CIVIL SOCIETY

WORKING GROUP on FINANCING MECHANISMS

Message from the coordinator (Djilali Benamrane, 17 September 2004 )

Dear Christoph, dear all

I read your mail to Francis, I am very happy to learn there is in the North some other efforts concerning this matter of financing. I am sending a copy to the few people I know which already stated - in a formal or informal way - to be interested in the issue. Thank you very much for the moment being I propose the following procedure:

1. I Myself (Djilali), Roberto (who is informed by the initiative and who have not yet react), Rainer or and anybody else willing and able to coordinate/moderate the group could start the e-mail list; maybe it would be helpful that every participant of the list briefly explains her/his background and his speficic interest in the Financing Working Group; Thanks a lot for your kind offer. I shall try to propose to some friends from Africa, Asia and Middle East to join us. In order to have fruitfull discussion, as you said, there is a need to have a mailing list and a web site. This is the reason why I asked Francis to help us in that regards. You are therefore kindly invited to register to the mailing list that has prepared for this purpose ( http://fr.groups.yahoo.com/group/wsis-finance ) I guess it will save the time of everybody if I register all the co-recepients of this message to the list. I stay waitting for your proposal some of you have already registered. I will be happy if another moderator may help me moderate this list. Concerning the coordination of this group in formation, it is the coalition of the willing, and my call is open.
   As an African and an UN economist (retired), I will be glad to coordinate this effort. I asked Francis from France to help us in that task because he is currently investigating under the friendly patronage of Adama Samassekou ( no longer a WSIS official ) what could be the international public legal framework for MSP. He is also available for providing us with some linguistics help ( English & Spanish). I better like to express myself in French and if necessary in English. I suggest that there should be no more than 3 or 4 co-coordinators, taking into account gender and regional diversity as much as possible, it is the maximal number I noticed in the current WSIS Working Groups, otherwise we have to go to another structure: a larger coordinating board with a president of the board. Too much complicated, What do you think ?
2. We briefly survey already existing civil society resources policy papers, good practice reports, evaluations, institutions, persons, ongoing research etc.); Yes, we must be open to new ideas and we do have to try to involve participants from Africa, especially from LDCs. Hashimoto from UNDP seems to be looking honestly for news ideas, new structures, the current UN system needs a reform, and possibly many funding organizations.
3. Starting from the "Financing and Infrastructure" chapter of the Civil Society Declaration we formulate some general guidelines for the further development of a CS position paper; OK, that could constitute a starting point.
4. . We have a civil society workshop on financing on Nov. 18th, the day before the UN ICT Task Force meeting in Berlin. Ralph Bendrath volunteers to coordinate at least the organizational part (is that correct, Ralph?). Workshop 3 of the Task Force meeting on Nov. 19th is about "Financing ICT for development". It is might be good idea to link efforts at the WSIS and efforts at the UN ICT Task force.