Sri Lanka university workers maintain indefinite strike as union backtracks

Saman Gunadasa

More than 15,000 non-academic workers from 15 Sri Lankan state universities are continuing an indefinite strike they began on February 28. The workers are demanding a 20 percent wage rise, a language proficiency allowance, increased concessionary loans, the introduction of medical insurance and a pension scheme.

The University Trade Union Joint Committee (UTUJC) called the strike under pressure from members who are increasingly restive over its back peddling in response to the government’s refusal to grant workers’ demands.

UTUJC chairman Edward Malwattage told Higher Education and Highways Minister Kabir Hasim last week that the strikers have threatened to withdraw their voluntary services at farm maintenance, research and medical facilities, and university laboratories, and other daily mandatory services.

The striking workers walked out over the same demands almost two years ago, in July 2016. The trade unions, however, called off the strike after 12 days, claiming they had received a written agreement from the University Grants Commission (UGC), the administrative body of state universities.

After the “agreement” was exposed as an empty promise, the UTUJC organised token strikes this year, on January 25 and February 6 and 7, to let off steam and deflect mounting opposition among union members.

Striking University nonacademic workers at Colombo University

On February 6, thousands of workers protested outside the UGC in Colombo as union leaders held discussions with UGC chairman Professor Mohan de Silva. When de Silva responded by threatening to make any future strike illegal, the UTUJC announced the February 28 walkout, while working behind the scenes to avert the strike.

The Sri Lanka University Technical Officers Union (SLUTOU) immediately moved to prevent unified action. Moratuwa University branch leaders called a meeting on February 23, declaring it had decided to break from the UTUJC because they were denied co-chairmanship of the committee and would not participate in the proposed strike.

Dehin Wasantha, a Socialist Equality Party (SEP) member and well-known among the SLUTOU membership, opposed this betrayal and demanded the union participate in the national walkout. He was supported by a majority of members and a meeting resolved to join the strike from March 2.

UTUJC leaders told strikers they would contact “friendly ministers” within the government and win their support for workers’ demands. UTUJC treasurer K. L. D. J. Richmond said: “Two unions which are representing the government parties can be fruitfully involved in the discussions with ministers.”

The two unions to which Richmond referred are affiliated to President Maithripala Sirisena’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe’s United National Party (UNP). Another union, controlled by the opposition Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), is backing the moves by other unions to derail the strike.

UTUJC Colombo University branch secretary R. P. G. D. Herath announced that the union alliance had called off a planned March 2 protest march in Colombo, declaring it was confident there would be a positive response after Hasim assumed his duties as the new higher education minister.

Hasim was appointed the minister on February 25, after President Sirisena and Prime Minister Wickremesinghe made some cosmetic changes to the cabinet, following defeats in recent local government elections. The changes were another desperate attempt to hoodwink the population.

The government is fully committed to the social austerity program demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and will continue to slash expenditure, including for education and limited welfare subsidies, and push for the privatisation of state-owned corporations.

These measures include boosting private universities, imposing fee-paying courses at state universities, refusing to fill university staff vacancies and cutting temporary and contract positions.

The UGC chairman’s threat to ban the strike action is not a personal one, but in line with the government’s use of police-state measures, including essential services orders and the deployment of the military to suppress strike action.

The craven appeals of the UTUJC and its false claims that the government can be pressured to grant workers’ demands are a political trap. The government’s refusal to increase pay for non-academic workers is of a piece with its blanket opposition to wage rises for power, postal and railway workers, to name just a few.

Non-academic workers demonstrating outside the University Grants Commission in Colombo

The non-academic workers’ struggle is a part of a widening working class struggle. Power workers are currently holding protest pickets throughout the country, demanding wage increases and opposing the political victimisation of their union leaders.

The university workers’ strike reflects a growing radicalisation of the international working class, expressed in the struggle of West Virginia teachers in the US, who have rejected their union’s rotten deal with the state government.

Last week, as the WSWS spoke with striking workers, Indika Diddeniya, secretary of Colombo university’s laboratory assistant’s union, intervened, declaring that the union “expected a progressive response” from the minister.

When challenged by a WSWS reporter, who said the new ministerial appointment did nothing to change the government’s policy, Diddeniya retreated and demagogically declared: “A change of minister is not a big deal for us. We only believe in our struggle. That’s why we launched this indefinite strike.”

The WSWS reporter pointed out the treacherous record and role of the trade unions and explained the Socialist Equality Party’s call for the establishment of “action committees” independent of the trade unions.

