Where we work – Page 3

Areas of Expertise, Eastern Europe, GBI Updates, Information and Communication Technology for Development, Integra News, USAF Updates, Where we work

USF workshops in Moldova, Ukraine, a success!

Under the GBI contract, Integra team members recently conducted a series of workshops in both Moldova and Ukraine, to support the governments of each country in their assessment and planning to introduce Universal Service Funds, and to promote Broadband ICT development. These countries, like much of the former Soviet Union region, have established a strong level of telecommunications infrastructure, including nearly universal mobile phone coverage, extensive fixed telephone networks, and reasonable extension of Internet access and even Broadband. However, significant gaps remain in access to computers, Internet, and Broadband connectivity, particularly outside of urban centers.

In Moldova, the Ministry of Information Technology and Communications (MITC) hosted a workshop attended by about 25 government and industry officials, to address questions surrounding the current legal mandate to establish a Universal Service Fund, and the goals and options for such a Fund. GBI experts David Townsend and Daniel Espitia presented international experience on the best approaches and priorities for creation of a USF, and the key issues that Moldova would have to address. Given that Moldova has already made considerable progress in establishing well functioning mobile networks as well as broadband services in many parts of the country, the challenge would be to close remaining gaps in access to ICTs, with emphasis on providing all schools in the country with broadband connections as well as low-cost PCs for students. Also, rural villages without adequate network capacity would be upgraded to broadband. The Ministry acknowledged that new legislation would be required to authorize a USF that could fully address these objectives, and pledged to move ahead in drafting such a statute.

In Ukraine, a public workshop was held in Kiev over two days, hosted by the National Commission on State Regulation of Communication and Information (NCCIR), and attended by about 30-40 officials and private sector representatives. There has been considerable debate in Ukraine about establishment of a USF, with strong resistance from the mobile operators, who must already pay 7.5% of their revenues into a national social security fund. Representatives of several operators attended the workshop, along with Commissioners and other government personnel. GBI’s David Townsend together with Parvez Iftikhar, former CEO of the Pakistan USF, presented ideas and examples of how an effective USF could work, yielding benefits both for the country and for the ICT industry itself. A range of options were discussed for the launching of a Fund, including starting out on a pilot basis to test the concept. Ukraine must also pass new legislation to mandate a USF, and will be working toward such a law.

Integra’s team will continue to assist both countries as they develop their USF legislation and policies.

March 8, 2012/by actualize

Areas of Expertise, GBI Updates, Information and Communication Technology for Development, Integra News, Latin America and the Caribbean, USAF Updates, Where we work

Taking Colombia’s USF to the next level

Sebastian Mendes from UNE at the Compartel workshop in Bogota

Representatives from GBI traveled to Bogota this month to participate in a stakeholder’s workshop, held by Compartel, the Colombian Ministry of Information and Communications Technology’s universal service administrator. The February 15th workshop was designed as a means of gathering stakeholder input to Compartel’s strategic planning process. Compartel is planning to restructure itself to effectively address the next generation of challenges for the use of ICTs in Colombia, and it invited GBI and key personnel from Intel Corporation’s World Ahead program to participate in the workshop.

Following the workshop, Compartel and GBI went into an intensive 2 day work planning session that laid out a six month plan of cooperation to define ICT sector goals and objectives, map strategic activities of Compartel, and to provide technical assistance on strategic plan implementation. David Townsend, Daniel Espitia, and Robert Otto represented the GBI team in Bogota.

Compartel, the Colombian Ministry of Information and Communications Technology’s universal service administrator, has already accomplished many important milestones with its Vive Digital program to connect most of Colombia to Internet and voice services. Among their accomplishments are completion of 2,000 kilometers of terrestrial fiber optic channels, 800 kilometers of undersea fiber optic cable to its offshore island of San Andres. Projects underway include an 18,000 kilometer national fiber optic network to serve some 753 municipalities, provision of broadband to 6,700 public schools, in-home broadband connections for 115,000 low income households, and seven projects designed to provide 10,000 more broadband connections for public schools, small villages, and community telecenters.

February 28, 2012/by actualize

Democracy & Governance, Eastern Europe, Elections, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

From the Arab Spring to the Russian Winter?

