local richess as the inside decoration of the church, completely guilded with gold leaf, freshly extracted from the land on which it was built, with the blood of people it had expulsed and demonised. The sounds and voices that just a minute back had sounded so warm and joyful, became distantly cool and, in a way, made me feel out of place. The performance got a whole new dimension, moving me immensly, giving me the sensation that history was overwhelming me. And that, at the sound of a theorbo...
The other night, I attended a performance of the Colombian 'early music ensemble' Musica Ficta, in the magical Iglesia de la Compañía, just a block down the road from the presidential palace. This baroque ensemble is renowned for playing Hispano-American baroque music, with scores dug up from archives in Bogotá, Quito, Cusco and other cultural centres of the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. By default, these historical notes beg for equally historical instruments such as the baroque guitar, the vihuela, the shawm, the dulcian and the theorbo.
As the church got filled with the warmth of guitar strings, graceful puffs and flaring chantings, Carlos Serrano shared with his audience how thrilled they all were to be playing their baroque music in that church, the perfect setting given their historical coincidence. That comment of his made me think back at some of the texts from The Peru Reader that I had read on the Viceroyalty of Peru (stretching from the Carribean beaches of Colombia to Potosi's ore-filled Cerro Rico in present-day Bolivia), the geo-political framework of the very same period in which that music was written and the Jesuit church built.
Musica Ficta performing in the Iglesia de la Compañía
All of sudden, history came alive. Realising I was listening to 16th century music in a baroque church in Latin America, it daunted to me how alien all of this experience was to these lands. Back in the day, locals didn't compose such music; they weren't catholic; and their concept of a fun night out most certainly wasn't attending a baroque music ensemble. Those who did attend such nights out (or, more likely, afternoons), were the nouveaux riches, the local elite seeking social acceptance among the Spanish colonialists, who had imposed their rites and customs on these promised lands.
Nothing else symbolised in a better way this cultural imposition and ignorance of the local richess as the inside decoration of the church, completely guilded with gold leaf, freshly extracted from the land on which it was built, with the blood of people it had expulsed and demonised. The sounds and voices that just a minute back had sounded so warm and joyful, became distantly cool and, in a way, made me feel out of place. The performance got a whole new dimension, moving me immensly, giving me the sensation that history was overwhelming me. And that, at the sound of a theorbo...
Tuesday, 21 February 2012
Small Brother prevails in media clamp-down
One big item has dominated the airwaves here in Ecuador since my recent arrival in the country: the Supreme Court ruling in the Correa v El Universo case. The judges upheld the earlier verdicts that condemn Emilio Palacio, former op-ed writer of the Guayaquil newspaper El Universo, as well as the three co-directors of the same newspaper, Carlos, César and Nicolas Pérez, to a $40m fine and a three year sentence in prison, on the charge of defamation of a public authority.
The reason for this hefty sentence is an op-ed written by Emilio Palacio on February 6, 2011, in which he questions the reasons behind president Rafael Correa's proposal to pardon the alleged perpetrators of the September 30, 2010 coup and attack at civilians in a hospital in Quito. The op-ed frames the president's actions in quite strong wordings (Correa is being referred to as 'Dictator'), hinting at an absence of evidence against the coup-stagers as the real motivation behind the presidential pardon. After highlighting several inconsistencies in the coup story, allegedly framed by the president himself to save face for a series of misjudged actions following the police protests of that very 30th of September, Palacio ends his piece with the advice that, given the different legal status of the pardon (compared with a general amnesty), "the president might himself face lawsuits once he steps down, for having ordered the indiscriminate shooting, without previous warning, of a hospital full with innocent civilians."
The ruling has stirred a lot of upheaval in the national and international (mainly Spanish) press, as it basically sets a dangerous precedent to restrict press freedom, whenever critical of the president's (or another public authority, for that matter) actions. Not only is the ruling's realm quite profound, several questionable procedural irregularities have occurred along the road. To name but a few: the first, 150-page ruling in this case was issued by a judge - who had just started that very day - in less than 24 hours; several judges who sat on the appeal process had been replaced while the appeal was ongoing; and the accuser's legal team has been reported to have exerted heavy pressure on the judges sitting in on this case (even up to the point that the ruling had been written in large part by Correa's lawyers).