On hearing this discussion, Asanka Heenkenda, a laboratory worker, voiced his agreement with the WSWS reporter. When the government initially granted a small wage increase, he said, many workers thought it was a relief. “However, the cost of living has gone up dramatically,” he said. “We can’t cope with the situation and the fight to win demands is imperative.”

Many workers who spoke with the WSWS rejected union claims that government ministers are sympathetic to workers. A striker from Jaffna University said: “The new minister is a minister of this government, which is responsible for everything. This is an act of cheating us.”

A Moratuwa University worker commented: “How many ministers in this and the previous governments presented us with fake promises? When this minister presents us with a letter, the union leadership boasts about it. It is better to quit the unions rather than being members.”

A University of Peradeniya striker said: “We have no confidence in the union leadership. They tried to postpone this struggle several times but couldn’t do it because of the determination of membership to win their demands. The union leadership only wants to protect their positions and ranks. They have no intention of winning our demands.”

Striking UTUJC members must reject all attempts by the union leadership to end their industrial action. They should take the initiative to establish action committees, independent of the trade unions, reach out to other workers and develop unified action for a workers’ and peasants’ government to implement socialist policies in opposition to the IMF’s austerity measures.

Mexico: The most dangerous country for journalists outside of war zones

Meenakshi Jagadeesan

On February 13, reporter Pedro Damian Gomez was found dead in his house in the Lomas de la Amistad area of Tijuana in the Mexican state of Baja California. Gomez produced a social media show called “Political Panorama,” which covered topical news stories and featured political interviews. While the initial reports by local media of a violent death have been denied by the state attorney’s office, the case is far from resolved.

Just prior to his death, Gomez posted a message on his social media account about the mysterious gift of a new car that had been left outside his house with keys and documentation in his name. Beyond the timing of the curious gift, what has fueled suspicions of foul play is the fact that the targeting of journalists working on political stories has become tragically routine in Mexico.

In 2017, Mexico was ranked 147th out of 180 countries on “World Press Freedom Index” that is released annually by Reporters Without Borders (RSF). The group condemned the “appalling level of impunity” in Mexico, where it claims there have been at least 21 unsolved disappearances of journalists since 2000. Mexico’s own National Human Rights Commission has backed this claim, further highlighting the fact that at least 8 of the 21 journalists have been missing for more than a decade.

RSF’s condemnation of the Mexican state’s treatment of journalists coincided with the 10th anniversary of the disappearance of Maurizio Estrada Zamora, who was a crime reporter for local daily La Opinión de Apatzingán. As reported in the PressGazette, Zamora had written a story that “reflected badly” on a federal agency police officer known as “El Diablo.” Zamora disappeared shortly after its publication. He was last seen leaving the offices of the newspaper on February 12, 2008. However, it is not just disappearances that seem to afflict Mexican journalists.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a non-partisan group that tracks press freedoms, reported that the number of journalists killed in the line of duty or in retaliation for their work declined worldwide last year, but remained quite dangerous in some countries. There were eight journalists killed in Iraq and seven in Syria. Mexico was right behind, according to the report, with the recorded deaths of six journalists. RSF pointed out, however, that this was half the number of actual deaths, thus in fact giving Mexico the dubious honor of being the most perilous country for journalists in the world.

In a list compiled last December, the Los Angeles Times provided a snapshot of the lives of the 12 journalists who were killed in Mexico in 2017. Despite difference in age, gender, work experience, and the kinds of media in which they worked, what was common to all the assassinated journalists was a focus on the nexus between organized crime, drug cartels and political corruption. Many of them had faced numerous threats to their lives and had carried on their work despite knowing the grave danger they faced.

Javier Valdez Cardenas, one of the assassinated journalists, had in fact been awarded the Committee to Protect Journalists’ International Press Freedom Award in 2011. On receiving the award, Valdez declared that he was dedicating it to “the brave journalists, and to the children and youths who are living a slow death. … I have preferred to give a face and a name to the victims, to create a portrait of this sad and desolate panorama, these leaps and bounds and short cuts towards the apocalypse, instead of counting deaths and reducing them to numbers.”

A well-known journalist and author, Valdez was a correspondent for the Mexico City-based daily La Jornada and a cofounder of the regional weekly Riodoce. When fellow correspondent Miroslava Breach was gunned down in the city of Chihuahua on March 23, 2017, Valdez tweeted, “Let them kill us all, if that is the death penalty for reporting this hell. No to silence.” Two months later, Valdez was dragged out of his car on a busy street and shot at least 12 times.

A significant number of journalists have given up their work, their homes and their families in an attempt to save their lives. While some have attempted to claim asylum in other countries, particularly the United States, others have gone into hiding in government designated safe houses in Mexico.