In another case of authoritarian regime vs. public protesters, information and communication technologies (ICTs) seem to have fueled the fire. Russians took to the streets last weekend in social media-driven demonstrations against alleged election fraud committed by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s United Russia Party, in the biggest protest the country has ever witnessed since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Russian opposition activists have used Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms to uncover electoral fraud and organize protests. Such is the case of Danila Lindele, 23-year-old citizen activist, described by VOA News as a “new breed of Russian activist, one more likely to reach for an iPad than a bullhorn.”

Despite conceding that irregularities did occur during the electoral process, President Dmitry Medvedev criticized the protests using his official Facebook page.

“I agree neither with the slogans, nor the statements voiced at the protests,” President Medvedev said. Russians responded with insults such as “shame” and “pathetic”, according to VOA News.

BBC reports that at least “7,000 comments had appeared under his post by 20:00 GMT on Sunday, a day after the biggest anti-government protests since Soviet times. An early random sample showed the comments were equally divided between hostility, support and neutrality.”

Authorities carried out over 1,000 arrests, mostly in Moscow, and key protester, blogger and anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny was jailed, the BBC said.

Global Voices, an online platform for bloggers from around the world who report on how citizens use the Internet and social media to make their voices heard, often translating from other languages, features posts by prominent Russian bloggers such as Navalny in their Russia 2011 Elections Special.

“The time has come to throw off the chains. We are not cattle or slaves. We have a voice and we have the strength to defend it,” Mr. Navalny blogged.

Navalny also posted a video of Putin’s speech at the Olimpiysky Sports Complex to illustrate the Prime Minister’s declining popularity as evidenced by boos he received from segments of the crowd.

http://youtu.be/ZxQslFifQBw

Blogger Sean Guillory points out that election fraud is not novel practice in Russian politics and refers to Leontii Byzov, a senior sociologist from the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences to explain why the largest anti-government protests is taking place now.

“There are several overlapping factors. First, the rise of a new generation of young people who don’t remember the ‘trauma of the 1990s’. They are not afraid of change, it is more attractive to them than the ‘gilded cage’ of Putinist stability. Young members of the middle class want social mobility and dream about meteoric careers,” said Byzov.

“Another factor is the swelling internal opposition within the Russian elite. In the 2000s, Putin served as a certain guarantor of balance between elite groups with completely opposite interests,” added Byzov. The tensions between the Putin-backed siloviki and liberals supporters of Medvedev are entangled in a power struggle over the control Gazprom and other state corporations.

Columnist DOĞU ERGİL argues that ICT tools in the form of social media platform, the Internet and cell phones can compensate for a lack of an opposition to an authoritarian regime, pointing to the power to connect millions and allow individuals to share messages and act in relative concert, that these platforms and networks possess.

“The Tahrir Square protest are the best example of what a virtual community can create in the absence of organized opposition,” he said.

As it was the case in Egypt and Tunisia, Russia has a strong, authoritarian leadership. ICTs are helping challenge the authoritarian state structure, as evinced by the recent anti-government demonstrations, and despite the Kremlin’s crackdown and control of the media, ERGİL argues.

In fact, two-thirds of Russians are said to be utilizing ICTs, especially the mobile phone network and blogging. The political space created by these tools enable exchanges that narrows the ideological divides and strengthen opposition to a government determined to sustain its grip on society as long as it can.

According to the BBC, “as many as 50,000 people gathered on an island near the Kremlin to condemn alleged ballot-rigging in parliamentary elections and demand a re-run” “The protesters alleged there was widespread fraud in the December 4th polls though the ruling United Russia party did see its share of the vote fall sharply.”

December 15, 2011/by actualize

Asia, Democracy & Governance, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

Solomon Islands: radio mail drive peace & development

Rural operators on discovery training into connecting with the rest around the globe

Frequency radio and e-mail maybe “simple” technologies but they are driving peacebuilding and development efforts in the Solomon Islands.

The People First Network (PFnet) is a UNDP funded project set up in 2001. PFnet promotes rural development and peacebuilding by enabling affordable and sustainable connectivity and facilitating information exchange between communities across the Solomon Islands.

PFnet has established a growing rural communications system based on wireless e-mail networking in the HF band, which enjoys full community ownership.

The PFnet community e-mail are the only link to the outside world, providing communities with access to information regarding health, public services and education, and enabling essential contact with family and professional peers.

Gender equality & rural development

PFnet plays particular attention to gender equity and democratic governance, helping women, especially disadvantaged rural women, to network, access services relevant to them and connect with women’s group.

A network of rural community e-mail stations is located on remote islands across the country, usually hosted in secure public facilities. The stations are pretty basic and consist of an old laptop, radio and modem, powered by a car battery, which runs off a solar panel as in most areas there is no electricity. The total cost of the equipment runs to around $8,000.

