Egyptian mobile operator uses Berlusconi quote in ads – why?

As late as 4th February, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was still praising Hosni Mubarak, saying the latter should remain in place for Egypt’s transition to democracy. On 11th February Mubarak resigned.

So isn’t it therefore rather odd that Egyptian mobile operator Mobinil is using a Berlusconi quote for its advertising campaigns? The photo above is from inside Cairo airport, but the same ads are on some streets of Cairo too.

Are they trying to be ironic? Or are they just blissfully unaware of Berlusconi’s reputation?

Will the politician ready to defend Schengen please stand up?

So started an interesting exchange of views about the future of Schengen yesterday – my tweet, and then a reply from European Commisson spokesperson Koen Doens:

Barroso you're a coward http://j.mp/jBBfEz Who is there in the Commission defending the integrity of the EU? Anyone? #Schengen

01.05.2011 18:00 via TweetDeck ReplyRetweetFavorite

@jonworth

Jon Worth

@jonworth Disagree. Intelligent Cion w/ courage to c that governance may possibly have 2 b adapted 2 take account of exceptional circumst.

01.05.2011 19:09 via Echofon ReplyRetweetFavorite

@ECspokesKoen

Koen Doens

Subsequent to the Twitter discussion, I’ve had some time to digest the letter Barroso sent back to Berlusconi and Sarkozy (you can find the PDF here) and, frankly, it’s not bad at all, and indeed contains plenty of positive points about how Schengen needs to be improved, although the letter does admit that reimposition of borders may be considered. Continue reading →

So started an interesting exchange of views about the future of Schengen yesterday - my tweet, and then a reply from European Commisson spokesperson Koen Doens: [blackbirdpie url="http://twitter.com/#!/jonworth/status/64751179715969024"] [blackbirdpie url="http://twitter.com/#!/ECspokesKoen/status/64768441663492096"] Subsequent to the Twitter discussion, I've had some time to digest the letter Barroso sent back to Berlusconi and Sarkozy (you can find the PDF here) and, frankly, it's not bad at all, and indeed contains plenty of positive points about how Schengen needs to be improved, although the letter does admit that reimposition of borders may be considered. The Guardian article to which I had linked only mentions the part about re-imposition of border controls, not the other answers provided by Barroso, notably to do with strengthening Frontex. It strikes me that there is a game of brinksmanship going on here, and we are only hearing the side armed with a megaphone - Berlusconi (aided by his interior minister Maroni) and Sarkozy. On the other side we have the European Commission, and the Member States of northern Europe, who have rather little time for the protestations of the Italians, but are saying so in a more subtle, quiet manner, as with Barroso's letter. This is the line from this Charlemagne blog post, and alluded to in the FT Brussels Blog here. Roderick Parkes also gives a good, comprehensive overview of the posturing, even questioning how serious the circumstances are that Italy is facing: Back in March, Italy cried solidarity. Northerners resisted. So Rome regularised immigrants, sharing its problems with its immediate northerly neighbour France. Now France and Italy have teamed up to force support from their partners. If denied, they threaten to trigger the end of passport-free travel as we know it. So what is the solution? The optimistic answer is that, so long as no real influx of immigrants materialises, the current panic will quickly resolve itself. The problem with the protestations of Sarkozy and Berlusconi is that - knowing their appeals for assistance are going to fall on deaf ears - they step up the 'put up the borders' rhetoric, so much that the terms of the debate are changed, framing a re-establishment of border controls as the only viable solution (even if burden sharing is actually doing the job). With populist parties already on the rise across Europe, the Franco-Italian calls could be in danger of becoming a crescendo. So how about a politician somewhere - in public - being willing to make an open, clear and determined defence of Schengen? [UPDATE - 2.5.2011, 1800] Thanks to a friend working on immigration policy I've been told that Germany took 432000 asylum seekers from the Western Balkans in 1992, while the number of Tunisians coming to Italy today is in the region of 25000. That would not seem to constitute 'exceptional circumstances', or at least less exceptional than Maroni speaks of. Amnesty has also gone as far as to argue that a lot of the issues in Lampedusa are of the Italians own making.

The need for a credible bargain – what the EU should learn from today’s #EUCO Twitter wall experience

Not so, or at least not in the way anyone expected. And there are parallels for today’s European Council Twitter experience.

