[Chapter-delegates] Interim Information: Serious considerations to dissolve the Cambodia ISOC Chapter

[Grigori Saghyan]

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Dear Norbert, All

the problem is serious. We have more or less similar situation,
our Chapter must show to Armenian community, that we are a legal
entity, which is working under local law. With current ISOC  ByLaws it
is impossible, because each ISOC.AM member must registered himself as
a member of other ISOC, which US based NGO. Only after that it is
possible to become ISOC.AM Armenian NGO member, and ISOC Armenian
Chapter Member.
 It is a violation of rights of Armenian citizens, who have rights to
become  a member of any Armenian NGO WITHOUT ANY PRECONDITION like
registration himself a a member of any foreign NGO.

For us, I am sure for other Chapters too, it is a big problem.
We are unable to act in contradiction with Armenian law - it is obvious.

But at the same time  we share ISOC principles, we need to be a member
of ISOC family, we need to be involved in discussions, participate in
the international events, coordinate our activity with ISOC large
community.

I think the problem is in organizational structure, and new proposals,
like "at first please register new Armenian ISOC Chapter Member in
Switzerland based NGO, and then in ISOC Armenia" will not resolve our
problem. There is no any difference - in which foreign country I have
to register myself in order to become ISOC Armenia Chapter member.

Grigori Saghyan
ISOC.AM


On 17.10.2013 5:59, Norbert Klein wrote:
> 
> Dear Members of the ISOC Cambodia Chapter,
> 
> and per copy for information, shared with
> 
> - Chapter Representatives,
> 
> - ISOC central and Asia-Pacific leaders and staff,
> 
> 
> With this mail I would like to start a follow-up to the mail sent
> to you in September by Be Chantra, our Secretary. I do the
> follow-up at present because he and some colleagues were invited to
> attend a number of Mozilla meetings in the USA – and it is time to
> consider reactions and responses received since.
> 
> First of all we were impressed by the many mails from other
> Chapters, understanding our situation, deploring that there have
> often been inconclusive discussions between Chapters and the ISOC
> Staff, but at the same time we received so many mail urging that
> ISOC Staff and leadership might find ways to work towards a
> solution of the problems we had raised in relation to the
> following:
> 
> 1. Structural Constraints 2. Experiences 3. Impressions
> 
> We are happy to see that the questions we had raised led to a deep 
> discussion about problems of the Internet Society as a world wide 
> structure, especially related to the question of the nature of the 
> Chapters in their relation to general ISOC regulations and staff,
> where several Chapter leaders expressed much sympathy with our
> difficulties. - We will send later a collection of such messages.
> 
> But secondly, we have also to say that we did not receive much
> response from ISOC staff and leadership. To be more specific, we
> would like to share the following.
> 
> One Chapter leader said: “Cutting through the entire mass of text,
> it seems the only real grouse is on funding” - really wrong! Or is
> it acceptable that a regional staff member comes to the country and
> refuses to discuss what the Chapter officers and the members of the
> Advisory Board what they think to be important? Had this Chapter
> leader carefully read what our Secretary had written, he might not
> have said so. I will quote only this one section from our original
> letter:
> 
> = = =
> 
> “*    Dear Thip,
> 
> After having received your mail, rejecting our request to serious 
> discuss the crisis for our Chapter, created as a result of the
> general situation and legal requirements in Cambodia in the
> meeting, and the refusal to ISOC staff to positively pay attention
> to our situation, we do not think it would be appropriate to
> cooperate, as a Chapter, with organizing a meeting for your 1 - 2.5
> hours event, for which you would like to invite the Members of the
> Cambodia Chapter and other non-Chapter members. To discuss
> fundamental problems within ISOC, affecting the whole membership,
> only among officers, as you suggest (which has been tried in vain
> by email so far) would not be in line with our history to promote
> and practice open communication – high values regularly lifted up
> among the goals of the Internet Society world wide and in its
> slogan: the Internet is for everyone.
> 
