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Morocco: French Elections Edition

Jillian York · 13:59

lingua → fr

Morocco, as a former protectorate of France, is still well connected to the country. Beyond French cars and French baguettes, Morocco's law and education systems are influenced by France, and more than half of its citizens speak French fluently. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the presidential elections in France were a popular subject in the blogosphere this week.

Ibn Kafka, writes in his blog Obiter Dicta (fr):

Concernant le tropisme droitier de l'élite marocaine, il ne doit pas étonner. Notons tout d'abord que si une large part de l'opinion marocaine est informée de la tenue des présidentielles françaises et de la personnalité de Nicolas Sarkozy et de Ségolène Royal, seule une minorité (dont je fais partie) suit le déroulement de la campagne au jour le jour. Cette minorité est généralement francophone, urbaine, aisée, et scolarisée dans les écoles de la mission française ou ayant fait des études supérieures en France. Ces caractéristiques dénotent son appartenance aux catégories socio-professionnelles supérieures de la société marocaines, appartenance qui l'incline sans doute assez peu au trotskysme. La culture politique marocaine est en outre autoritaire, et l'ordre socio-politique marocain actuel est adossé à un “partenariat” structurel avec les alliés occidentaux du Maroc, dont la France est le premier, tant au plan économique que politique. D'autre part, le contexte politique marocain est caractérisé par l'émergence irrésistible des islamistes en général et du PJD particulier en tant que première force politique du Royaume - islamistes dont les caractéristiques socio-culturelles sont à l'opposé de celles de l'élite urbaine francophone, qui a dès lors intérêt au statu quo politique.

The tendency for the Moroccan elite to be right-leaning should not be surprising. Let us note, first of all, that if a big part of Moroccan opinion is informed of the behavior of the French presidential candidates and the personalities of Nicolas Sarkozy and Ségolène Royal, only a minority (of which I am part) follows the unfolding of the campaign on the day to day. This minority is generally French-speaking, urban, well-off, and has been educated in French Mission schools or has completed higher education in France. This minority is part of a higher socio-economic group of Moroccan society, which undoubtedly does not incline it toward Trotskyism. The Moroccan political culture is, moreover, authoritative, and the current Moroccan socio-political order is geared toward a structural “partnership” with the Western allies of Morocco, of which France is the first, economically and politically. Additionally, the Moroccan political context is characterized by the emergence of Islamism in general, and the PJD in particular as a top political force of the Kingdom - Islamism, of which the sociocultural characteristics are contrary to those of the French-speaking urban elite, which therefore has an interest in the political status quo.

Earlier this week Reda (fr) had posted:

Le 1er tour des présidentielles françaises aura lieu dimanche prochain. Normalement, j’essaie le moins possible de m’immiscer dans les affaires politiques internes d’un pays (je parle de la France bien sûr) pour lequel je n’ai pas d’attaches particulières à part le fait que le Maroc (mon pays natal) avait fait les frais des visées expansionnistes de la France pendant 50 ans et surtout qu’il y a pas mal de marocains ou de leurs descendants (2 millions disons) qui sont installés dans l’hexagone.

Mais voilà, Sarkozy-le leader actuel dans les sondages pour ces élections-a commis l’impair de prendre position dans une affaire maroco-marocaine: Apparemment qu’il aurait convaincu les autorités marocaines de ne pas accorder le droit de vote aux marocains résidants à l’étranger. Il est vrai que le fait que celles-ci accordent la moindre importance à ce qu’un ministre de l’intérieur d’un pays même pas voisin du Maroc m’échappe mais là n’est pas mon propos, Sarkozy aurait dû se mêler de ce qui le regarde.

The first round of the presidential elections will take place next Sunday. Normally, I try my hardest not to get involved in political affairs of a country (I speak of France of course) to which I am not particularly attached, except that Morocco (my native country) has already paid for the expansionist ambitions of France for 50 years and except that there is a significant number of Moroccans or people of Moroccan descent (let's say 2 million) living in France.