The Mexican government has claimed that it is committed to protecting press freedom and the lives of its journalists. As an example, the government cites the establishment of the “Mechanism to Protect Human Rights Defenders and Journalists,” a program that provides reporters and photographers who have been threatened or attacked with security guards and a panic button that summons authorities. In the five years of its existence, at least 368 journalists have sought these protections. However, as a recent Los Angeles Times story points out, this remains far from a guarantee of safety.

Julio Omar Gomez, a 37-year-old reporter from La Paz, used to run a popular news web site that reported on the growing violence in the region, as well as stories of government corruption. Hired assassins set fire to vehicles in his garage twice in an attempt to kill Gomez and his family, even leaving a crudely worded note on the scene, "Don't involve yourself in politics."

Initially, Gomez refused governmental protection since it appeared as though local politicians were involved in the murder attempt. But, after his mentor Maximino Rodriguez—a well-known and respected La Pa z journalist—was murdered in a parking lot while assisting his disabled wife, Gomez decided to accept the protection of 24-hour security guards.

Despite this, a third attempt was made on his life, this time resulting in a gunfight that took the life of one of the guards. After this attempt, Gomez has taken refuge in an anonymous safe house, which he leaves only for appointments with a therapist, who is treating him for anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. Gomez’s time at the safe house is limited. In six months, he will have to fend for himself.

The journalists who fled north of the border have not necessarily fared much better. Despite its claims of prioritizing combating violence against journalists in Mexico, the US government has been singularly reluctant to provide asylum to targeted journalists. Last May, Mexican journalist Martin Mendez dropped his asylum claim in the US and agreed to be deported after he was held in detention for nearly four months. Emilio Gutierrez Soto, a celebrated journalist who has been in the US for nearly a decade after fleeing Mexico, was denied asylum last November and is currently being held in a detention center in El Paso, Texas.

Gutierrez made the decision to flee Mexico after the publication of a series of articles about soldiers ill-treating migrants in boarding houses and stealing their money drew the ire of military commanders. After withstanding a ransacking of his house and ominous drive-bys by military personnel, Gutierrez left in 2008 after a tearful call from a friend who told him to leave immediately since the army was about to kill him. He had assumed that his story would ensure him political asylum in the United States, but that was not to be. Despite being awarded the National Press Club’s prestigious Press Freedom Award in Washington, D.C. last year, Gutierrez now awaits potential deportation. As quoted in the Los Angeles Times, he is convinced he will be killed by the government the minute he returns to Mexico. “I feel like I’m another dead journalist,” he said.

Far fewer Mexicans receive asylum in the United States than citizens of other countries, including India, Ethiopia and China. The denial of asylum in cases such as that of Gutierrez only underscores the inhumane enforcement-driven logic that has become the guiding force of US immigration policy, notwithstanding its lip service to prioritizing humanitarian concerns.

Belgian military plans to quintuple spending on weapons systems

Olivier Laurent

As NATO countries across Europe come together around the drive to increase military spending to 2 percent of their gross domestic product, Belgium is launching a major rearmament drive. As the Belgian army and state apparatus denounce the condition of the country’s weapons systems and troops, the government is proposing a drastic solution.

Its 2018 military budget includes 4.7 times more so-called engagement credits—that is, cash to be paid on delivery and that therefore does not appear in normal operating budgets—than the 2017 budget. Altogether, this involves spending €9.2 billion ($US11.3 billion) on military equipment between 2020 and 2030.

Officially, the goal is to reestablish the “credibility” of the Belgian army. According to the New Year speech by Chief of Defense General Marc Compernol at the Royal Army Museum, the Belgian army has suffered from measures that “can be summarized as using budgetary restrictions.” He proposed to “modernize and invest to ensure key missions but also to save our core business while taking into account of demographic changes.”

In fact, spending increases have already been underway for several years. In 2014, the NATO member states agreed on an “end to cuts to defense spending.” This was officially inscribed in the government coalition pact agreed that same year between Flemish Christian Democrats (CD&V), the Reform Movement (MR, right-wing Francophones), the right-wing separatist New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) and Open Vld (the Flemish free-marketeers) after elections that produced a hung parliament.

The coalition formed under Prime Minister Charles Michel launched a brutal austerity program, including 20 percent cuts in cultural and scientific budgets, cuts to the judicial system, privatizations, tax cuts for business, pension cuts for the unemployed, the deregulation of overtime and of part-time work. At the same time, the government boasted that it would “give back to the army the means it needs to do its missions.”