At the heart of the operation is an Internet café in the capital Honiara, which connects to the Internet via satellite. The connection speed is around 2Kbps, meaning a typical text e-mail sent by rural villages takes about 10 seconds to transmit.

“We are using old technology but it is robust,” said Joe Rausi, staff on the PFnet project.

“This laptop is quite old but it does the work. In the end we have to look at what is affordable in villages.”

“The People First Network is not about technology. It is about improving the standard of living of people in rural areas,” added Rausi.

Peace promotion

In a country where the only means of communication with the outside world for most remote areas consist of unreliable short-wave radios, and expensive statellite telephones, the PFnet project helped overcome the legacy of fear and mistrust created by years of fighting between rival ethnic gangs.

“We thought that by connecting people together, they would know more about each other and bring peace to the country,” said Rausi.

Map of the Solomon Islands

The Solomon Islands consist of roughly 850 islands and is one of the least developed nations in the South Pacific region. A quest for land and power fueled ethnic violence between 1998 and 2003 where hundreds were killed and thousands made homeless. Australian-led forces arrived in 2003 to restore order. Since then the country has enjoyed relative stability.

PFnet project illustrates how information and communication technologies (ICTs) can play a role in developing rural areas and driving peacebuilding initiatives. The project hopes to move beyond e-mail and explore using the system for distance-learning and e-commerce but bandwidth remains the biggest hurdle to this goal.

October 14, 2011/by actualize

Anti-corruption, Asia, Civil Society, Democracy & Governance, Eastern Europe, Elections, Governances, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

e-Government: a novel approach in tackling governance challenges?

The World Bank approved in June a $20 million credit to support Moldova’s Governance e-Transformation (GeT) project. According to Philippe Dongier, World Bank ICT sector manager, eTransformation is “about leadership commitment for institutional reform and for citizen-centric governance.”

The project is part of a Government initiative to address Moldova’s legacy of corruption and bureaucracy inherited during the Soviet Union era by improving and modernizing public sector governance and increasing citizen access to government services.

As part of an institutional reform, the Government established in August 2010 an e-Government Center charged to develop a “digital transformation policy, a government IT strategy, and an open data roadmap”. In April, Moldova became one of the first countries in the region to launch an open data portal.

“The initiative is aimed at opening government data for citizens and improving governance and service delivery,” says Stela Mocan, executive director of the e-Government Center.

Benefits of GeT

GeT has several intended benefits that include increased transparency. The Ministry of Finance recently released a spreadsheet of more than one million lines, detailing all public spending data from the past five years.

“Publishing information about public funds will increase transparency,” says Prime Minister Vlad Filat

GeT also intends to reduce the cost of public service delivery. Through “cloud computing” infrastructure—in which applications and data are accessible from multiple network devices—the Government also expects significant savings in public sector IT expenditure.

Promoting innovation in the civil society sector is another key feature of the project. The Bank’s Civil Society Fund in Moldova—which provides grants to nongovernmental and civil society organizations—is supporting the National Environment Center in the collection and mapping of information on pollution of water resources. Since 80% of Modova’s rural population use water from nitrate-polutated wells, this initiative aims to empower citizens with the necessary tools to hold the Government accountable on the environmental policy.

E-Government: a worldwide phenomen

According to the Wolrd Bank, “e-Government” is the use by government agencies of information technologies—such as Internet, and mobile computing—that have the ability to transform relations with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government.

Moldova is not the only country using ICTs as part of an innovative approach to address corruption and strengthen democracy.

Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan of the State of Maharashtra in Western India recently launched an e-Governance program that aims to tackle corruption by reducing personal interaction between the public and government officials and requiring government officials to use computers in their day-to-day operations. Limiting discretion and facilitating the process of tracking all transactions decrease the incidence of corruption.

To combat fraudulent activities during elections, the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) upgraded its computer and communication network in 2002 to verify the eligibility of voters who had lost their voting cards or whose names were missing from the manual voter registers in the respective polling stations.

ICTs’ potential for addressing governance challenges is significant. Through increased transparency and accountability, governments can better serve their citizens. Implementing successful e-Government initiatives in developing countries is a challenging endeavor. However, sustained political commitment to institutional reform, citizen-centric policies, and financial backing create an environment where ICT applications can improve governance.