There are some more striking elements in this case. Shouldn't the basis of the ruling be evidence presented by Correa's lawyers to prove that Palacio has willingly and knowingly written lies (ie. defamated) about the president? And why suing and condemning the directors of the newspaper, while they have offered to rectify any factual errors upon the president's providing evidence thereof (which Correa kindly declined to do)? No evidence has been reported to have been presented to justify the ridiculously high fines to compensate for the 'moral damage' Correa has suffered as a result of that op-ed (isn't a right to response more in order to rectify such mistakes written in newspapers?). Remarkably, the magnitude of the fines and jail sentence has been justified by Correa's public office, whereas the president has claimed all along this trial to have taken this case to court as a layman, to show that even laymen should not tolerate that newspapers write lies about them.
The sentencing in this case seems to have forgone any measure of proportionality, leaving little margin of interpretation other than setting an example to rein in press scrutiny of high public offices. Worryingly, this has not been the only sign of restricting press freedom in Ecuador. Upon the president's introduction, the National Assembly has passed a law limiting press freedom during elections, and another law is under discussion to set up a media regulatory board to vet the content of Ecuadorian media. Also, two other journalists (Juan Carlos Calderón and Christian Zurita) have been fined $2m for their 'defamatory' book The Big Brother (El Gran Hermano), in which they disclose evidence of cronyism in granting big state contracts to the president's older brother Fabricio Correa. Commenting on his small brother's legal escapades, big brother Correa stated that "one doesn't even observe such acts of barbarity in African dictatorships." The last word has not yet been spilled, so much is certain.
Ecuadorian president Correa calls press scrutiny of his actions to a halt (source)
The reason for this hefty sentence is an op-ed written by Emilio Palacio on February 6, 2011, in which he questions the reasons behind president Rafael Correa's proposal to pardon the alleged perpetrators of the September 30, 2010 coup and attack at civilians in a hospital in Quito. The op-ed frames the president's actions in quite strong wordings (Correa is being referred to as 'Dictator'), hinting at an absence of evidence against the coup-stagers as the real motivation behind the presidential pardon. After highlighting several inconsistencies in the coup story, allegedly framed by the president himself to save face for a series of misjudged actions following the police protests of that very 30th of September, Palacio ends his piece with the advice that, given the different legal status of the pardon (compared with a general amnesty), "the president might himself face lawsuits once he steps down, for having ordered the indiscriminate shooting, without previous warning, of a hospital full with innocent civilians."
The ruling has stirred a lot of upheaval in the national and international (mainly Spanish) press, as it basically sets a dangerous precedent to restrict press freedom, whenever critical of the president's (or another public authority, for that matter) actions. Not only is the ruling's realm quite profound, several questionable procedural irregularities have occurred along the road. To name but a few: the first, 150-page ruling in this case was issued by a judge - who had just started that very day - in less than 24 hours; several judges who sat on the appeal process had been replaced while the appeal was ongoing; and the accuser's legal team has been reported to have exerted heavy pressure on the judges sitting in on this case (even up to the point that the ruling had been written in large part by Correa's lawyers).
There are some more striking elements in this case. Shouldn't the basis of the ruling be evidence presented by Correa's lawyers to prove that Palacio has willingly and knowingly written lies (ie. defamated) about the president? And why suing and condemning the directors of the newspaper, while they have offered to rectify any factual errors upon the president's providing evidence thereof (which Correa kindly declined to do)? No evidence has been reported to have been presented to justify the ridiculously high fines to compensate for the 'moral damage' Correa has suffered as a result of that op-ed (isn't a right to response more in order to rectify such mistakes written in newspapers?). Remarkably, the magnitude of the fines and jail sentence has been justified by Correa's public office, whereas the president has claimed all along this trial to have taken this case to court as a layman, to show that even laymen should not tolerate that newspapers write lies about them.
The sentencing in this case seems to have forgone any measure of proportionality, leaving little margin of interpretation other than setting an example to rein in press scrutiny of high public offices. Worryingly, this has not been the only sign of restricting press freedom in Ecuador. Upon the president's introduction, the National Assembly has passed a law limiting press freedom during elections, and another law is under discussion to set up a media regulatory board to vet the content of Ecuadorian media. Also, two other journalists (Juan Carlos Calderón and Christian Zurita) have been fined $2m for their 'defamatory' book The Big Brother (El Gran Hermano), in which they disclose evidence of cronyism in granting big state contracts to the president's older brother Fabricio Correa. Commenting on his small brother's legal escapades, big brother Correa stated that "one doesn't even observe such acts of barbarity in African dictatorships." The last word has not yet been spilled, so much is certain.