In 2015, the Belgian parliament adopted a resolution calling for a “balanced” military force, at which point Defense Minister Steven Vandeput (N-VA) said that “spending more will be inevitable.” In 2016, a new resolution accepted the NATO military spending increase agenda laid out at the Warsaw summit. In 2017, the military planning law prepared a major increase in spending, and in December 2017, Belgium and 25 other EU countries signed the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO), the embryonic European army proposed by Berlin and Paris.

The technical plans of the Belgian government, as of its counterparts in other imperialist countries, show that it is preparing for aggressive wars, not for a more “credible” defensive posture.

The Motorized Capacity (CAMO) program, the main land army program, is designed to allow the Median Brigade, the Belgian army’s principal land unit, to “profoundly modify its doctrine, training and logistics.” This program entails buying 60 armored Jaguar combat and reconnaissance vehicles, and 417 multi-role Griffon armored vehicles. This program is being closely coordinated with the French “Scorpion” rearmament program, launched in 2013 under the Socialist Party (PS) government of President François Hollande.

This program, which will benefit Renault Trucks Defense, Thales and Nexter, aims to “establish a partnership based on identical French and Belgian combat vehicles,” declared the Defense Ministry when the CAMO program was adopted and €1.1 billion spent on it by the Belgian government in June 2017. The government also stated at the time that the Belgian companies CMI, Herstal, and Thales-Belgium could thus obtain contracts in exchange for Belgium’s decision to join the program. France for its part is buying 1,668 Griffon and 248 Jaguar vehicles as part of this program.

This is supposed to allow the forces of the two countries to coordinate even more closely on the battlefield.

Other programs involved entail improving “Special Operations Forces” for use in operations abroad, with 200 transport vehicles for light troops. Already in 2016, Belgium had ordered some 108 Fox rapid-reaction vehicles with the British company Jankel.

Brussels is also planning to acquire some 34 fighter jets starting in 2023 in a common program with the Netherlands to develop frigates and warships, mines, drones and a complete redesign of computer systems for the intelligence services. There is also a plan for a joint military satellite program with France.

The plan is not, however, only to mount imperialist wars in former colonial countries. The European Union is engaged in a massive rearmament program in anticipation of growing international conflicts as the world has not seen since World War II. This emerged notably in French President Emmanuel Macron’s statement last year that “we have entered into an era in international relations where war is again a possible horizon of politics.”

Many countries are launching “civic service” programs that are thinly disguised calls for a return to the draft. Macron wants to establish a universal military service, and Sweden has already introduced obligatory military service that was canceled in 2010. Above all, in 2014, Berlin announced that it would re-militarize its foreign policy.

In remarks flowing directly from those of Macron, the Egmont Institute, an official Belgian think tank funded by among others the country’s Foreign Ministry, published a recent report titled “Belgian Defense in 2018: Regeneration Time?”

It declared, “The present and future force structure is based on a logic of peacetime, whereas the possibility of major conflict on the European continent is perhaps still remote, but surely no longer inconceivable. The deepest challenge for Belgian defense planners relates to the question of how to respond to future contingencies that could be vastly more challenging in operational terms than the experience of recent decades.”

It also proposes to plan interventions inside Belgium itself. The report declares, “The 2016 terrorist attacks in Brussels have made clear that security problems do not necessarily remain ‘far away’ problems.”

In fact, what the recent terror attacks in Europe have shown is that the attackers were all in one or another way linked to the intelligence services, who protected the Islamist networks they were a part of in order to use them for their brutal war for regime change in Syria. They were in fact fighting for NATO before they turned to organizing horrific terror attacks across the continent.

The central problem facing the Belgian army, and the ruling classes of all the NATO countries, is the lack of enthusiasm in the population, or in fact its deep opposition, toward war. The report is aware that youth do not want to be killed in overseas conflicts. It therefore notes cynically that “paying constant attention to recruiting a far higher number of young men and young women for flexible and attractive careers will therefore be the key for the future, and particularly once the economic situation gets worse.”

UK government lies exposed over civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria

Jean Shaoul

Recent reports expose the absurdity of the British government’s claims that it had “no evidence” that UK air strikes had killed a single civilian in Iraq and Syria during the three-year-long bombing campaign.

In the absence of regular Ministry of Defence (MoD) statistics on its air strikes in the region, the website Middle East Eye (MEE) has used data collated by the campaign group Drone Wars about Britain’s operations.

Since the start of Operation Shader against IS in 2014 until last September, Royal Air Force (RAF) drones and jets dropped more than 3,400 bombs and missiles on Islamic State (IS) militants in Iraq and Syria. These include 2,089 Paveway IV “precision-guided” bombs and 486 of the more accurate Brimstone missiles from Typhoon and Tornado jets. RAF Reaper drones fired 724 Hellfire missiles at IS targets.