September 20, 2011/by actualize

Africa, Areas of Expertise, GBI Updates, Information and Communication Technology for Development, Integra News, USAF Updates, Where we work

Integra provides telecom training in Tanzania

Robert Otto shakes hands with Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete

As a part of its contract with USAID, Integra led the GBI team to successfully host a panel and workshop for Universal Service & Access Fund administrators in Sub Saharan Africa on Friday in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The sessions were part of the annual Connecting Rural Communities Forum held by the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organization (CTO). GBI’s Project Manager for its USAF Initiative, David Townsend, facilitated the sessions, which were attended by over 100 people from across the continent.

Integra’s Eric White spoke to the conference attendees twice – first to describe the USAID program for digital development, and second to deliver survey results collected from participating African USAF administrators.

The conference, which was officially opened by Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete, and hosted by the Minister of Communications, Science and Technology, Makame Mnyaa Mbarawa, lasted three days, and brought together telecommunications professionals from more than 2 dozen African countries. Sessions topics included policy and regulatory issues, equipment and technology, and applications and content.

These sessions mark just part of GBI’s overall support for telecommunications infrastructure in the region, for which Integra is the sole contractor. In addition to support for Universal Service & Access Funds, GBI provides support and technical assistance for legal, regulatory and competitiveness counseling as well as research and support for low cost/low power technologies. Please visit our Current Activities page for more information about GBI.

September 9, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Asia, Connectivity, Mobile, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

3 million impoverished to gain mobile numbers

U.K. startup Movirtu has announced plans to help 3 million or more people in developing countries gain access to mobile services by giving them personal phone numbers – not phones. Movirtu plans to work with a U.N.-affiliated initiative called Business Call to Action (BCTA) to offer the numbers which will be called “mobile identities”.

The service will be called Cloud Phone and will be offered through commercial carriers in developing countries in Africa and South Asia. The name Cloud Phone should not be confused with cloud computing which operates through the internet.

Movirtu is aiming to get 3 million people to use their mobile service for the pilot phase. Movirtu expects about 75 percent of its users to be women, because women in Africa and South Asia are statistically far less likely than men to have their own phones according to Ramona Liberoff, executive vice president of marketing at Movirtu.

The pilot phase will take place in Madagascar through the carrier Airtel. “Madagascar is a perfect market for Movirtu, because Airtel has built an extensive network but many people in the country can’t afford to buy a phone,” Liberoff said.

Owning a mobile identity as opposed to owning a personal mobile phone can save money for the users. For those living at poverty levels, affording a mobile phone may be impossible. A mobile identity allows users to use mobile services without having to purchase a phone.

Also, according to Liberoff, “the cost of prepaid service from a carrier typically is less than what consumers in those countries pay someone to borrow a phone. The average savings from using regular prepaid service instead is estimated at about $60 per year.”

Users can get a mobile identity by going to one of the mobile carrier’s shops. When the user wishes to borrow a mobile phone, the user enters a shortcode for the Movirtu service and then punches in their individual phone number and a personal identification number.

After that, the temporary user can access all the services available through the phone, as well as a personal carrier home page where they can manage and replenish their prepaid account. The system works on any GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) phone, using USSD (Unstructured Supplementary Service Data), a GSM protocol for communicating with a service provider’s computers.

Following the pilot in Madagascar, Movirtu plans to open up the Cloud Phone service in at least 12 markets in Africa and South Asia by early 2013, reaching at least 50 million potential users. “The two regions were chosen because they are home to about 1 billion of the 1.3 billion people in the world who rely on borrowed phones,” Liberoff said.

If successful, these mobile identities will allow mobile services to be physically and financially accessible to the poorest of the poor. This will greatly benefit aid parties since according to Liberoff, “In many cases, there are great NGO programs that can’t reach 80 percent of their base because those people don’t have their own phones.”

The overall goal with Cloud Phone should be to bring the impoverished out of poverty by giving them access to a brand new set of tools.

Giving rural populations and women access to mobile services will empower them, and get them involved economically and socially. It will enable them to enter a mobile world which billions of others have already tapped into, opening up many opportunities for development.

August 22, 2011/by actualize

Anti-corruption, Asia, Civil Society, Democracy & Governance, Elections, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

#Berish2.0: The Ire of Malaysian Protests

Photo Credit: Saeed Khan/AFP

Social media may have helped fuel the 50,000 demonstrators who gathered in Kuala Lumpur this past Saturday demanding electoral reforms—despite the Malaysian government responding roughly and deeming the peaceful protests illegal.

