Two worlds, two parties

“Here at the summit, it is very obvious that people have a desperate need to express themselves. When the presentations finish, people don’t have questions, what they need is to be listened to. It makes you reflect on grave lack of opportunities to participate and have a voice when, as soon as there is an opportunity to speak people need to talk and talk and tell what is happening to them and how it is happening”.

Yesterday at the alternatives summit I spoke to Diana Torres, a Progressio Development Worker with Educa, The Institute for the Promotion of a Quality Education. She is working in the very deprived district of San Juan de Lurigancho on the outskirts of Lima, promoting participation in local development. She had some interesting reflections on the lack of real mechanisms for participation for marginalised groups in Peru and on people’s response to the summit:

“This summit is a place where you can hear the voices which have ended up being silent because nobody listens to them. It is absolutely vital that NGOs including Progressio and its partner organisations should be here. I think these kinds of events are crucial for us to be able to continue re-thinking the work we do and improving it.

“I think it is positive that talking about things with others who are living the same problems or with others who have a different perspective allows people to construct different narrative and make their discourses more flexible. But the problem is, what will happen when the summit is over? That is where you start to feel dissatisfied because there are these interesting conversations and processes, but then we are all going to disperse, which is just what the state wants.

Self expression: a huge crowd watch theatre at the summit yesterday

Diana says she feels a mix of great satisfaction at the summit (as an opportunity for people to talk and be heard and learn from each other), but also a deep dissatisfaction at the lack of real dialogue between the governments in the official summit and the people:

“The position of the state in relation to all of this is interesting. You can see the fragmentation in which the state is acting in one sphere and the people are acting in another and you wonder where is the dialogue and space for conversation between the two. That’s what I feel is happening in Lima this week.

“I think the official summit responds to the needs of a specific economic model and so the proposals for solutions and any achievements they make are going to respond to that model – and by that I mean that they are not going to resolve the gap between rich and poor. They are working within the perspective of an economic model which continues to fragment society, making the poorest poorer and the richest richer.

Diana Torres

She sees the contrast between the lavish party to be laid on for delegates in Miraflores, one of the richest parts of Lima, and the ‘people’s party’ to be held miles away in another plaza, possibly with the presence of Evo Morles and Hugo Chavez, but no other leaders, as emblematic of the inequality and division in Peruvian society:

“In Miraflores, there will be a big party – who will be at that party?, and here there is going to be a big party – who will be at this party? It shows how divided we are: the state is on one side and civil society is on another.

“Alan Garcia can continue saying that we are in ‘a time of abundance’ and effectively we are, but abundance for who? I think that whatever is agreed at the summit will continue to sustain what is happening in Peru at the moment. I don’t think anything at all will change.

Criminalising protest

In Peru, civil society organisations are extremely concerned about the increasing repression of dissent. The government has introduced measures to try to increase control over NGOs and has openly attacked dissenting voices, calling them ‘terrorists’ and ‘traitors’ who are against development. He has also passed legislation which increases police impunity in cases of violence against protesters. Diana took part yesterday in some of the debates on this topic:

“It was interesting for me to understand the way protest is being criminalised here in Peru in relation to what is happening around the world – that protest and repression of protest is increasing at an alarming rate around the world”.

“One of the speakers said that protest and appears because it is so difficult to sustain the neoliberal model – it is almost a natural consequence of the unjust model – but then it becomes necessary to repress the protest so that it doesn’t have the impact that it should – changing the system. The repression is a symptom of an inability to sustain the system. I think that understanding that reflection might help us to find ways to act and respond.

“It was also interesting to hear that the same thing is going on in Europe – when supposedly we are developing countries and this shouldn’t be happening there…”

A learning opportunity

From her own perspective, having started relatively recently moved to Peru from her native Columbia to start work for Progressio, she says she found the summit a useful window on the reality in Peru:

“As a Development Worker, I think it has helped me to open up my vision – I have learnt things here that I hadn’t even learnt yet in the context of the organisation where I am working.

“It allows you to understand other aspects of the national reality which you cannot find out about through the media which don’t really represent these other worlds and other realities. It allows you to know what is happening for all the groups which are called ‘minorities’ but which are actually sustaining the country.

“You feel like communities are tired – that there are small efforts in the communities but that they aren’t enough. Here in this summit you can see that there are people who are really fighting and achieving important things - and that's encouraging."

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Today the official summit gets underway properly and the alternative summit enters its last day. As Diana says, the two are worlds apart with the official summit talking about climate change in terms of carbon trading schemes and Garcia talking about the need to open Peru up to more investment, whilst the alternative summit talks of ecological debt and rejects all privatisation of natural resources.

I'm heading to the alternative summit now to hear the reading of the final declaration from the summit and the judgements of the People's Tribunal.