Such estimates are at best conservative, since MoD updates do not always specify the number of bombs or missiles used in a strike. In October, a MoD spokesperson admitted that the RAF had dropped a further 86 bombs and missiles.

Referring to the battle to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul, former defence secretary Sir Michael Fallon stated the RAF had struck more than 750 targets in the city—“second only to the United States.”

Airwars, a journalist-led project monitoring reports of civilian casualties from airstrikes, estimated that the number of civilians killed last year by the US-led coalition against IS was between 11,000 and 18,000, mostly in the battles to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul and the Syrian city of Raqqa. Figures released by Associated Press, Amnesty International, Iraq Body Count and the UN put the number of civilian deaths at around 11,000 people, while hundreds more may be buried in the rubble.

Greg Bagwell, a former RAF deputy commander who oversaw air strikes in Iraq, Syria and Libya before retiring in 2016, told Drone Wars UK that it was “almost unbelievable” that the British government had said it had no credible evidence of civilian deaths during the RAF campaign against IS.

He pointed out: “You can’t see through rubble.” Last July, there were reports that Iraqi soldiers had used bulldozers to hide the bodies of hundreds of civilians killed in the last days of the battle for Mosul.

Britain’s air campaign in Iraq and Syria has cost at least £1.75 billion ($2.5 billion), with almost $2.1 billion spent on operating the RAF’s fleet of Reaper drones and Tornado and Typhoon jets, and $376.2 million on weaponry. The cost of Brimstone missiles is believed to be at least £100,000 each; heavier Paveway IV bombs £30,000 each, and Hellfire, fired by the Reaper drones, £71,300 each.

These are just the headline costs. The figures, compiled by Drone Wars UK exclude any ground operations or training support either to the Iraqi army or the Syrian forces supported by the US-led coalition. Neither do they include crew time, maintenance and capital costs. Parliament’s defence select committee was told that the official cost of Britain’s involvement in the NATO-led war to unseat Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in Libya in 2011 was “not a true and realistic calculation of the costs of operations.”

Crucially, these estimates—obtained from Freedom of Information requests—confirm that the MoD’s figures of £800 million given to Parliament in October were fictitious. They also give the lie to the preposterous claims made in December 2015—some time after the bombing campaign had actually started without Parliament’s knowledge—by the then chancellor of the exchequer, George Osborne. He said, in an attempt to assuage popular opposition to Britain’s intervention against a background of austerity and ongoing privatisation of health and education, that the cost of launching British airstrikes against IS in Syria would be in the “low tens of millions of pounds” and would “come out of the special reserve which we established for the purposes of military action like this.”

While Osborne and then Prime Minister David Cameron confirmed that the Syrian campaign could well last for several years, the seven-month-long bombing campaign in Libya had cost at least £1.5 billion.

In 2014, after the Obama administration sent US troops back into Iraq and started its bombing campaign in Iraq and Syria—ostensibly to defeat IS but in reality to shore up its position in the Middle East—Britain joined the US-coalition. Along with the US, London supported a war for regime change in Syria, a Russian ally, in an alliance with Islamist militias and Kurdish forces.

This was well before any authorisation to intervene in Syria and in defiance of the 2013 House of Commons vote against military intervention in Syria, which Cameron had promised to honour, much to Washington’s fury.

In December 2015, Parliament voted to support an air campaign against Islamic State in Syria but did not authorise the use of ground troops or special forces, but Cameron ignored this distinction.

More than 85,000 Iraqi and 500,000 Syrians, many of them civilians, have been killed in the past seven years. An estimated 11 million Syrians have been displaced, producing the worst refugee crisis since World War II.

Despite declaring victory over IS in Iraq and Syria, government ministers, including Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, and senior military officers have indicated that they want RAF bombing to continue. Both International Development Secretary Rory Stewart and Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson have called for drones to be used to kill British-born IS members in Iraq and Syria—a kill-on-sight policy that would breach UK and international law.

Just last week, Johnson went further, raising the possibility of a full-scale intervention against Syria that could lead to a wider conflagration with nuclear-armed Russia, when he said that Britain would consider bombing the Syrian government if it was proved to have used gas on civilians.

None of this would have been possible without Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s willingness to ditch positions he has held for decades to maintain the unity of the Labour Party and its ability to defend the interests of British imperialism.

On every key issue—war in Syria, NATO’s military build-up against Russia and the renewal of Britain’s nuclear weapons programme—the former chairperson of the Stop the War Coalition has given way to the militaristic demands of his right-wing critics.

