3/31/03

These articles originally appeared on we!, our weekly newsletter.

Much work has been by civil society groups in the past two weeks to incorporate their voice (and having it heard) at the recently concluded Second Preparatory Meeting (PrepCom-2) of the WSIS in Geneva, Switzerland (17-28 February)

Here are some of the highlights and output we have gathered:

Comprehensive PrepCom-2 outcomes with input from women's groups

The website http://www.genderit.org is the working site of the members of the This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. mailing list run by the WSIS NGO Gender Strategies Working Group. The group was formed at the first WSIS PrepCom Meeting in Geneva in July 2002 as one of the sub-committees of the Civil Society Coordinating Group (CSCG). The groups involved in this effort are: the African Women's Development and Communications Network (FEMNET), Agencia Latino Americana de Informacion, Association for Progressive Communication-Women's Networking Support Programme, International Women's Tribune Centre, and Isis International-Manila.

A comprehensive flowchart of the whole WSIS process as well as pertinent documents and civil society inputs are also online.

Open Letter about the Orientation Non-paper

Weeks prior to PrepCom-2, the president of the Preparatory Committee, Adama Samassekou, released an informal draft of a paper intended for submission to the PrepCom-2. Civil society organisations reacted strongly to the paper, saying the draft had very vague concepts that can lead to dangerous misinterpretations when implemented. Concerns anticipated and validated by the women's groups point to the seeming absence of gender equality in the paper, which had lumped women in the category of "women and youth" or had assumed/subsumed it under the umbrella "marginalised people."

To critique the non-paper, women from the NGO Gender Strategies Working Group (NGO-GSWG) crafted an open letter and submitted it to Samassekou. As a result, a group of women from different women's organisations had a brief meeting with him. They also found Samassekou receptive to civil society viewpoints in general.

The NGO-GSWG will also send Samassekou documents they prepared and presented at the PrepCom-2 plenary.

The orientation non-paper can be accessed at this new link: http://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/md/03/wsispc2/inf/S03-WSISPC2-INF-0001!!MSW-E.doc.

The open letter can be accessed at:
http://www.genderit.org/wsis/Open-Letter-Fr.doc (French version)
http://www.genderit.org/wsis/Open-Letter-En.doc (English version)

Content and themes

The Content and Themes Group of the Civil Society Plenary submitted two documents. The first briefly enumerates "seven must-haves" that attempt to highlight critical issues which are absent or are insufficiently addressed within the WSIS process. This document is available at this link: . The second is an update of the Draft Declaration (Preamble, Visions and Principles) submitted to the Government drafting committee on 26 February

This document is available at this link: http://www.isiswomen.org/onsite/wsis/docs/WSISSCT25Feb2003-en11.doc.

NGO Gender Strategies Working Group intervention

Representing the NGO-GSWG, Susanna George presented an intervention to the Government plenary. The document highlighted the fundamental concerns the Group would like to see reflected in discussions and the outcomes of the WSIS.

This document can be accessed at this link: http://www.isiswomen.org/onsite/wsis/docs/ngo-gsw-intervention.html

Civil Society Draft Declaration

The final Civil Society Draft Declaration underwent a number of revisions and amendments, and this final draft reflects these changes.

This draft highlights concerns discussed several times in different civil society-led mailing lists and working groups. Most of the concerns were noticed to be absent in the official documents that were/are being prepared by the official WSIS body, or the secretariat. These concerns echo the basic sentiment that the whole WSIS outcome, in general, should be pro-people and not pro-technology, and that people's needs should be assessed comprehensively by looking at the basic needs first before embarking on more complex plans of action.

This document is now available online and it can be accessed at: http://www.genderit.org/wsis/comments-cs-on-draft-declaration-26-02-2003.doc.

More updates will follow as soon as they are made available.