Street kids raid WSF poverty summit

by attended the wsf Mon Jan 29, 2007 23:34

Hello,

I attended the world social forum in Nairobi, was there translating mainly, and attended some workshops, the anti coke, some of them organised by Oil Watch from Ecuador against Texaco and a few ones on climate change/carbon trading by a Swedish institute ( with Vandana Shiva)....

There was a tree planting ceremony, Prof Wagaari Matthai did not attend it, however she participated at some of the events...At one of the debates... launching a new women nobel peace prize initiative many of the participants questioned the Somalia US interventions... she made some comments on this...

Just coming back to the organisation of the forum. I met some of members of the organising committee. In fact the cultural stuff was brilliant, I believe that the financial/accounting side failed... as they even were thinking of selling the receivers ( radios) to listen to the translation provided at the forum for 500 shellings... is this a capitalism forum?

the original price charged to access the social forum venue was 500 shellings... around 10 dollars... far too much for Kenya, and later on was dropped to 50 shellings...

I visited Kibera, the second biggest slums after Soweto in South Africa...

I met Frank from a youth community project( will upload the interview asap!) and he was insulted a few times at the forum,,,, just because some believed that he was one of them one attacking the food stalls

in general I enjoyed the forum, although the issue with security and personal belongings was a kind of nightmare... people were robbed camaras, passport, laptops. mobile, event articles... and glasses....

I attended the demonstration at the opening... there were not enough Latin Americans.... the airplane cost is quite expensive, and this was obvious...

for more question or comments please feel free to email me miren.s@gmx.net

I had some interesting recorders...
bye for now

by dunk - IMC-radio support for WSF Tue Jan 30, 2007 17:33 fuspey at yahoo dot co dot uk

Another act of thievery also happened, this time vital equipment there to assist local communities was stolen: IMC radio team and IMC-Kenya teams were robbed at gunpoint
IMC-radio team held up in Naorobi by gunpoint yesterday evening
http://kenya.indymedia.org/news/2007/01/521_comment.php

and...

The impact of the World Social Forum on the people of Kibera: "a Failure"
http://kenya.indymedia.org/news/2007/01/534.php

includes more stories from the recent WSF:

"What Is WSF? Something That Will Bring Me Medicine?"
Peace March: From Kibera to Uhuru Park, for the opening of the World Social Forum
Kenya. Wsf 2007: "Da Kibera a Nairobi" (Italian)
Kenya: I Poveri e il World Social Forum

by pat c Tue Jan 30, 2007 17:42

"Another act of thievery also happened, "

Are you for real? The kids expropriation of the food was not thievery. Given the contempt shown to the local communities by the WSF organisers I'm not surprised that people were robbed. Its a pity it happened to IMC activists.

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