Unfortunately, Sarkozy, the current leader in the surveys for these elections - has made the mistake of taking a stand in a Morocco-Moroccan affair; Apparently he may have convinced the Moroccan authorities not to grant voting rights to Moroccan residents abroad. The fact that they give more importance to the Interior Minister of a country which is not even close to Morocco escapes me, but it's not my business; Sarkozy should worry about his own business.

As the results that Sarkozy had won were announced, Kahina (fr) wrote:

Le choix des français s'est porté sur Nicolas SARKOZY par plus de 53,5% des voix, bonne chance donc à notre nouveau président et acceptons cette belle leçon de démocratie.L'heure de la réforme a enfin sonné…

Sarkozy won with more than 53.5% of the votes. Good luck thus to our new president and let's accept this beautiful lesson of democracy. The hour of reform has finally arrived…

Laila Lalami was less congratulatory, saying “53% of French voters have decided to let Sarkozy ‘water-hose' more 'scum' from the projects.”

Lastly, Label Ash (fr) summed it up nicely by saying “Et comme il faut être bon joueur, Bravo Monsieur le Président, même si je n'ai pas voté pour vous.”

In other words, “And as it is necessary to be a good sport, Bravo Mr. President, even if I did not vote for you.”

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Turkey is Typing…Winding Down from May Day

Deborah Ann Dilley · 13:53

The days before May Day were marked by presidential protests in Turkey, but somehow with the coming of the new month, those peaceful protests became marred by violence. This week on Turkey is Typing we discuss the lasting impressions of the presidential protests, May Day, and the reform that the country is talking about.

Let's begin with Carpetblogger who sums up her impressions of marches, of any type:

In ripening and mature democracies, I hate marches. I think they are pointless tactical efforts that divert energy and resources from more productive organizing activities. They look good on teevee, especially when there are lots of women and pretty flags, but strategically, they accomplish very little.

I make a huge exception in repressive places where public gatherings require serious courage. In the old Ukraine, Belarus and Azerbaijan, gathering in a large groups can help move the ball down the field, provided there's a strategic objective……..

The worst part about marches like the one in Istanbul on Sunday and in Ankara a few weeks back is that they give participants the false impression that they are actually doing something to change the situation. No one got organized as a result of those marches. Not one nurse in Izmir or office worker in Bursa decided, “well, AKP had done a lot to improve the economy, but I've been told secular values are important and those Istanbul secularists can organize a pretty good march, so I guess they deserve my vote.” It's like a bunch of smug San Francisco liberals holding anti-war march on Market Street. Breaking! San Francisco Liberals oppose the war in Iraq!

As the only functioning Muslim democracy with a growing economy in the region, there's a lot at stake here. The prospect of Sharia scares me and so does the prospect of a military coup. What scares me the most, however, is that the secularists are allowing this opportunity to slip out of their hands.

If either scenario develops, Turkey's secularists have no one to blame but themselves and their marches.

The question is, were the Presidential protests a waste of time? Erkan's Field Diary lists all of the international news coverage on the subject, so in that sense Turkey's citizenry was heard. Ignore Me If You Can fills us on in on the new found action of the parliament and the news that the general elections have been moved up:

It looks like we’re getting the elections that we’ve been waiting for sooner than we thought. This is when we will see what the people really want. Hopefully, more than 30% of Turkey will have finally gotten the message and will go use their legal right and voice their opinion at the ballot. This time there is no room to screw this up.

Any good that was done with the Presidential protests was damaged by the May Day riots in Istanbul, where just days earlier marches were peaceful, now hundreds have been detained by police. Talk Turkey posts about the negative press this generates:

Distress calls' are going out in Turkey once again, and the country is definitely in chaos mode. It seems like everytime Turkey makes front page news in the global media (and I mean really makes the headlines, not the ones Turkish press makes it sound ike the whole world is talking about us when they're not,) it's all negative. And the Turks then think the whole world is out to get us. I guess the Turks of Turkey don't realize they're more guilty for making the news than those who report it, even if it is biased.

