Protecting campaigners essential for transparency

CAFOD is calling for action to halt the suppression of groups and individuals working for change in the extractives industry in developing countries

At the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Doha last week, we spoke out against intimidation, threats and detention of civil society campaigners.

Addressing the conference, CAFOD private sector policy analyst Anne Lindsay said: "A disturbing development over the last three years has been the repressive action by a small number of EITI participating countries against their own civil society representatives.

Intimidation, threats and even detention have all been documented

Anne Lindsay, CAFOD

"Intimidation, threats and even detention have all been documented. One of the most valuable elements of the EITI is its tripartite structure. It brings together governments, companies and civil society.

"If one of these actors is missing, the initiative will fail. This must be addressed – without civil society there is no EITI."

Significant resources

We work with around 500 local partners in more than 50 developing countries worldwide, including many with significant oil, gas and mineral resources such as Angola, Bolivia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Sudan, and Timor-Leste.

Measures to ensure that ordinary people benefit from their country’s mineral wealth have to be at the heart of any work to combat poverty and promote sustainable development.

Citizens in these countries are often not able to access information about revenues from oil, gas and mining, or track how their money is being spent.

To work towards better transparency on these issues and against corruption, we became one of the founder members of the Publish what You Pay (PWYP) Coalition in 2002 and have been involved in EITI’s development.

Anne Lindsay adds: "CAFOD believes that all human beings have the right to dignity and respect, and that the world’s resources are a gift to be shared equally by all men and women, whatever their race, nationality or religion."

In 2006 EITI civil society representatives Christian Mounzeo and Brice Makosso were detained and put on trial in Congo-Brazzaville.

Marc Ona, from Publish What You Pay Gabon, a member of the national EITI multi-stakeholder group, was not at the 2009 PWYP conference because his government prevented him from leaving the country to fly to Doha. At the beginning of this year he was detained in Gabon for a number of days along with other NGO campaigners.

Need for stronger action

The EITI Secretariat set up a rapid response group in response to the detentions, but we are asking all participants to do more to end this worrying aspect of EITI’s development.

1. It is essential that all EITI participants are clear that there is no place for intimidation and harassment of civil society within this initiative.

2. As more countries go through the validation in 2009, the Secretariat needs to capture learning about whether civil society groups have been able to participate fully. This will help identify good practice as well as flagging up potential problems early on.

3. When more countries implement EITI at sub-national level, careful thought is needed on how to ensure protection for local activists who are often working in remote areas.

Notes to editors

• In 2002 former Prime Minister Tony Blair announced the launch of a new initiative at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, partially in response to pressure from the Publish What You Pay NGO coalition for greater transparency in oil, gas and mining industries. EITI is an international multi-stakeholder initiative to increase transparency of payments by companies to host country governments for extraction of oil, gas and minerals, and of government receipts of this income.

• EITI encourages resource-rich countries to sign up to a set of principles and implement reporting guidelines to publish information on company payments and government revenues, working in conjunction with local civil society and extractive companies. After two years, performance is independently validated to see if the country has met the criteria required to be EITI compliant.

• CAFOD has been a member of Publish What You Pay since 2002 and has been one of the NGOs lobbying to influence the development of EITI over the last six years.

For more information about the Publish What You Pay campaign: www.publishwhatyoupay.org
For more information about EITI: www.eitransparency.org
For more information and interviews contact Pascale Palmer +44 20 7095 390