> The situation and this response has been shared and discussed with 
> the Members of the Advisory Board of our Chapter and is
> unanimously supported.
> 
> Norbert Klein President, ISOC-KH*
> 
> 
> The five members of our Advisory Board at that time were
> (reflecting the stipulation of our Bylaws “The Advisory Board of
> five members, from important sections of the ISOC Cambodia Chapter
> membership”):
> 
> the Head of the IT in Education Section in the Ministry of
> Education the Editor in Chief of a leading Cambodian daily
> newspaper, who is at the same time President of the Club of
> Cambodian Journalists the President and CEO of a major broadband
> providing ISP a senior staff member in the office of the Council of
> Ministers of the Government of Cambodia, and one student. = = =
> 
> It is also surprising that there was no word from some “higher up”
> staff commenting on this; we assume there must be some monitoring
> of staff activities going on in ISOC, though we are not aware in
> which way regional staff is selected (without involvement of the
> Chapters of the regions). - We hope that others will better
> understand what kind of damage has been done by this treatment of
> our Advisory Board members, distinguished persons in Cambodian
> society.
> 
> Also other Chapter leaders have used strong language, related to
> outside financial support:
> 
> I’m following with great attention this discussion initiated by
> the Cambodian Chapter intention to leave the Internet society
> Great family which lead to the old debate about ISOC’s direct
> financial support to Chapters.
> 
> Before I continue, I would like to clearly express my opposition to
> that.
> 
> The direct financial support to Chapters for their administrative
> and running costs will make the Chapters useless, dependent and 
> non-sustainable. If we put in place the systematic direct
> financial support from ISOC HQ to Chapters, we will see many
> useless Chapters flourish around the world only to benefit to that
> direct financial support.”
> 
> This is an interesting concept of “family” - others think that in
> a family, the resources available to the family are shared and
> made available to those who need them.
> 
> There were also different models discussed on the Chapters list,
> how ISOC could help the Chapters – for example by taking over some 
> administrative or reporting tasks (including to the government) –
> but it is hardly probable that the 90 or so ISOC staff and advisers
> have the capability to handle things in the Cambodia language (some
> of our members cooperated to translate the Bylaws for the initial
> contacts with the Ministry of Interior); most such proposals try to
> avoid financial payments to the operation of the Chapter, as this –
> as one voice said – would result in a bloated staff in the
> Chapters.
> 
> Many of our members are actively involved in a variety of local 
> information technology and communication activities: Linux and
> Android groups, a Hackerspace center, regular Barcamps since some
> years with hundreds of participants each time etc. – all that works
> well. - In other fields, related to the sharing of information
> which others do not like, where people have spoken up related to
> injustice and corruption: Some were beaten, others had to face the
> court (I had this experience also) or were sent to prison, some
> lost their lives – but the organizations actively helping towards a
> more just society are internationally funded. Are they useless? Who
> thinks local fund-raising in these crucial fields, related to the
> free sharing of information and opinion, is so easy?
> 
> We did not say that we just intend to leave the “Internet Society
> Great family” - but we said that we do not see any other way under
> the present Bylaw – drafted and formulated under the guidance of
> ISOC staff (using material currently on the ISOC website as
> mandatory text). To our surprise a number of Chapter reps said they
> do not have some of these clauses in their Bylaws, and we should do
> without them. Can we do that without being censored, as long there
> is no authoritative statement from ISOC staff and leadership?
> 
> One Chapter leader wrote: “Would be good to see ISOC APAC team
> reply on this list on efforts to keep the Cambodia Chapter alive.”
> - That is also what we had expected.*But we did not have any mail
> in response from the two ISOC ASIA PACIFIC staff in the office in
> Singapore **(except from occasional circulars sent to all)**. *
> 