Police fired tear gas and water cannons at the dissidents demanding change from a electoral system that they claim has unjustly favored the ruling party since the country’s independence from Britain in 1957.

The recent rally puts pressure on Prime Minister Najib Razak in the racially stimulated Southeast Asian nation, as Malaysia’s next general election is planned for 2013.

Peaceful protesters in Malaysia’s capital were met with police violence, and 1,667 arrests over the span of the weekend, according to reports. In lieu of the aggressive response, Amnesty International urged the UK government yesterday to press Najib to honor the freedom of assembly

“As a current member of the UN Human Rights Council, the Malaysian government should be setting an example to other nations and promoting human rights. Instead they appear to be suppressing them, in the worst campaign of repression we’ve seen in the country for years”, Donna Guest, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Asia-Pacific. Amnesty International, states.

Bersih (The Coalition for Fair and Clean Elections) is the oppositional NGO that organized the electoral reform movement called Bersih 2.0.

Bershish 2.0 Poster

The original Berish protests occurred on November 23, 2006 in the Malaysian Parliament, such attendees included political party leaders, civil society groups and NGOs, including People’s Justice Party (PKR) president, Dr. Wan Azizah Wan Ismail

The electoral reform demands of Berish 2.0, also known as 709, can be summarized in the eight following points:

Clean the electoral roll
Reform postal ballot
Use of indelible ink
Minimum 21 days campaign period
Free and fair access to media
Strengthen public institutions
Stop corruption
Stop dirty politics

Social media’s role in the Malaysian movement was to coordinate groups and record demonstrations.

As of today, the Berish 2.0 Facebook page had over 169,000 fans calling for Najib’s resignation, and the official Twitter account had close to 18,000 fans.

Though there are 10 million Facebook users in Malaysia, the preferred social media platform, protesters shared information over Twitter on how to circumvent sealed off roads and closed train stations to get to the protests.

@ask_ivan's Google map of the Malaysian government's roadblocks

While Facebook and Twitter were used for mobilization purposes, videos circulated on Youtube broadcast the movement to the world.

Over the span of the weekend 2,000 Youtube videos were uploaded with 2,774,812 total views based on the single keyword “Bersih 2.0″ on YouTube

As the case with the Arab Spring protests, the truth behind the movement is told by first hand perspectives of civil society, not the political parties. Social media is not a panacea current uprisings, but rather serve as a medium for organization and propagate that truth.

July 12, 2011/by actualize

Asia, Civil Society, Democracy & Governance, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

Cambodian Civil Mobilization

Another flame is your husband who you stay with forever

You should serve well don’t make him disappointed

Forgive him in the name of woman; don’t speak in the way that you consider him as equal

No matter what happen we have to wait to listen with the bad word (even if he say something bad you have to listen)”

This is an excerpt from the Chbap (law) Srey (woman), a traditional Cambodian proverb, outlining the codes of conduct women are expected to follow in their society.

Sopheap Chak, with the computer notebook on her lap, at Cambodia's first Blogger Summit at Pannasastra University

Sopheap Chak at Cambodia's first Blogger Summit at Pannasastra University Photo Credit: David Sasaki

Sopheap Chak’s ambition is to break this social taboo by using social media to educate Cambodia’s women and youth.

The Clogher [defined as a female Clogger = Cambodian Blogger] uses her blog to mentor other young women, urging them to step out of their comfort zone and get educated.

She also advocates and speaks at conferences for Cambodian youth to work together and make social change. The youth civic mobilization taking hold in the Southeast Asian country is increasingly being arranged as a digital movement.

According to Chak, “Over the past few years, civic mobilization in Cambodia has gained momentum with the emerging power of digital and social media. Unlike in rice production where farmers awaited the rains for a good yield of crop, the young generations no longer await the initiatives from the government or civil society organizations to yield results.”

The Cambodian youth are taking the future into their hands, organizing numerous events and initiatives, to encourage their innovative collaboration to make change.

On June 4, Chak spoke at the Khmer Talks to over 200 attendees. The monthly events are hosted by the Khmer Young Entrepreneurs (KYEs), a group of young emerging Cambodian leaders, who on their website state they believe in, “personal empowerment.”

Khmer Talks is an informal online platform where emerging social and business entrepreneurs gather together in forums and public speaking events, they express unique and innovative ideas in their local Khmer language.

A couple weeks ago on June 10, Chak went to another event organized through the group’s Facebook page called the Cambodian Women in Business.