Continue reading →

There’s a legendary story for those of us that look at political activity on the web that concerns change.gov, Obama’s platform to allow the public to put forward their political ideas that went live the day after he was inaugurated. Give the people a platform, so the argument went, and excellent ideas for future legislation will emerge. Not so, or at least not in the way anyone expected. And there are parallels for today's European Council Twitter experience. Fifteen of the top fifty ideas proposed concerned the legalisation of cannabis for medical purposes, something that had no hope of seeing the light of day. You can hear Clay Shirky explain more about the change.gov story here, but essentially there was a lack of a credible bargain – there was no realistic assumption on either side that the ideas would be implemented, so an organised group lacking a voice in traditional American politics settings gamed the system to their advantage for publicity purposes. So how does this relate to the EU? Today and tomorrow all the heads of state and government are meeting in Brussels at the European Council. Citizens can’t get close to the event, held back by razor wire and police with water cannon trucks. Yet in a token effort to gain some kudos among the Brussels EU blogosphere and twittersphere two screens were setup in the atrium of the Justus Lipsius building where the summit is taking place, showing a live Twitter wall of all tweets containing the #EUCO hash tag. Normally there’s comparatively little blogging and tweeting around summits – what do bloggers who are not actually present at the venue have to contribute? Plus a load of anodyne statements from high-level politicians is not that fun to analyse anyway. So what to make of a Twitter wall in the summit venue in the area the journalists sit? I assume rather naively the European Council’s people were expecting a bit of nice chatter about the subjects on the agenda. But that isn’t much fun. So game it! Make a splash! It started with a few sarcastic tweets from me, a blog entry, and some tweets to some Italian followers alerting them about the Twitter wall. A bit of Wikileaks-style critique was thrown in for good measure too. Then the rest was done by the braying Twitter mob who swamped the #EUCO tag with a critique of Berlusconi who was due to be present at the European Council. The tweets (branded ‘noise’ by the European Council twitter account) were adequately controversial to mean the Twitter screens were turned off ahead of schedule. Why is this like change.gov? Essentially there is no credible bargain. People might have used the #EUCO tag anyway to discuss the summit a bit, but the presence of the screens gave the semblance that the European Council was somehow listening when that of course is not so. Hence a well-organised group shut out from the debate in Brussels – anti-Berlusconi protestors – could game the system, make a bit of a splash and in some very small way make their voice heard. The lesson: these sorts of things work if they are two-way. Doing them because they look cool isn’t enough any more.

More on the Roma in Roma predicament

roma-hut

It’s far from easy to take photos when people are looking at you from all sides and wondering who the guy is with the zoom lens and the black satchel. Plus knowing the tensions between the Roma population and the ‘establishment’ I cannot have known what reactions my presence would have provoked. Still I managed a few shots that convey the depravation of the camp.

Continue reading →

Having been shocked by the horrible living conditions of the Roma in the Italian capital while jogging earlier this week I today returned to the area, camera in hand. There were no police or military present this time. It’s far from easy to take photos when people are looking at you from all sides and wondering who the guy is with the zoom lens and the black satchel. Plus knowing the tensions between the Roma population and the ‘establishment’ I cannot have known what reactions my presence would have provoked. Still I managed a few shots that convey the depravation of the camp. Rather that surreptitiously take photos I decided to walk right up to the camp and try to talk to someone to gain a further insight into what had happened here earlier in the week. I approached an elderly chap and asked in my limited Italian why the military had been present earlier in the week. ‘Perché?’ He replied with a shrug, not wishing to divulge any information. The mention of the ‘militari’ drew an interesting reaction from the small boy beside the old gentleman, hands to his face and eyes darting with nerves. I tried to ask whether such military action was normal as in the UK I had never seen anything like it; this too provoked a shrug. By this time I had drawn the attention of the whole family, bringing the women away from a rough pan of minced meat being prepared beside an old stove outside the metal shack. Feeling I better not pry any more I said goodbye and thank you to the old guy, shook his hand and drew a toothless smile. I’m not sure what he and his family made of this meeting with a stranger who spoke little Italian but at least showed them some respect. I walked back towards my hotel with a sadness in my heart. How in 2009 in the European Union can people live like this? No sanitation, make-shift metal shacks surrounded by puddles and mud? For some added irony the wall of the bridge on the main road close to the camp was plastered with posters with a baby with a crown with the slogan “Roma Capitale della Vita” (Rome Capital of Life) put up by a group on the right of Italian politics, and for Di Pietro’s “Italia dei Valori” party. CGIL’s “Italiano / Straniero” campaign posters adorned a derelict building a little further – does it apply to Roma too? Beside the CGIL posters a dead moped is propped up in front of billboards for Berlusconi’s party stating how the local police had been armed. What do the Roma feel when walking past all of this on their way back to their deprived corner by the Tiber? What do the middle class parents in their Fiats think when dropping their children off at the Circolo Sportivo RAI (the sport centre of the state TV) just a matter of metres from shocking poverty? I don’t know what the solutions are for all of this, but in most of Europe there would be an outcry if prisoners were kept in surroundings like this – where are the people helping out and caring here?

Barroso as maoist rebel, and Berlusconi as, erm, Berlusconi

My favourite member of the European Commission has an interesting past…

Hat tip: EUX.tv / Schuman Square

Silvio Berlusconi instead seems to think it’s OK – in public – to look like he’s more than attracted to a traffic warden. Eeeuuuuggghhh. Please, please get rid of that man.

Hat tip: you know who you are after laughing over a beer
[UPDATE - 26.01.2008] A further amusing one from today at Th!nk About It: