Global Voices Online » 2007 » October

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Ecuador: Alianza Pais Wins the Majority of Seats

Milton Ramirez · 22:32

lingua → pt · es

Photo of Rafael Correa during the campaign. Taken by Manuel Nieves and used by permission.

This past weekend nearly 9 million Ecuadoran nationals and others who live abroad voted looking for a change in direction of Ecuador politics. Seats for the Constituent Assembly were up for grabs, and the current President Rafael Correa's political party, Alianza Pais, was expected to win a large majority of these positions. Even though the official tally is still being counted, early estimates have given Correa a majority in the 130-member assembly.

EcuadorElige [ES] has been following all the conversation regarding this election and shares with us some links of some of the most recognized Ecuadoran bloggers and what they have to say about the election.

The blogger Don Xavier [ES] writes about the different threats and warnings given to voters if Correa was given increased power in the country's affairs. He makes a reference to childhood saying about witches, old men in coats and a cuckoo that would take small children away if they did not do what they were supposed to.

Ahora ya no dicen CUCO, se refieren a el como CHAVEZ, no me amenazan con la BRUJA en vez de eso me dicen que van a derogar la dolarización y que el VIEJITO DEL SACO no es nada mas ni nada menos que el SOCIALISMO DEL SIGLO XXI.

Now they no longer say CUCKOO, talking about him like CHAVEZ, they do not threaten me with the WITCH, and instead, say to me that they are going to change the dollar currency and that the VIEJITO OF the COAT is nothing more than the SOCIALISM OF the 21st CENTURY.

Libertad Ecuador [ES] is worried about the results and what might happen to the country now that Correa has increased control:

Solo cuando pierdan su trabajo o una posibilidad de negocio y se les haga imposible enrumbarse nuevamente debido a la recesión económica ya iniciada gracias a las políticas populistas del Rafico se darán cuanta del error cometido.

Only when they lose their jobs or any business possibility and for them it becomes impossible to find a path due to the economic recession already initiated thanks to the Rafico's populist policies, will they realize of the mistake that they committed.

El Federalista [ES] sums it up bluntly:

The winer: Correa, the losers: everyone

El ganador: Correa, los perdedores: todos

Cronica Cero [ES], mocks of two of the most senior parties in Ecuador for not acknowledging their defeat:

En la hora de la derrota, ni Jaime Nebot, ni Nicolás Lapentti acudieron a dar la cara. La historia seguramente los marcará como cobardes, faltos de entereza para reconocer que se equivocaron.

…In the hour of the defeat, neither Jaime Nebot, nor Nicholas Lapentti appeared. History surely will mark them as cowards, without integrity for not admitting that they were mistaken.

El Manaba [ES] author of a very popular blog in Ecuador concludes:

Una leccion para los partidos politicos, o se renuevan o mueren

A lesson for the political parties, either they change or they condemned to die.

Ecuador will know if the majority of assembly men and women who were picked up to change the Ecuadoran Constitution were the right people and whether giving Mr. Correa more power will mean a positive change for emigrants, locals and all people living and will grow up in this country.

1 comment · »»

Ukraine: So Long, Oleksandr Moroz?

Veronica Khokhlova · 20:54

According to the preliminary results of Ukraine's Sept. 30 snap parliamentary election, five parties and blocs out of 20 will most likely get the minimum 3-percent share of the vote required to enter the new parliament: the Party of Regions, Yulia Tymoshenko's Bloc, Our Ukraine/People's Self-Defense Bloc, the Communist Party, and Volodymyr Lytvyn's Bloc.

It also appears that Oleksandr Moroz, leader of the Socialist Party, who was Victor Yushchenko's ally during the 2004 Orange Revolution, but joined Victor Yanukovych's coalition to become the speaker following the March 2006 vote, is not getting a sufficient number of votes this time.

It's still a bit too early to tell for sure, but a number of Ukrainian bloggers are already cheering the renegade Socialist leader's defeat. Yaroslava Naumova, editor of the Life section of the new Ukrainian-language weekly Novynar, wrote this (UKR) on her blog on Oct. 2:

Observing my friends and colleagues for the past two days, I've arrived at this conclusion: there is a lot more interest in the fate of the Socialists than in who will come in first or even in the future [coalition-building process]. We call one another, check the latest figures, regions where the vote is still not over, etc. That is, everyone's had enough of Grandfather Moroz. This has become a matter of principle, and everything, even the more important things, are pushed back. And so we have one more peculiarity of this election: “Moroz isn't gonna get through” (?!) :)

Here are the comments to this post:

reporterka:

To Yaroslava. I think it's not as much of an interest and concern for the fate of Grandfather Moroz, but rather cynicism: whether he'll get what he deserves.

Yaroslava Naumova:

Right, it's something of a way to check whether there is justice in this world :) and we are all busy now trying to get an answer to this rhetorical question :)

Anatoliy:

It seems to me that this will serve as a lesson to others (the leaders).

Borys Kushniruk, an economist who maintains a blog at Ukrayinska Pravda, a popular online publication co-founded by Georgiy Gongadze in 2000, wrote this (UKR) on Oct. 1:

[…] The Socialists' failure to get into the parliament may become one of the most important results of this election. Betrayal of their voters and public lies that [abounded] at the time of their joining the Party of the Regions had to be punished. Such a result of the vote has to become yet another new tradition of the Ukrainian parliamentary system. Parties, and, even more so, their leaders, have to bear responsibility for their actions […] and [their voters] have to punish them by no-confidence vote.

Here is a handful of readers' reactions:

zinik:

How are you going to survive without Moroz? Who's going to act as a [scapegoat]? The [president]?

PVN:

The author's so naive. Moroz is out - so what? Other fools have voted for Lytvyn, a faithful Kuchmist. […]

LH:

What's there to be happy about? It would've been better to have 3 percent of the Socialists in and [all] the Communists out. Just think of their constant screaming about NATO. Sick of them.

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Philippines: Bloggers React To Poll Chief's Resignation

Tonyo Cruz · 16:02

lingua → mg

The corruption scandal that Mong Palatino reported as having reached the Philippine presidential palace is unfolding fast.

Benjamin Abalos, the powerful chair of the Commission on Elections (Comelec) who was implicated in the National Broadband Network (NBN), resigned from his post on Monday.

Just last week at the Senate, former socio-economic planning secretary and now Commission on Higher Education chairman Romulo Neri accused Abalos of trying to bribe him into favoring Chinese firm ZTE in the construction of a US$329-million NBN for the Philippines. Neri told the senators that he heard Abalos tell him during a golf game, amid chats about the NBN: ” Sec, may 200 ka dito” (Secretary, you have 200 here). Neri told senators that Abalos clearly meant 200 million pesos. Comelec spokesman and blogger James Jimenez posts Abalos's resignation statement and capped it with a question/remark asked of him minutes after his now-former boss made the announcement on national television:

Can you say 'surprise move?'

The immediate reactions of journalists, at least those I saw reporting on ANC, was that of shock.

Manolo said it was a welcome development that should be accepted by those crying for Abalos's head eversince:

For those calling for his resignation for ages now, don’t hit a man when he’s down. He resigned to save his ass, but he still resigned. Give him credit for that. Now, on to the harder part, hauling him off to court. Credit is due for resigning but that’s as far as credit goes. In a country where too few resign despite the public clamor to do so, he did it; but he also did it, to avoid what could have been an historic impeachment. So a historic trial necessarily comes next.

Perhaps one of the many who wanted to Abalos to resign is My name is Daaaviiiiid…who shares that:

Personally it’s been something I’ve been hoping he’d do for a long time. If you check him out online as much as you could, it won’t be surprising if you’ll find a lot of…questionable acts he appears to have committed.

While we're taking on corruption, philiblogs.com asks a relevant question:

Abalos also claimed he would continue the crusade to clear his name and reputation. How noble! But who’s going to clear the name and reputation of the Philippines that by now has firmed up its reputation as a corrupt nation after this scandal?