> A Board Member of one Chapter had written: "So let's draw in Lynn, 
> Waldaor whomever else actually has the power to make things happen
> and prevent a deep organizational problem." *But this also went
> without a response visible to us.*
> 
> We had mail from the more recently appointed “Chapter Development 
> Manager, Asia-Pacific” Mr. Naveed Haq who had been wrongly informed
> that “ISOC staff has reached out several times to try to find a
> solution for the situation” and who called the chapter officers and
> members of our advisory board to a telephone conference, suggesting
> also to find “non-monetary ways to address the issues” - which, as
> we had described in detail related to the specific Cambodian legal
> framework and regulations, with a serious monetary aspect.
> 
> Our Secretary responded on 25 September 2013 to the ISOC Chapter 
> Development Manager, Asia-Pacific, saying that such a telephone 
> conference is not feasible with the Chapter officers and Advisory
> Board members engaged in their professional obligations in
> different places and times. And our secretary added in his
> response:
> 
> “We suggest that you first carefully re-read our mail, and then
> respond to what we wrote there, and not to some hearsay that 'ISOC
> staff has reached out several times to try to find a solution'”
> which is not true. *There was no response from him to this
> request.*
> 
> Mr. Ted Mooney, ISOC Senior Director, Membership & Services, wrote
> to our Secretary saying: “If the Cambodian Chapter wishes to
> rescind its ISOC chapter status, a letter so stating to the APAC
> Chapter Development manager is sufficient.” No discussion
> necessary? And also:"Please indicate to me what you really are
> trying to accomplish" – to which our Secretary responded
> also:“Please read our mail again, it is stated there.” *There was
> no response to him either.*
> 
> But he wrote also:*“*...the characterization of the Regional ISOC
> Staff by the Cambodian chapter as unresponsive is wholly different
> than what has been communicated to me. For the Cambodian Chapter to
> take this opportunity in a broad letter to the Board and Chapter
> delegates to denigrate specific ISOC staff is unprofessional and
> counter productive.” We do not know “what has been communicated" to
> the ISOC Senior Director, Membership & Services in this respect –
> but the situation continues: *neither the Singapore based ISOC ASIA
> PACIFIC staff, nor the **ISOC **Chapter Development Manager,
> Asia-Pacific, **nor the **ISOC **Senior Director, Membership &
> Services have responded to the **detailed content in the**mail from
> our Secretary*(unless it happened during the last couple of days
> and I have not yet hear about it).
> 
> But if such mailwas sent and we did not receive it for whatever
> reasons – it would be appropriate to share it here on the Chapters
> list.
> 
> Whether the way our Secretary shared our mail widely was
> unprofessional, we leave it to others to evaluate. Obviously many
> Chapter leaders seem to have welcomed it, as it started a
> fundamental discussion in the ISOC fellowship.
> 
> Finally, I am quoting here an interesting suggestions from a
> Chapter leader: "If the decision to close the chapter goes forward
> at least try to keep together board members and the current
> membership through an informal group even if the group is not a
> legal entity. After all, you were able to do many things the way
> you are set up at the moment."
> 
> 
> I send this after the members of the Executive Committee agreed on
> this text. Finally, please remember the invitation from our
> Secretary:
> 
> *We would therefore call for such a meeting to discuss the
> dissolution of our Chapter, or not to do so in case practical and
> timely ways would show up within one months from sending out this
> mail. Such a meeting shall be convened as follows:
> 
> Location: #8, St. 352, BKK1, Phnom Penh (Open Institute new
> office) Date and Time: October 26, 2013 at 2:00PM *
> 
> Please inform Chantra - chantra.be at gmail.com - whether you will 
> participate or not; please send a note in either case.
> 
> With my best greetings,
> 
> 
> 
> Norbert Klein Member of the Executive Committee ISOC Cambodia
> Chapter
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________ As an Internet
> Society Chapter Officer you are automatically subscribed to this
> list, which is regularly synchronized with the Internet Society 
> Chapter Portal (AMS): https://portal.isoc.org
> 


- -- 
Grigori Saghyan
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