Negative press…and as Turkey and My Foreign Perspectives points out, negative traffic:

Can you imagine a city the size of Istanbul having the main arteries of travel cut off during morning commute traffic? On purpose! This is exactly what happened when the police closed transportation corridors on the ferries and Metro and added to it the thoroughfare to the Bosphorus Bridge along with closure of Besiktas, an area which sits on the Bosphorus and leads to Taksim Square.

Not only did it create mass traffic problems, but many employers told their employees to stay home, so no work today (or rather yesterday).

We have recently seen two weeks of thousands in the streets here in Istanbul, making it seem to outsiders that Turkey is on meltdown with everyone running riot in the streets. This is just not true!

And of course, as Me and Others illustrates, not all public opinion on the recent marches is the same:

my father in-law had asked the most ridiculous question to my wife when he learned that we attended the caglayan rally in Istanbul. he asked “what were you doing there? are you a commy? you were like that when you were a kid too.”

even though it is the most ridiculous comment, it is perfectly understandable. there is a very solid image in this country that only the leftists and communists attend street demonstrations. the fields were left to people who demanded things which didn't necessarily meet with the demands of the public which is the consequence of the simple fact that the leftists failed to understand the real nature of the Turkish people for most cases. so, even though my father-in-law prefers to define himself as a democrat, he seems not to understand what we were trying to do in the rally, because I am quite sure that he would appreciate it if he understood. but the thing is, it was really better that I didn't go to that barbecue party because my father-in-law is too old to accept anything new in his political views, and he would just refuse to listen to me when I said his comment was not even close. That's why I don't like getting into political debates. Nobody cares to listen but only wants the others to accept his views as the ultimate truth.

We will end today with the White Path who outlines the latest “Jewish conspiracy”, you will probably find it as hard to believe as he did:

Did you know that Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdoğan and his wife are crypto-Jews who secretly collaborate with the Mossad? And that they are trying to cook-up “moderate Islam” and destroy Turkish secularism for the sake of serving the elders of Zion?

Well, I had no clue about that terrible conspiracy either, until I went into a major Istanbul bookstore last weekend and checked the bestsellers list. There were a few usual titles telling stories about how the beloved Secular Turkish Republic is targeted by internal and external plots — a highly popular and powerful paranoia in the country these days — but none of them were as informative as the one penned by a die-secularist named Ergün Poyraz.

Ahhh….politics…

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Nicaragua: Open Source Software, Machisimo in the Park, and an Immigration Rally

Rodrigo Peñalba · 12:56

This is a round-up for blogs in Nicaragua in the last week.

Spreading Open Source Philosophy

On March 28th the Grupo Ubuntu Nicaragua (an open source community) coordinated the Festival Latinoamericano de Instalación de Software Libre (FLISOL 2007) for Nicaragua. The Festival is an effort across Latin America to help spread the knowledge of Open Source Technologies. The Group Ubuntu ran the event in León and Managua, with conferences explaining the advantages of Linux and Open Source softwares compared to propietary software and licenses.

Many volunteers were installing and giving away discs with samples of free software, even installing complete linux distributions for the visitors for free.

Barricada.com.ni reported on the event:

Photo taken from Barricada.com

Hace falta ver a más gente No Dedicada a esas areas tecnicas exponer sus experiencas; y se hablo poco o nada sobre varios fenómenos web que están sucediendo hoy en dia: Blogs, ciberperiodismo, medios independientes, generación de contenido, etc. Pero esta fue la primera experiencia de este tipo, y todo el esfuerzo fue hecho de manera gratuita por el Grupo UBUNTU de Nicaragua y el Grupo Pro Software Libre, por lo que creemos positivo el esfuerzo.

There's a need for people Non Dedicated to IT to share their experiences, and many trends of the web were not part of the conferences: blogs, ciberjournalism, independent media, user generated content, etc. But this is the first experience of its kind in Nicaragua, and the Grupo Ubuntu gave their time for free, so we think its a positive effort.