Another blogger, Ideological Soup, did not mince words in a really scathing reaction to Abalos's resignation statement:

I was extremely bowled over by Abalos's resignation statement, more so when he mentioned the words “to clear my name and reputation.” His crusade to clear his already tainted name by his own wrongdoings is something beyond imagination. History will not be so kind to those who try to distort it. And reputation, this is something that you can't buy, something that you can't pay for, even if you bribe somebody for 200 million or 200 billion to grant you good reputation.

Even Comelec employees reportedly went wild with glee over their chief's resignation.

Oragon is skeptical. Apart from listing three implications of Abalos's action, Oragon says:

[T]he resignation may be viewed as a combination of legal strategy and political maneuver. The first would seek to provide a breathing space for Abalos, the latter would put a breathing space for political leaders implicated in the scandal.

Abalos's resignation effectively stopped the efforts in the House of Representatives to impeach Abalos or, in other words, hold him politically liable, for his role in the NBN-ZTE scam.

christabel is cynical. Hear her speak on the event as sandwiched between thoughts on college basketball and showbiz :

Like some Filipinos, I don't know what to believe anymore. I'm still waiting for further events and I just pray one thing, for the truth to be set out and for corruption to end but just some time ago, the Philippines was named as one of the most corrupt countries in the world today. It's very disappointing.

The team blog of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism thus smells a rat and dubbed Abalos's act as no different from Richard Nixon's.

In Cradle of the Brave, journalist Reeza Singzon shares her conversation with a jurist :

In a conversation this afternoon with the mild-mannered and soft-spoken retired Court of Appeals Justice Santiago Javier Ranada, I brought up the subject and said “Well, now that he is no longer an impeachable official, he just untimely opened himself up to criminal prosecution.”

Justice Ranada said, “That may be true, but remember that resignation does not mean admission of guilt.”

Reeza also issues this warning:

Abalos' persecutors still have a long way to go if they want his head on a platter. Abalos may yet turn out to be greatest strategist in all this, knowing full well that by rendering impeachment moot, any alleged wrongdoing on his part will have to be proved the hard way— beyond reasonable doubt in a criminal case before a fair and impartial court of justice— instead of the highly political and biased impeachment process.

Such cynical view is perhaps shared by many, considering the government's track record. As I have previously pointed out, the Ombudsman may again fail the public's expectation that criminal charges be pressed against Abalos immediately after he relinquishes his post, if we base it on what the agency has done regarding an earlier scandal that rocked the Commission on Elections which Abalos headed.

For AWBHoldings, Abalos has become a lead nominee for his Wall of Shame this year.

The Senate is expected to continue its inquiries, until the whole truth is laid bare. First Gentleman Mike Arroyo may be summoned by the chamber and, if he ignores the summons, may be arrested and forced to sit before the senators.

While there are now millions of Filipino netizens, only this minority may be able to understand what the NBN project is or what it hopes to achieve. Methinks it is a really good project to link together all government agencies, national or local, as well as schools and businesses. Similar projects have done wonders in other countries like Australia. The problem is that the government which aims to do it is so unpopular, graft-ridden and widely perceived to be inefficient and incompetent — so much so that the NBN project is now cursed as if by authorities' reverse Midas touch.

For background info and latest news on the NBN, please visit the Inquirer.net's NBN microsite. Tek 4 d Pipol gives an alternative, nay, progressive view on an NBN for the Philippines for the Philippines. Ditto for physicist Dr. Giovanni Tapang who reminds us in his blog Penguin tales:

Improving telecommunication services by using modern technologies, without corruption and foreign interests, will always be a welcome development for the people.

I agree.

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Bloggers' Notes From Web2forDev Conference

Ndesanjo Macha · 11:56

lingua → pt · zht · zhs

Web2forDev is the first conference on participatory web for rural development, which took place from 25-27 September 2007 in Rome, Italy. Bloggers who were covering the event included African journalists who were blogging both in English and French at the Web2forDev blog.

