[Chapter-delegates] Letter from the ISOC Elections Committee

[Chris Mulola]

Hi All,

I agree with you that companies like Google, Microsoft, etc. would like to
help local chapters mostly  because of their relationships with ISOC.

However chapters will fall in two categories:

-A chapter in a developed world whereby there is presence of these IT
company giants.

- And a chapter in a developing country whereby there is no such thing like
Google's presence etc. and that all the other international organizations,
present in those countries, have only the mandate to help governments that
host them.

Those organizations will have a mission to please these governments because
that is what their job is - diplomacy and international affairs. And
chapters will not get significant support from them like they are most of
the times politically-oriented.

I have been raising funds and fighting for support for more than 3 years
and i know what i am talking about.

Just recently, i was challenged by a question following some reports of
what ISOC global pays as taxes on salaries to i dont know remember which
organization.. and the question was like this:

"I wonder how your organization can be ignoring you by giving you $2000
annual support and spend more than 12millions US dollars (please  check
ISOC tax reports for the exact figure, it is about that) on taxes? The
money you are given cannot even cover your administration needs let alone
raise your visibility."

Now, imagine what my answer to the question was, it was like..i dont know
what to say. We chatted for a time and he said that chapters are not given
value by ISOC global and he wonders why ISOC wants to keep them if it does
not want to maintain them or why it wants other organizations to support
those chapters on its behalf.

If given the power there is something that i would like to change in the
way that isoc operates, i mean the working relationships between
governments-isocChapters-isocGlobal.

Beside that, i am sorry to say this but i have often observed that some
african chapters will just tend to only do online works (sending emails
back and forth) pretending or trying to give the impression that everything
is fine, that they have serious ongoing activities.

Just say it, it is not working. And i am quite certain it is not, you want
to know how... say if we could assign other  chapters delegates to just
come visit and see what your chapter is busy doing now.. say for a week's
visit,  i bet that they will not find anything significant.

The bottom line is that chapters need to have longterm initiatives that are
always running, the fact that there is nothing like that make governments
pull back as they realize that you cannot help them when you need them to
help you - who needs who.

I guess the situation will be slightly different in  countries whereby the
Isoc people are the ones that  built the internet up along with their gover
ments, here they will continue to have a strong say. Case for Older
chapters i must say.

For the young chapters to have an influence they need to bring something
different to what is already available otherwise they stand no chance.

I believe this will change one day, but it will not, if we continue to put
these chapters in the same basket and treat them the same way, forgetting
that they should be categorized, and given different kinds of support. Just
as an example.....  Not $2000 for a chapter in New York or Colorado or
Tokyo and the same $2000 for another one in Uganda or Burundi.

Best regards,

Chris Mulola
President, ISOC Rwanda
On May 18, 2014 3:28 AM, "Gihan Dias" <gihan at uom.lk> wrote:

>  On 2014/05/17 ප.ව. 1:12, Charles Oloo wrote:
>
> Engaging local stakeholders is done at various levels and functions
> depending on activity or event. The more engagement we have the more we
> raise ISOC profile and visibility. In most cases, the involvement of the
> media is paramount if at all one has to reach a wider audience.
>
> Charles,
>
> Yes. I agree. Could you shre with us some the engagements you have carried
> out or planning to do so. Also, how you are engaging the media?
>
>  All these cannot be done without financial resources, and the annual
> grant of 2000 USD is not adequate for this,
>
> My suggestion, (not as a trustee, but based on my experience elsewhere) is
> to first spend the USD 2000, and then discuss with Christine/Anne about
> your additional requirements. Often, some funds may be available somewhere.
>
>  bearing in mind the other equally important events like the annual IGFs.
>
> The IGF ambassadors program is separate from chapter funding. Not sure
> about its status in 2014.
>
>
>  If chapters cannot get or identify other financial resources, increasing
> visibility and impact in local scenarios will take a little longer,
> especially for young chapters. And this is a specific area the ISOC BoT,
> and the Chapter Advisory need to look into.
>
> To develop your chapter, you need to get other funding. Since the ISoc
> name is well known, it is often not difficult to get funding, both from
> local companies and rom the local offices of places like Google, Cisco and
> Microsoft. Please let me know what assistance you need in this regard.
>
> Regards,
>
> Gihan
>
> _______________________________________________
> 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
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/private/chapter-delegates/attachments/20140518/59a032b7/attachment.htm>