In December 2015, Corbyn authorised a free vote on military action in Syria and allowed Hillary Benn, a supporter of Britain’s intervention in Syria, to close the parliamentary debate for Labour, enabling RAF bombers to carry out the first sanctioned attack on Syria.

In 2016, he abandoned his opposition to NATO membership and then gave Labour MPs another free vote on the renewal of Trident—Britain’s nuclear arms programme—lining up Britain alongside the US in a potential nuclear war with Russia.

Despite the government’s increasingly absurd claims that it has no evidence that RAF strikes have killed civilians, he has initiated no debate in Parliament over this or the continuation of British bombing raids in Syria. Iraq has declared victory over IS and secured its borders—the supposed purpose of Britain’s intervention in the first place.

Putin’s state of the nation speech highlights crisis of Russian oligarchy

Clara Weiss

On March 1, Vladimir Putin delivered a state of the nation speech that highlighted the crisis of the Russian oligarchy which finds itself beleaguered by US imperialism while Russia is in the midst of prolonged economic and social decline.

The annual speech to members of the Federal Assembly (i.e. both the upper and lower houses of the Russian parliament) is usually given in December, but was delayed multiple times before the Kremlin announced just a few weeks ago that it would be held just 17 days before the presidential election. Unlike in the past, Putin gave his speech not in the Kremlin’s St. George Hall but at the much larger Manege, an old Tsarist riding school outside the Kremlin.

Putin’s two-hour speech was riddled with contradictions, combining extreme nationalism with social demagogy, concessions to the liberal opposition and the announcement of Russia entering a nuclear arms race with the United States.

Before he proceeded to Russia’s military rearmament, on which all Western press reports have focused, Putin devoted some two parts of his speech to social and economic questions. It was the first time that Putin, who is widely expected to win the presidential elections on March 18, has revealed something akin to an election program.

Putin deliberately refused to acknowledge the massive impact of the sanctions of the EU and US on the Russian economy. He did not once mention gas exports and oil prices, on which the Russian economy and budget heavily rely. Even though the sanctions and the drop in international oil prices have led to a recession in Russia from 2014-2016 from which the economy has still not fully recovered, Putin mentioned the crisis and the sanctions only once in passing, arguing instead that “a new macroeconomic reality has been created in Russia today with a low inflation and a generally stable economy.”

In delivering a speech that, in its final parts, was aimed at preparing the population for the possibility of a nuclear war with the United States, Putin thus tried to belittle both the extent of Russia’s social and economic crisis and its extreme dependence on the world market.

In addressing the social situation, Putin offered a bizarre mixture of grandiose social promises with statements that everything was going great already followed by grudging, vague admissions of an acute social and economic crisis in Russia.

Many of these promises were reminiscent of what Putin had promised before time and again. If anything, the demagogy was even starker. Putin proposed an increase in pensions; massive government investments into the development of cities and small towns, the infrastructure of streets and railways, which are in a desperately poor state; the development of the housing stock; as well as a substantial increase in spending on education and the health care system. This is after almost two decades in which Putin has been president or prime minister while drastic cuts to almost all of these sectors were undertaken.

Virtually every task that Putin set for the new government was followed by a variation of the phrase: “This will be a very difficult task. But I’m confident that we can solve it.” He briefly mentioned his May decrees from 2016 in which he had already set forth a series of social demands, including a livable income for everyone, basically acknowledging that they had not been realized.

With this lengthy but remarkably vague and demagogic part of his speech, Putin was no doubt responding to growing unrest in the working class. Just a few weeks ago, a series of teachers in Tagaranrog had protested against the poverty wages they received, referring to Putin’s May decrees. One of the teachers involved was promptly fired.

Shortly thereafter, a young nurse from the southern Urals posted a video of herself on vkontakte (a Russian version of Facebook), reciting a poem in which she severely criticized the decrepit state of Russia’s social and health care system and explained why she was becoming ever more nostalgic about the Soviet Union: “I’m teaching my children to love their motherland, but I cannot explain them for what. My father did not make it until retirement age, he could not bear the burden, he always paid into the pension fund but where is his money now?” The video has been viewed by over 200,000 people.

After describing at length all social issues that his new government would allegedly address, Putin announced an economic program that de facto caters to the demands of the liberal opposition and figures such as Ksenia Sobchak, and would inevitably be accompanied by further social austerity.

He added: “In order for the economy to work at its maximum strength we need to fundamentally improve the business climate, and guarantee the highest level of entrepreneurial freedoms and competition. …The participation of the state in the economy must be gradually lowered”. He also promised to ruthlessly fight all tendencies by the state and law enforcement to intervene in private business activities.