Brenda Zulu, a journalist and blogger from Zambia asked participants what they learnt on Day Zero:

I asked people about what they learnt on Day Zero Web2.0fordev conference and what they where going to take home.
Prince Deh GINKS Assistant Network Coordinator, Ghana
I am planning to host local language videos and translate the text in English because I realise that many people get my stories and information from the blog. Video blogging has enhanced my knowledge and sharing skills.As you see people are attracted by video and they want to see and hear at the same time. I have learnt how to use delicious, wikis and tagging. One thing is that if you don’t tag your work not so many people will read about it.

William Eziniwa Nwangwu, Nigeria
Regional Center for Information Science, Lecture
I have been wondering why Web 2.0? Isn’t it a new word for an old thing?I have discovered how it is being used and sometimes it worries me as an academician. Some Universities in the
USA have banned students giving reference to wikis as one of their sources of researched information. In wikis who is the author? Is the information peer reviewed? In my institution I limit the reference of wiki copies.

On day 3 she spoke with Wycliffe Ochieng Arua of Agricultural Commodity Exchange from Kenya:

It has been a great conference and the way forward especially if there is a way we could work together to blend the existing web 2 tools that are used in Africa putting in mind our users farmers they would like to access these application.I am looking at mobile telephone and interative voice resposnses an dthe local FM stations in Kenya.
I have taken home a lot of knowledge and I am very much informed now about blogs and wikis and would like to certain up a blog in our organisations especially when we are contributing to a proposal.
I think we used existing network to reach the people CSOs are working with on the grassroot level.

Chris Kgadima posted a podcast of his interview with SANGOnet ICT Services Manager, Matthew de Gale. Matthew talks about Citizen Journalism project designed to promote the use of Web 2.0 bu rural communities in Africa:

SANGOnet is an Information Communication Technology NGO in Southern Africa that promotes and support ICT projects in the region. They are currently setting up Citizen Journalism project with the aim of promoting the use of Web 2.0 by rural communities on issues of development. SANGOnet ICT Services Manager, Matthew de Gale explains how they are planning to make this project to provide communities with necessary skills and opportunities to utilize Web 2.0 to improve their lives.
Interviewee:Matthew de Gale ICT Services Manager SANGonet
Interviewer:Lillian Malete, Nkgowa Media

Brenda Zulu covered the session on video blogging for rural communities in Africa, Vlogging: amplifying voices of rural communities in Africa?:

Rural communities in Africa can have their stories shared with the larger audience using video blogging which is a Web 2.0 application to amplify the voices of the grassroots in the future.

Sharing his experience as a Vlogger, Prince Deh said he had been creating videos and posting them on a blog and hence received feed back from all over the world. “How do we solve the problem of rural connectivity in order to extend the benefits of Web2.0 tools much wider beyond the scope of the cities?” he asked.

Togolese multimedia journalist, Noel Tadégnon, posted a video of his interview with Kuami Ahiabenu from Ghana about empowering journalists with online tools, “Making a case for online training.”

Online training, according to Kwami Ahiabenu, will become the dominant means of training for journalists:

Making a case for online training of Journalists in Africa, Kwami Ahiabenu II from the International Institute for ICT Journalism (PenPlusBytes) observed that online training was going to become dominant means of training and that there was need to invest time and energy to ensure that it becomes part of a capacity building projects and programmes application.

He noted that though there are costs associated with online training in the long run online training was relatively cheaper and cost effective. An achievement was that online learning provided an opportunity for Journalists to learn about new tools and use them in the process of learning

In overcoming the challenges, Ahiabenu II explained that the course used a group e-mail list as their primary course delivery tool in order to ensure low bandwidth participants are not left out of the course.