Tuesday, 7 February 2012
On the road again
It's not an easy time for young people, like myself, who have a keen interest in international affairs, development dilemmas and other cross-boundary enigmas, to find a job. Competition is fierce at home, and it only gets worse if you're looking into getting some real field experience that doesn't come straight off your (parents') bank account. For some reason, it just seems that people had it so much easier say twenty-thirty years ago. You just jumped on a plane and went into the field; whatever your experience was, you could turn it into some development-building skills.
Nowadays, however, thousands of students are able to study international development, human rights or even more specific topic areas - unheard of twenty years ago. All these students enter the labour market, eager for a job, preferably in the field, with no other skills but their mind and all the theoretical discussions they've so eagerly engaged in at uni. They face an increasing demand for professional employees - upward and downward accountability kind of spiked up the game for development organisations - while stimulating local capacity building (i.e. getting locals to do the job you so eagerly want to do).
Many a student ends up quite disappointed in a random office job in his home country, doing whatever to keep the beer flowing. Others prefer to get out there, earning the field cred by having themselves exploited for a dime (or less) as they tick off all the main world wonders along the way. Admittedly, some beer may have flowed as well.
In my experience, it has been as much about following your heart and engaging in the real stuff as it has been about getting to know the people, or, put better, getting people to know you and what you're worth. After all, you do possess the skills needed to make it; it's just, there's like a thousand of you waiting to do the same job!
Anyhow, to cut the chase: I'm off! After a year of doing bits and pieces, some more related to international development than others, I've managed to get hold of a really interesting intern position at UNDP in Quito, Ecuador. I hope to learn more soon about what it is exactly that I'll be doing there, but word is that I'll become a gender strategist, as part of a team that accompanies Ecuador's decentralisation of development cooperation. Of course, I'll do my utmost best to keep you posted on my wanderings, along with the occasional inspiring video. Let's stick to the development area this time: sometimes you just need people thinking outside the box, or applying approaches from different fields to yours, to achieve a break through, or at the very least, to stir up sedated minds. Enjoy!
Nowadays, however, thousands of students are able to study international development, human rights or even more specific topic areas - unheard of twenty years ago. All these students enter the labour market, eager for a job, preferably in the field, with no other skills but their mind and all the theoretical discussions they've so eagerly engaged in at uni. They face an increasing demand for professional employees - upward and downward accountability kind of spiked up the game for development organisations - while stimulating local capacity building (i.e. getting locals to do the job you so eagerly want to do).
Many a student ends up quite disappointed in a random office job in his home country, doing whatever to keep the beer flowing. Others prefer to get out there, earning the field cred by having themselves exploited for a dime (or less) as they tick off all the main world wonders along the way. Admittedly, some beer may have flowed as well.
In my experience, it has been as much about following your heart and engaging in the real stuff as it has been about getting to know the people, or, put better, getting people to know you and what you're worth. After all, you do possess the skills needed to make it; it's just, there's like a thousand of you waiting to do the same job!
Anyhow, to cut the chase: I'm off! After a year of doing bits and pieces, some more related to international development than others, I've managed to get hold of a really interesting intern position at UNDP in Quito, Ecuador. I hope to learn more soon about what it is exactly that I'll be doing there, but word is that I'll become a gender strategist, as part of a team that accompanies Ecuador's decentralisation of development cooperation. Of course, I'll do my utmost best to keep you posted on my wanderings, along with the occasional inspiring video. Let's stick to the development area this time: sometimes you just need people thinking outside the box, or applying approaches from different fields to yours, to achieve a break through, or at the very least, to stir up sedated minds. Enjoy!
Sunday, 22 January 2012
And you thought you were off for a nice morning of bargain-hunting...
Two weeks ago, I was out on the streets of Leuven, raising funds for Vredeseilanden. Although it is a non-governmental organisation, 68% of its budget comes from the government. (That's quite a lot, considering that most - if not all - NGOs in the South get nothing from their governments.) However, to justify that this civil society organisation is worthy of these tax Euros, it should demonstrate that it actually has a support base in society. That is why, every year, thousands of volunteers seek the financial contributions of the people on the street as a tangible evidence of them conferring legitimacy on Vredeseilanden's mission in our society.
As my fingers were getting numb from the cold, I didn't even get to explaining in most cases what we were raising money for. People either pretended not hear me, ditching me with a cold 'no, no' while staring into the shop displays with the newest sales on offer, or happily pulled out their wallets with their minds torn between which gadget to get in return for their contribution. Fortunately, the mix of people's reactions was balanced enough to keep me going through the cold. One guy, however, made my day.
