How the Ghanaian Media Missed the Masters of the Internet at IGF IV

So the Internet Governance Forum has come and gone like it never happened—and none of the media in Ghana covered it. I cannot quite understand how the Ghanaian media can pick up feeds from the BBC on all and sundry, but somehow miss issues like these? If it is about building capacity, then perhaps a shake-up of the Editors who manage news content ought to be done so that particular kind of news can be covered.

I do not know about you, but last time I looked, technology had assumed an important factor in the development of most nations. That we have the beleagured Vodafone; Tigo; MTN; and Zain in the country and that they are reputed to making tongues of observers of that sector wag could be construed as a sign that the market is saturated, given that Globacom is yet to take-off. That in itself should probably give more of the media food for thought on the future of technology beyond value added services to our mobile phones. These days, for example, mobile internet has become de rigeur, and I am wont to believe that it is only a non-discerning media that will want to leave the debate on technology at the door of mobile phones!

Truth be told, some papers have started to get their act together on reporting technology and ICT. Though I can only think of two out of many of the private press, it is at least a start. Then again, even one of the state-owned sister paper’s that does a great job on reporting technology every week failed to touch on the Internet governance forum, preferring to do an interview of the boss of the International Telecommunications Union(ITU) Dr Hamidou Toure.

Why Internet Governance matters

Perhaps one of the cardinal benefits of the internet is its ability to serve as a source of information to people all over the world. That it is generally free once one overcomes the hurdle of internet café fees and whatnot makes the appeal all the more greater. While I understand it is very easy to appreciate the value of the Internet and its utility for all sorts of uses, I also understand that it is very easy for all of us to take it for granted.

This is where Internet governance comes in, because it enables policy to be formulated so that people worldwide can continue to enjoy its benefit. Even more critical is the Internet governance forum, which I touched on last week. Its value is found in the fact that it is a multi-stakeholder forum monitoring the work of the Internet, and therefore making it easier for policy to be produced around it.

The naysayers of the internet governance process might speculate that after the World Summit on Information Society in Tunis, the UN just needed another excuse to spend inordinate amounts of money on a process that does not get anywhere. Before we accept this idea lock, stock and barrel, let us read what is officially written about it.

Wikipedia says that it was a working group established after a United Nations-initiated World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) that proposed the following definition of Internet governance as part of its June 2005 report:

Internet governance is the development and application by Governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.

Wikipedia maintains that “Law professor Yochai Benkler developed a conceptualization of Internet governance by the idea of three "layers" of governance: the "physical infrastructure" layer through which information travels; the "code" or "logical" layer that controls the infrastructure; and the "content" layer, which contains the information that signals through the network.”

In other words, looking at how the Internet works through how governments themselves do their work is probably one of the ways in which we can better-appreciate the work of the Internet Governance Forum.

In the final analysis, if the impression I am giving is that the Ghanaian media does not cover these issues because they are apathetic to them, then I would be way off mark. The truth of the matter is that I should have known that having failed to cover the past three Internet Governance Forums (2006-2008), they were hardly going to change tack and suddenly begin covering it. At least, one has to commend the consistency!

ENDs

Introducing the Masters of the Internet at the Fourth Internet Governance Forum

By E.K.Bensah Jr.

Despite the apparent growing ubiquity of broadband internet--as expressed, for example, through USB mobile modems that promise us heaven and blink-of-the-eye speeds--it is true that access to the internet is a great deal better than it was even five years ago.

The media generally likes to talk a lot about costs going down, inexorably providing the general Ghanaian population with relatively less expensive access to the Internet. Truth be told, the availability of mobile phones is probably that which has democratised access to the 'Net, through the easy access of wap-enabled services--as exemplified by those of Zain, which, with a simple sim card, enables you connect to mobile internet within 24 hours.

Back to the ICT Future?

You may re-call that last week, I touched on ITU and how it creates standards. This week, I want to remind us to reflect a bit on the progress of the Internet since 2005, when the World Summit of Information Society ended in Tunisia with what has come to be known as the “Tunis Agenda for the Information Society”. Adopted on November 18, 2005 in Tunis, Tunisia, it called for the creation of an Internet Governance Forum(IGF) and what wikipedia calls “a novel, lightweight, multi-stakeholder governance structure for the Internet.”

Few Ghanaians might know that as I write this, the Fourth Edition of what has become known to the ICT cognoscenti as IGF will end on 18 November, where a number of important developments in the ICT and information society sector will develop. The Internet Governance Forum is underway in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, which to some might seem a curious place, given its record on human rights. Already, repports doing the rounds on the internet are trying to suggest that the UN has been involved in some kind of nefarious conspiracy of silencing proponents of human rights--just because some UN guards removed posters on human rights that had not been approved earlier.

Back in Tunis, in 2005, there was even a stabbing of a human rights activist, lending credence to the assumption that just because it was a UN-sponsored conference, the global body could come and wag its finger at Tunisia for bad human rights. Most of us who had the priviledge to be there at that time were consumed by attentiveness to the multiplicity of terminologies and developments coming at us with juggernaut speed that in all honesty, agitations like that looked like a footnote to the wider debate on where the information society was going.

IGF IV Explained

All that said, reports seem to indicate that the meeting is rather focused, with discussions focusing primarily on access to the “Internet; diversity; openness; security; and critical internet resources”.

The statistics are also not to be sneezed at. For example, Subramanian Ramadorai, the Vice-Chairman of Tata Consultancy Services in India has not just talked about how new technologies “can mean the difference between life and death for the 701 per cent of the global population still unconnected to the Internet”, but crucially, how “while 79.4 per cent of Australians and 70 per cent of Americans have internet access, only 15 per cent of Asians and only 4 percent of Africans have access.” This kind of statistic reinforces the perception of a digital divide that is a veritable reality for millions of the non-connected. One-Laptop-Per-Child (OLPC), though a commendable endeavour that also came out of WSIS 2005, can only go so far in addressing the digital divide.

What it seems we can say about the outcome of this IGF is that it will be one that makes concrete suggestions on the above-mentioned points, including recognizing that connectivity has a direct correlation with a positive social and economic changes; therefore ensuring that rural communities are privy and party to these positive changes are critical.

Ramadorai maintains that bringing ICT into rural clinics, schools and mobile devices, impacts basic education, health care, and agriculture in ways that one can never have imagined. To that extent, it makes sense that while we appreciate that consumers in the developed market enjoy broadband and are even moving to newer technologies, there is quite some catch-up that many parts of the developing world will need to do to ensure that the information society is not just part of UN nomenclature--but contributes to a fair and inclusive society.

ekbensah AT gmail.com / +233-268.891.841