Holly Ashley, the Assistant Editor, Participatory Learning and Action, wrote about from Ugandan web 2.0 pioneers:

I felt like I had found a magic bean. Ednah works for a Ugandan NGO, Busoga Rural Open Source & Development (BROSDI). It’s a not-for-profit organisation that works with government and civil society in improving rural livelihoods. Within BROSDI is a project called Collecting and Exchanging of Local Agriculture Content (CELAC).

Both BROSDI and CELAC project make extensive use of Web 2.0 approaches. But it’s a real combination of Web 2.0 and grassroots participation. For example, CELAC is almost entirely populated with locally generated content. As Ednah says, ‘We are sharing information from our great grandfathers that we are losing in our generation.’

Essentially, it’s a great combination of the online – Blogs, Google Maps, Wikis, online documentation, chatrooms – and the offline – a weekly mobile phone SMS farmers’ information service, village knowledge brokers, monthly farmer forum meetings, village meetings, radio, and hard copy documentation. They are even developing an e-learning tool for primary school children.

Ethan Zuckerman shared some highlights and his overall impressions:

Kwame Ahiabenu from the International Institute for ICT in Journalism (PenPlusBytes) in Accra, Ghana, makes a persuasive case for the importance of basic tools in online education. His team offers free online trainings for journalists on how to incorporate IT into their journalistic practice and better use IT tools for reporting. The courses are offered via email, and while they encourage the use of fairly complex online tools, they’re accessible to anyone who can participate in the email lists, which helps explain their popularity with users throughout Africa, and as far away as Bangladesh and Australia.

Two overall impressions:

- There’s a great deal of enthusiasm for the tools of web 2.0, but I worry that people are embracing tools because they’re worried about falling behind.

- Those of us who have been working in ICT for development for a while may - or perhaps should - be starting to feel like it’s “put up or shut up” time for these tools. We need to get beyond discussions of how these tools might benefit people and get closer towards ensuring they do benefit people.

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Syria: Reflections from the Blogosphere

Jillian York · 11:40

lingua → ar

Ramadan is a period not only of fasting and restraint, but also of reflection, judging by posts from many Muslim bloggers. Syrians (whether Muslim or not) are no exception, taking this period to reflect upon philosophy, patriotism, and Ramadan itself, among other things.

Abu Fares shares his private thoughts about Ramadan:

I also see no reason to live if my vanity is not subdued by my private notion of faith. I have rejected trekking along a railroad track that could only reach a predetermined destination. I have as well abandoned the delusion of sauntering in an open desert without a compass in hand. My chosen path is shunned at from believers and agnostics. It’s an inacceptable compromise to both, a shortcut leading to a cul-de-sac at best. Yet I persist and when the moment comes and I can’t walk no more, I will look behind from wherever I happen to be and lip-sing with Frank Sinatra: “I did it my way”.

The post garnered a variety of comments. From KJ:

How I live my religion is that religion is a pact exclusively between me and God and no one else has the right to probe into it. You can't standardize something that depends highly on individualistic responses and feelings to the subject matter. I keep my own values, which are mostly guided by religion, and I have other built in values that happen to correspond to the values of my religion (like not drinking). I try to seek knowledge and not limit myself, as well as try to find the formula that JAZZ mentioned. It is a difficult process, but in the end when I manage it (and I know I will), I will be greatly pleased because I know I would have fulfilled, hopefully, my religious and spiritual duties as well as have seen most or all what I would have liked to see and experience in my non-confined life while maintaining my social standards and values.

Dubai Jazz:

My argument is that the richness and the colorfulness of a person's life has nothing to do with his/her religion, that, in my humble opinion, is also applied to one's achievement in life.
An atheist can become a nuclear scientist if he has the faculty, a highly devoted Muslim can be a successful poet if he has the potential.. and so on..
The challenge which is facing Muslims nowadays is this: could a devoted Muslim live his life to the full and enjoy it, and at the same time keep his values intact?
The answer is yes, we can Abu Fares, we can… and if I fail to find the formula, then it is my own shortcoming not Islam's…

But the reflection during this holy month was not only focused on the fast - Decentering Damascus discusses what it means to belong to Syria…