Watch more photos on Flickr and a video on Youtube. More comments for the group were made on the Universidad Nacional de Ingeneria Computing Forums

Working With Meat

A new blog called Working With Meat by “Christiane” tells us:

Saturday's field investigations led to the shocking conclusions:

1. Patriarchy is still the foundation of our society
2. It sucks to be a woman in said society

Christiane and Glow went for a photography session at a local park in Managua only to find themselves sexually harassed by “machistas” all day long.

So, that's the sad story of two girls who had the audacity of being young, female, and pedestrians, but more importantly, young female pedestrians with NO MALE CHAPERONE! The horror!

The whole cronicle gives evidence of how far are we from getting a totally equal and respectful societies for ALL our citizens.

Morterazos en Los Angeles

Luciano Cuadra Waters (a nicaraguan in Los Angeles) writes in NacionGueguence [ES] and La Prensa about a Pro Immigration Rally in Los Angeles, which ended with police violence.

Por lo que pude ver, parece que LAPD pretendía obligar a la multitud a evacuar hacia el lado Nor, nor-oeste del parque MacArthur, pero por alguna razón, los agentes que tenían ubicados en ese sector, empezaron a agredir a los manifestantes, los que se sintieron acorralados. En la televisión se puede notar claramente a los oficiales de policía golpeando a personas mayores de edad, también a personas que cargaban con sus hijos pequeños, e incluso a periodistas claramente identificados.

La nicaragüense Martha Lorena Guillén me asegura que uno de los agentes intentó golpearla sin razón alguna, quizá por que ella había filmado a este oficial mientra agredía a otra persona. Aproximadamente una hora más tarde, mientras caminaba en dirección al lugar donde había dejado mi vehículo, me encontré con un muchacho que había sido impactado por una bala de goma en su costado derecho “Fue sin motivo alguno. Yo solo llegué a reclamar mis derechos”…

For what i could see, the LAPD pretended to move the crowd toward the Northwestern area of the MacArthur Park, but for some reason the policemen started to hit the demonstrators… On television you can see the officers hitting elderly people, small children and even properly identified journalists.

The Nicaraguan Martha Lorena Guillén assures me that the officers tried to hit her without any apparent reason; maybe for a video she filmed of an officer using extreme force on other person. About a hour later, while I was walking to my vehicle, I found a boy who had been impacted by a rubber bullet in the backside. “It was without reason” said the boy. “I only showed up to demand my rights”

Biodiesel

The MEL-info mailing list posted this article by Arturo M. Lozza about the use of Biodiesel:

Los movimientos sociales lanzan voces de alerta y no son pocos los investigadores con visiones muy distintas a las planteadas por las petroleras ahora devenidas destiladoras del combustible verde. El periodista británico George Monbiot, por ejemplo, hizo cálculos y descubrió que para mover solamente nuestros coches y autobuses con agrodiesel se requerirían sembrar 25,9 millones de hectáreas. Sin embargo, existen en el Reino Unido solo 5,7 millones de hectáreas.

The social movements have raised the alert and many researchers have a different vision for the future, different from the perspective of the oil companies turned defenders of the green fuels. The British journalist George Monbiot, for example, made calculations and discovered that in order to cover the oil demand in United Kingdom there is the need to grow 25.9 millions hectares of corn. However, there are only 5.9 millions hectares available in the United Kingdom.

MEL-Info is a mailing list with 5000 suscribers dedicated to enviromental and cultural discussion in the country. Sometimes the editors post articles relevant to local events.

On the other side, Sofonías Martín Cisneros Argeñal writes an apology for the biodiesel project in Nicaragua:

La actual campaña de demonización en contra de los proyectos de producción de biodiesel tempate es totalmente infundada, malintencionada e irresponsable.

The demonizing campaign against the biodiesel project is totally unfounded, ill-intentioned and irresponsible.