Asked to support Vredeseilanden, he replied in a somewhat offended manner - 'Don't you know how expensive life's become these days? I have to buy a new car, that's taking more than enough out of my wallet!'. Well, then. I reckoned that if he was going to buy a new car, 5 Euro more wouldn't really make that much of a difference in the face of so big an expenditure. Yet, that really seems to have pulled his strings - 'Haven't you got any idea how much a Mercedes costs? You must think I've got money to spare!' Mightily offended, he then strode off to the car salon and left me wondering whether to rip the hair off my head or burst out in laughter.
This anecdote came to my mind as I was thinking back on the seminar I gave yesterday at a development course. During the last part of that session, we were reflecting with the group on solutions for the structural inequality and unfairness of the international trade system, especially when it comes to agriculture. One of the students asked me why it is that policy makers and politicians persistently neglect the evidence that free trade is hurting instead of benefiting the 1.3 billion small scale farmers who - oh gruesome irony - do not have enough to feed their families. 'Because a lot of them honestly believe that free trade is the real solution to this problem,' I said to her. At which point, then,
several other students joined that girl's outrage at willingly turning a blind eye at three decades of failed agricultural free trade policies.
It struck me that the indignation with which the girls at the seminar fumed against those 'blind and ignorant' policy makers, was not too different from the way that man on the street reacted to me for even daring to suggest that he could pinch off a few bucks from his car budget. As this only hit me several hours after that class, I couldn't share these last thoughts anymore, so I do it here. All too often we are so convinced of other people's wrong, that we erupt like a volcano with lava streams of arguments proving our right. Self-gratifying as this may be, it won't bring us any closer to a solution. For this, we should seek to understand why that other person holds these views and figure out a way - if possible - to create common ground, a level playing field from which to reach a better outcome than the status quo; an outcome to which both parties agree and which they honestly support. After all, there is often little point in being right when you're on your own at the right side of the table.
Who could say no to such cute faces freezing in the cold? (source)
As my fingers were getting numb from the cold, I didn't even get to explaining in most cases what we were raising money for. People either pretended not hear me, ditching me with a cold 'no, no' while staring into the shop displays with the newest sales on offer, or happily pulled out their wallets with their minds torn between which gadget to get in return for their contribution. Fortunately, the mix of people's reactions was balanced enough to keep me going through the cold. One guy, however, made my day.
Asked to support Vredeseilanden, he replied in a somewhat offended manner - 'Don't you know how expensive life's become these days? I have to buy a new car, that's taking more than enough out of my wallet!'. Well, then. I reckoned that if he was going to buy a new car, 5 Euro more wouldn't really make that much of a difference in the face of so big an expenditure. Yet, that really seems to have pulled his strings - 'Haven't you got any idea how much a Mercedes costs? You must think I've got money to spare!' Mightily offended, he then strode off to the car salon and left me wondering whether to rip the hair off my head or burst out in laughter.
This anecdote came to my mind as I was thinking back on the seminar I gave yesterday at a development course. During the last part of that session, we were reflecting with the group on solutions for the structural inequality and unfairness of the international trade system, especially when it comes to agriculture. One of the students asked me why it is that policy makers and politicians persistently neglect the evidence that free trade is hurting instead of benefiting the 1.3 billion small scale farmers who - oh gruesome irony - do not have enough to feed their families. 'Because a lot of them honestly believe that free trade is the real solution to this problem,' I said to her. At which point, then,
several other students joined that girl's outrage at willingly turning a blind eye at three decades of failed agricultural free trade policies.
It struck me that the indignation with which the girls at the seminar fumed against those 'blind and ignorant' policy makers, was not too different from the way that man on the street reacted to me for even daring to suggest that he could pinch off a few bucks from his car budget. As this only hit me several hours after that class, I couldn't share these last thoughts anymore, so I do it here. All too often we are so convinced of other people's wrong, that we erupt like a volcano with lava streams of arguments proving our right. Self-gratifying as this may be, it won't bring us any closer to a solution. For this, we should seek to understand why that other person holds these views and figure out a way - if possible - to create common ground, a level playing field from which to reach a better outcome than the status quo; an outcome to which both parties agree and which they honestly support. After all, there is often little point in being right when you're on your own at the right side of the table.
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