With a country and our belongings to it, the process becomes rather complex. Each Syrian loves her Syria, and each fights or not, to maintain the Syria she sees or wants to see growing. I think most of our belonging to Syria is either fictionist if not imagined. For some, Syria lies in Syrian food, for others it lies in old cafes in Old Damascus. Some belongings to Syria lie in the longing for her. I think some belongings are “touristy” when it comes to Syria's traditional atmosphere.
Syrian becomes its “ornamentation”.
I believe racism, sexism, sectarianism, human rights' abuse, are unconsciously celebrated in the Syrian daily life. Just like the Syrians are now the prime reason for everything wrong happens in Lebanon, the Iraqi refugees are the prime reason of everything wrong happens in Syria, if one caught AIDS, it's an Iraqi girl, if one cannot find a job, it's the Iraqis' fault, if a family are sleeping in the streets, it’s the Iraqis fault. Syrians now, and away from the regime's tyranny, are constructing the “Syrianism” within this binary opposition “Syrians/Iraqis”, as a continuous process that started with the “Syrians/Lebanon”. Syrians are formulating a belonging to Syrian in opposition to the “new comers” of Syria.

…While Wassim of Maysaloon discusses his recent trip to Syria and what it meant to him:

The trip was over far too quickly, but a terrible weight was on my mind by the end of the first week. This wasn't just “Syria” for me anymore, an artificial state with it's own flag, national anthem and football team. This was “the beating heart of Arabism” as Mansfeld put it, for Muslims, Christians and Jews it is the land where they believe the final showdown between good and evil will begin, where Jesus will return. I can't emphasise the sheer weight of seeing history living and breathing in front of me, both in the streets of Damascus and in it's National Museum. Stereotypes which had been imposed on me since birth by virtue of an education in the West were now being completely stripped away. I didn't just understand Edward Said, I lived what he had said. I also felt frightened because for the first time in my life, I felt acutely aware of who “I” am, not just a Syrian, but an Arab and a Muslim. Both of these terms I was to recognise carry with them immense responsibilities and a breathtaking shift in the lense one might normally view the world with. They have been weighing heavily on my mind since I got back and this is where my post becomes serious.

Finally,
Brutally Honest shares her feelings the power of words:

Simple encouraging words that are from the heart, are of great value to me, simple words that I end up printing out and sticking onto my monitor to be a reminder of how loved and appreciated I am. The worst thing that you can do is not to show your appreciation and concern towards someone who is of value and importance to you, or not to express your feelings and gratitude towards a loved one. Forgetting that every moment in life is of great value and that life will pass sooner than you think and then it will be too late.

Creative Commons-licensed photo by DWinton

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Myanmar: List of Detainees and Letter From A 88 Generation Worker

yangonthu · 10:07

lingua → mg · fr · de · es

Blogger Niknayman has a list of names and affiliations of over 300 monks and civilians who have been arrested by the Myanmar Military Regime. Many are from the National League of Democracy, the party led by Aung San Suu Kyi. Newspapers across Asia are putting the number of detained people at 1500. Democratic Voice of Burma, a Norwegian organization reports that the number of arrested is much higher at over 2000. Death toll is rumoured to be in the hundreds, though the Myanmar Junta refuses to confirm the official number.

Democratic Voice of Burma is quoting this announcement from Ko Sein Lin, a 1988 Generation worker. In 1988, there was a similar protest against the Myanmar Junta, led mostly by the students. These protests were brutally crushed by the Junta and over 3000 people were thought to have been killed and many more tortured.

Ko Sein Lin urges the rest of the workers to join in the protest against the Myanmar Junta:

Only the citizens of Myanmar should be the Mother and the Father of the country. (The Myanmar Junta has repeatedly tried to brainwash the citizens by trying to elevate the army's status as that of being the parents of the country.)

During the “Sangha's heroic act of peaceful defiance against the Junta”:

1) Many monks, students and civilians have been ruthlessly killed, beaten and tortured by the evil Junta, in a bid to crackdown on the protests. We workers from the 1988 generation vehemently oppose these acts of violence.