…Los costos de producción y mantenimiento del tempate y de la palma africana son convenientemente mucho más bajos que los costos por hectárea de maíz. Las ventajas de estos cultivos no se limitan solamente a la simple producción del bendito aceite. Por ejemplo, en el caso del tempate, está conjuntamente ayudando a prevenir y revitalizar exitosamente suelos perdidos por la erosión y desertificación de zonas desérticas de África, Australia, China, India y Latinoamérica.

The production costs of oil with tempate and African palm are conveniently less expensive in costs per hectare of corn. The advantages of this crop doesn't limit the production of the oil. For example, in the case of tempate, it is preventing erosion, helping revitalize the land and stopping the expansion of the desert regions in Africa, Australia, China, India and Latin America.

The La Prensa blogs sometimes serves as ideological supporters of the editorial line of the newspaper, which at this moment is serving as an opposition media to the goverment.

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Madagascar: Lack of Activity in Local Blogs in Times of Crisis Sparks Debate

Lova Rakotomalala · 11:14

lingua → zht · zhs

Much has been written about the series of natural disasters that have hit Madagascar recently. Tomavana sheds some light on yet another crisis in the North-West region of Madagascar now plagued by famine.

Le Programme alimentaire mondial [PAM] a lancé un nouvel appel en faveur des 190′000 Malagasy victimes des récentes intempéries et cyclones qui ont frappé Madagascar. Le PAM a aussi communiqué l’envoi d’urgence de 100 tonnes de nourriture et de matériel de secours par hélicoptère au cours des quatre prochaines semaines depuis une base dans la ville d’Antsohihy.

The world food Program [WFP] launched a new call for the relief of the 190,000 Malagasy victims of the recent bad weather and cyclones that struck Madagascar. WFP also communicated the emergency send-off of 100 tons of food and rescue-materials by helicopter in the next four weeks from the central base located in the town of Antsohihy.

The post prompted this reaction from a reader of the blog, Lamako, who is disappointed that there are too few of such kind of
actions or posts:

C’ était à prévoir même si les médias malgaches n’en parlent qu’avec parcimonie voire pas du tout.
Ce qui est triste, c’est le manque de solidarité des malgaches de la diaspora envers ces milliers de de sinistrés.
Les sites web malgaches parlent de tout sauf de ces risques de famine. Les reportages vidéos et photos se concentrent sur des sujets “people”. Il faut aller sur le site de l’UNICEF pour en voir. Pas d’appel à la solidarité non plus.
C’est comme si la réalité du cyclone est niée. Et c’est cette même diaspora malgache qui hurle au loup contre un reportage de FR3 un tant soit peu critique (?) envers le pays.
On croit rêver !!!

It was to be expected even though the Malagasy media speak little about it or even not at all. It is quite sad that there is a lack of solidarity of the Malagasy diaspora towards these thousands of victims of the disaster. The Malagasy websites speak about everything except these risks of famine. The video reports and photographs concentrate only on “people” issues. One has to go to to the site of the UNICEF to see some news. There is no call to solidarity either. It is as if the reality of the cyclone is denied. And this is the same Malagasy diaspora which cries foul when a FR3 (French tv ) report is a tiny bit critical (?) towards the country. Unbelievable !!!

Tomavana agrees that there could have been more calls for action but points out that more actions were undertaken by other organizations.
Tattum notes that the trust in charitable actions have decreased because so many times humanitarian projects were spoiled by corruption. She would rather act on her own to have more control over the projects.
Lamako responds that there still could have been more publicity in the Malagasy blogs to promote solidarity as it was seen during the Tsunami or Katrina.
Vola points out that the very idea behind a blog is that the subject and ideas posted on it are up to the blogger only. There is no moral or economic duty to fulfill nor should there be a moral judgment imposed upon bloggers' choice of subjects. A blog does not have a mission to save the world unless it wants to. Is there really a need to justify what we are not writing about?

In related news, no Malagasy bloggers commented on the alleged attempted assassination of the Malagasy President last week.

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