In the final part of the speech, Putin emphasized repeatedly and at length that the Russian government had undertaken every possible effort to negotiate with the United States about issues such as the Missile Defense System. “There was a time when I thought that a compromise could be found. But all our proposals, literally all our proposals, were rejected.”

The massive nuclear rearmament that the Russian government was now undertaking was, Putin stressed, a defensive measure.

In an unprecedented military show of strength, Putin detailed Russia’s new weapons systems and showed a video simulation of a nuclear attack on Florida. Finally, he warned that Russia would consider any attack with nuclear weapons, of whatever size, on its territory or that of an ally, an assault on Russia which would be “answered accordingly”.

He concluded his speech with appeals to nationalism, implying that “the Russia we all dream of” would and could now be created in the 21st century and that “our bright victories” still lie ahead.

The speech by Putin highlights the profound crisis of the Russian oligarchy. If in the 1990s, the generally held motto of the ascending oligarchs who were plundering and destroying the economy was “après moi le déluge” (after me the deluge), they now find themselves in the midst of the deluge and do not know how to get out of it. From its very inception, the Russian oligarchy has been based on the destruction of the Soviet economy, the brutal exploitation of the working class, the frenzied selling off of raw material resources and an economic and political dependence on imperialism. Yet their economic basis is now becoming ever more flimsy, there is growing unrest in the working class and US imperialism, on which the oligarchs had always counted as a possible ally, and is now openly preparing for war against Russia.

The oligarchy’s only way out of this crisis lies in a desperate combination of the whipping-up of nationalism and massive rearmament on the one hand, and attempts to find a last-minute negotiated settlement with US imperialism on the other. For the working class in Russia and internationally, either would result in a disaster.

China’s National People’s Congress to install Xi as political strongman

Peter Symonds

China’s annual National People’s Congress (NPC), which began yesterday, is set to rubberstamp a change to the country’s constitution that will remove the two-term limit on the president and vice-president, ensuring that President Xi Jinping can remain in office after his second five-year term expires in 2023.

While a formal vote of some 3,000 heavily-vetted delegates is yet to take place, NPC deputy chairman Wang Chen declared in advance that the constitutional change had unanimous support and that the party had broadly canvassed public opinion across all sectors.

In reality, the vast majority of the population has had no say in the decision. It will entrench Xi as a Bonapartist figure presiding over a regime confronting worsening economic and social problems at home and the growing threat of US trade war and war.

Xi is also chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which defends the interests of a tiny super-wealthy elite that has profited immensely from three decades of capitalist restoration. Some of China’s richest individuals are delegates to the NPC and associated Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) advisory body,

According to the latest Shanghai-based Hurun wealth report, published last week, 153 of the delegates to the NPC and CPPCC each have a personal wealth of more than 2 billion yuan ($US315 million). While the number of super-rich delegates is down from last year, their total wealth increased by nearly 18 percent to 4.12 trillion yuan ($US650 billion).

Speaking at the CPPCC national committee’s opening session on Sunday, Xi absurdly declared that China’s party system was “a great contribution to [the] political civilisation of humanity.” In reality, the CCP rules through a police-state regime that is according extraordinary powers to Xi amid fears it will confront mounting social unrest and the danger of war.

The constitutional change to allow Xi to hold the top post indefinitely follows his promotion as the CCP’s “core” and the strengthening of his control of the military and the economy. Last October’s CCP Congress took the unusual step of directly including a reference to Xi’s “thought”—the nationalist aim of making China a great power—in the constitution.

It is likely that the NPC will install Wang Qishan, the key figure in implementing Xi’s anti-corruption drive over the past five years, as the country’s vice-president. Xi used the pretext of stamping out corruption to purge the CCP and state apparatus of potential political challengers and undermine rival factions. Wang, due to his age, was not re-elected to the top CCP committee at last year’s congress, but was prominently seated on the platform near Xi at yesterday’s NPC session.

The main address yesterday was Premier Li Keqiang’s two-hour work report, which was devoted primarily to economic matters. While couched in anodyne, bureaucratic language, the report nevertheless pointed to the predicament facing the Chinese regime as the economy continues to show signs of slowing.

In what has become virtually mandatory, Li again stressed Xi’s “core status” and the necessity of “centralised and unified leadership.” While claiming that the global economy was continuing to recover, Li warned of “many factors that bring instability and uncertainty.” In an oblique reference to the US threats of trade war and war, he added: “Protectionism is mounting, and geopolitical risks are on the ascent.”