2) We urge the workers in the government sector and also those in the public companies to look upon the flag of the Sangha (monks) and to be united as one and we also urge the founders and CEOs of the public and private companies to support the workers' unity.

3) We, 88 Generation workers would like to announce that we will unite with the citizens of Myanmar, in protest against the evil Myanmar Junta and will join in the fight against the military regime, until they are wiped out.

The citizens of Myanmar should study the legendary history of Myanmar (where we have been victorious) and be prepared to fight as one, even if there were to be bloodshed. [author's note: this sentence was especially difficult to translate as it was a Myanmar idiom that does not exist in English but yours truly has tried her best to convey the meaning behind it]

We would like to request that all workers cease work and to join in the protest against the evil Junta.

-Workers from the 88 Generation

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Bangladesh: Bloggers demand release of detained cartoonist

Rezwan · 06:03

lingua → pt · de · es

Zafa Noor writes in E-Bangladesh:

“It has been two weeks since Arifur Rahman’s cartoon “Naam” was published which prompted the Bangladesh police to take him to jail and lock him up without pressing any formal charges or allowing him any legal representation in his defense. Arif was picked up from his Uttara residence under Section 54 of Code of Criminal Procedure for drawing the very harmless cartoon that portrayed a widely used naming convention for Bangali Muslim men. The cartoon did not insult the prophet in any way, nor was it Arif’s intention, because his own first name is Mohammed (newspaper reports addressed him as Md. Arifur Rahman).”

free arif

arifur rahman
(photo credit: the Daily Star)

Arifur Rahman is just twenty three years old, who just a month before his arrest, received an award from the government for his cartoon against corruption. The editor of the Daily Prothom Alo apologized for publishing the cartoon but It is interesting to see that the political Islam has been keeping this issue alive and demanding ban of the progressive newspaper Prothom Alo. They have also targeted another popular magazine of Prothom Alo group called Saptahik2000, which had to take their Eid issue from the shelves as the Government banned it for publishing some words of a memoir of an exiled writer Daud Haider. The third world view and E-Bangladesh have more backgrounds on this.

The Bangladeshi bloggers are calling for an international campaign to free Arifur Rahman who was detained for his harmless statirical cartoon published in Alpin, the satirical supplement of the Bangla Daily Prothom Alo. It must be noted that Bangladeshi media are surprisingly silent about Arifur Rahman's release.

* Shourav created the splendid banner above and called for support. (Anybody can use it under creative commons)

Other bloggers chimed in:

* Mash at “Or how I learned to stop worrying” calls him the Bangladesh cartoonist hero.

* Keep me honest

* Addafication

* Dhaka Shohor

* Voice of Bangladeshi Bloggers

- In the Middle of Nowhere who also asks to free Nurul Islam, the Bangladeshi aid worker (BRAC) kidnapped in Afghanistan by the Talibans.

- Serious Golmal

- Unheard Voices

- Tacit

- And some more bloggers in Bangla blogging platforms “Bandh Bhanger Awaaj” and “Sachalayatan“

Many international organizations demanded the release of Arifur Rahman:

- Reporters without border (RSF) - Cartoonist arrested over harmless play on name Mohammed. Excerpts:

“The play on words had no intention of attacking the Prophet,” Reporters Without Borders said “It was a joke about a cultural custom. The government should not yield to pressure from extremist leaders who are trying to politicize the case. Rahman should not be made a scapegoat. He must be freed.”

- International Press Institute (IPI) protests jailing of Cartoonist in Bangladesh and suspension of publication of satirical weekly. Excerpts:

IPI would like to remind Your Excellency that the state of emergency imposed in January after the cancellation of the general election is not an excuse to restrict press freedom. With a general election planned for the end of 2008, it is vital that the country’s citizens have access to information and that the media is free to report facts and express opinions.

Please show your support for Arifur Rahman by putting the badge on your blog.

Join the facebook group to get the updates of this campaign.

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