[CS Bureau] Information about overpasses in Tunis (HLP and Plenary meetings)

[Magaly Pazello]

Dear all,

the gender caucus is not confortable with the number of overpasses 
allocated for the plenary meeting, in special given that there is no 
reason for the WSIS ES allocated 100 overpasses for the organziations of 
host country. I didn't have haerd thing like that in any UN conference. 
Brazil have hosted two Un conferences (UNCED-Rio 92, and UNCTAD last 
year) and the brazilian NGOs have not preference in relation the 
legitimacy of the NGOs representatives of the rest of the world. It is 
unceptable.

I also would like to second Robert Guerra when he pointed out the peace 
caucus issue. Despite the Joseph clarification, I understanding that 
this caucus is not active in the process.

Comments follow below:

CONGO - Philippe Dam wrote:

> Dear all,
>
> Please find attached our proposition concerning the attribution of 
> overpasses to CS participants in Tunis (HLP and Plenary meetings), 
> further to the up-date from ITU on the number of available overpasses 
> for civil society. We request your comments on this document before we 
> send it to the Plenary List. You can find below some clarifications or 
> questions.
>
> You can find in this document the requests we received and the actual 
> repartition, based on the guidelines established by the CSB.
>
> *High Level Panel:*
>
> The CSB decision was: one overpass for each active existing 
> family/WG/caucus during previous WSIS events in priority, and one 
> overpass for emerging family/WG/caucus during if available.
>
> After this, we still have 2 non-attributed overpasses. 2 caucuses 
> requested an extra overpass (Internet Governance and Human Rights) and 
> it would make sense to allocate one extra overpass to the African 
> Caucus with regards to its actual size.
>
I'm fine with to give the extra overpasses for the both caucus.

> */It is up to you to decide to whom allocate those two remaining 
> overpasses/*, or if we should give them back to the WSIS ES (for 
> information, the CSB guidelines stated that: “Any remaining after this 
> will be returned to the Executive Secretariat for allocation to other 
> stakeholder groupings.”)
>
> *Plenary meetings:*
>
> Taking into consideration the expected number of participants and the 
> participation in the overall process (priority to existing caucuses at 
> previous PrepComs), we tried to attenuate obvious overstatements 
> (Peace Caucus requested 80 overpasses) and obvious understatements (WG 
> on Finance requested only 8 passes) to compile the list enclosed.
>
> The fact that 100 overpasses would be reserved for host country 
> participants is a decision of the WSIS CS, and was in principle 
> accepted by the CSB when discussing overpasses.
>
Not exactly accept, as I've understood it was presented to us as 
something that tehre was no solution as it is a political issue and was 
imposed by the host country.

> We propose to keep 36 passes not to be attributed to any caucus, in 
> order to have some flexibility with new comers or major CS entities 
> which are not actually involved in CS structures. This is further to 
> some concerns expressed to us and on the Plenary list. Guidelines 
> would be made available later on for the distribution of these 
> overpasses. */Do you agree with that?/*
>
36 overpasses seems to be a high number in realtion to the reality. I 
agree to keep some overpasses 6. I don't believe that at this stage of 
the WSIS process we have commers not really involved in any caucuses or 
conected with the organizations that make aprt of the CS structures.

Also I agree with the Robert's proposal to allow people to do online 
overpasses request. It is a good initiative and should be implemented ASAP.


Thank you Philippe for your work.

Magaly Pazello