Their page, established on Facebook in November 2009, imparts experiences of women doing business and networking in Cambodia. A number of formal gatherings have been held for the women with the support of the International Finance Cooperation of Cambodia.

Chek writes, “About 40 network participants showed up at the gathering June 3 to discuss the role of Facebook in facilitating their various businesses. The event was participated by bloggers, e-entrepreneurs, business women, and civil society organizations.”

In addition to the events that perpetuate the cycle of ideas and collaboration, InSTEDD’s first iLab in Southeast Asia, is headquartered in Phnom Penh.

The InSTEDD iLab is a participatory development project launched in Cambodia in 2007. Their goal is to build technological capacity through collaborative learning and cross sector partnerships, to address health, safety and developmental issues in the Mekong Basin.

The Cambodian people, communities, and local organizations know what challenges they face, InSTEDD iLabs merely aim to leverage the technological solutions to help address them.

Social media and technology has revived civic mobilization in Cambodia. Collaborative and innovative solutions help are helping to bring a new kind of digital empowerment to a the tattered Southeast Asian country.

June 27, 2011/by actualize

Anti-corruption, Asia, Civil Society, Democracy & Governance, Governances, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Where we work

Kashmir & Facebook: Citizens and Journalist Against the State

Crowd up people will cell phones held up

In Kashmir Photo Credit: BBC

A year after the government imposed a ban on Short Message Services (SMS) in the Kashmir Valley for “security purposes,” the numbers of cell phones has decreased, but the demand for Internet enabled phones to access Facebook continues to rise.

Kashmiris avidly use the social media site, and last Friday it was the catalyst for the arrest of London-based BBC Urdu Services senior journalist Naeema Ahmed Mehjoor by the state.

Compared to June last year when the SMS ban began, the number of cell phone users in Jammu and Kashmir has gone down from 5,155,363 to 4,974,400 in April this year—a decline of 3.5 per cent.

Those Kashmiris who do own cell phones, however, want to use them to exchange messages and access social media sites like Facebook.

“After the ban on SMS services, every customer wants to purchase Internet enabled mobiles so that they can exchange messages on the move. Therefore the demand for the same is on a rise in the Valley as the Internet enabled mobiles are available at very cheap rates now,” says Ajaz Ahmed, an executive at a mobile shop there.

According to a study on social media usage by The Nielsen Company, nearly 30 million Indians are online where two-thirds spend time on social networking sites daily, more time than they do on personal email. 42 per cent of mobile users in India use their phones to go onto Facebook, according to the report.

A local, Jameel Bhat, says using Facebook on mobiles is a cheaper option. “I used to be in touch with my friend in Dubai through SMS but after the ban, I found making calls very expensive. Now, I chat through mobile as I cannot afford a computer and other Internet services,” he says.

Jasmine Kour, another avid Kashmiri Facebook user, also finds the social networking site a ‘good source of acquiring knowledge’ because it is easily accessible on her cell phone.

Access to Facebook on mobile phones has not always been easy though, as the state continually denies citizens access.

The cellular communication in Kashmir has been witnessing sharp ups and down since 2008. The most recent ban being in June 2010 when the government shut down the SMS service for the five month long agitation against killing of teenagers.

Incidentally, the BBC journalist, Naeema Ahmed Mehjoor kept the high response from the Kashmir people towards Facebook in view, using the social media platform as source for primary information.

This was until she was arrested by J-K police for “inciting violence and spreading disinformation,” on June 10th.

Mehjoor was booked under Section 66 of the Information Technology Act; using the IT for spreading dissatisfaction against the state.

She was taken in for her comment on Facebook, ‘Why did police kill this man in Lalchowk? Any reason?’ on June 6th. The comment was made the same day a man was killed in Srinagar’s Lal Chowk area by an unidentified gunman.

The man, police claim, was killed in a criminal conspiracy by three armed men and not police.

“As a journalist, I am working for peace,” she claimed.

Well-known broadcaster Mehjoor has been writing articles for local dailies about the 2010 unrest, where she would gain insight on Facebook to reflect the daily happenings. She also went public on her rejection to three-member Kashmir interlocutors’ invitation for a peace conference on the Kashmir problem.

This is another case where the combination of mobile and social media have helped to both push and pull information in civil society. Yet another example of how the oppressive states have attempted to circumvent citizens from accessing new technologies to control their freedom of expression and right to information.

June 17, 2011/by actualize

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