Li foreshadowed a target of 6.5 percent for economic growth in 2018, even though growth last year exceeded the official target of 6.5 percent—the first rise since 2010. The figure is well below the 8 percent rate that the Chinese leadership long regarded as a key benchmark to avoid high unemployment and prevent social unrest.

The manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) for February showed a sharp drop to 50.3 from 51.3 in January. A figure under 50 indicates the sector is contracting. The sub-index for foreign orders dropped to 49, showing falling foreign demand. Moreover, the PMI for the services sector, often touted as a key economic driver, declined by 0.6 points to 53.8.

Li announced further deep cuts into steel and coal production, which will inevitably mean the loss of thousands of jobs. Steel output will be slashed by 30 million tonnes this year and coal by 150 million tonnes. Already 1.1 million jobs have been axed over the past five years as steel production has been cut by 170 million tonnes and coal by 800 million tonnes.

Nevertheless, Li claimed that urban unemployment would be under 4.5 percent in 2018. He boasted that personal incomes were rising, laid-off workers receive government assistance, and 68 million people were lifted out of poverty over the past five years. The figures are little comfort to workers and the rural poor, who struggle to survive amid rising costs.

The much-promoted figures on poverty alleviation are based on an austere official poverty line of annual income of 2,300 yuan (about $US350), at 2010 prices. According to the National Bureau of Statistics, 30.45 million rural people still live in poverty. As one of its “three tough battles,” the government is pledging to eliminate poverty by 2020. Economic hardship and difficulty, however, affects many millions, including in the cities, particularly among migrant rural workers who form a large underclass with no social rights.

Social tensions are not only fuelled by absolute poverty, but also relative poverty. The gulf between rich and poor has widened over the past three decades. The Gini coefficient for China, which had been falling marginally since 2008, has begun rising again, increasing from 0.462 in 2015 to 0.465 last year. Even small increases can point to significantly growing disparities on a scale where 0 indicates everyone’s income is equal, and 1 indicates all income goes to one person.

In his report, Li highlighted handouts aimed, not at the working class and poor, but at relatively well-off middle class layers: lower costs for high-speed Internet, reduced prices for mobile telephone services, lower highway taxes, tax breaks for small businesses and lower electricity prices for commercial enterprises.

Even while pledging poverty reduction, Li said the budget deficit target would be cut significantly to 2.6 percent, from 3 percent over the past two years. Massive stimulus spending since the 2008 global financial crisis has led to spiralling speculation, huge debts and the growing danger of financial instability, which Li vowed to bring under control. Lower government spending will lead to cutbacks to essential social services such as education and health.

Li announced a substantial increase in military spending of 8.1 percent, compared to 7 percent last year, in response to the Trump administration’s increasing bellicosity, particularly against North Korea. Much of the spending will go into hi-tech weapons. Xi has sought to refashion the People’s Liberation Army into a military capable of fighting a war with the US.

Li’s work report points to the underlying reasons for the CCP’s turn to a political strongman. It is to defend the interests of the Chinese capitalist class against the US and its allies, and to attempt to suppress any eruption of the class struggle at home.

Parasitism and “tax reform”: Trump’s corporate tax cuts fuel stock buybacks, not investment

Gabriel Black

In the 10-plus weeks since President Donald Trump signed into law his $1.5 trillion tax cut for corporations and the rich, US companies have funneled the vast bulk of their windfalls into stock buybacks rather than using it, as promised by the White House, to invest in production, jobs and higher wages for workers.

By mid-February, $171 billion in stock buybacks had been announced—more than double the $76 billion announced in the same period of 2016-2017, according to the stock market research firm Birinyi Associates. This is the largest amount ever recorded at this point in a new year.

Catalyst Capital, a market research firm, predicts that 2018 will be the biggest buyback year on record, with corporations spending $1.2 trillion to push up their share values and reward their major shareholders, far surpassing previous years.

Compared to these huge sums, the amount being spent by corporations in “tax reform” bonuses for their workers is a pittance. Of the 500 companies in the S&P 500, 44 have announced bonuses or raises because of the new tax law. The total new money these 44 companies plan to spend on workers this year is just $5.2 billion, according to research by Rick Wartzman, William Lazonick and the Academic-Industry Research Network published by the Washington Post in February.

Certain companies, like Bank of America, are providing one-time bonuses “in the spirit of shared success.” Bank of America’s $1,000 bonus will cost the company $145 million. Meanwhile, it will spend at least $17 billion for stock buybacks in just the first half of this year. For every dollar spent by the bank on its 145,000 employees, it is spending $117 on enriching its owners, including its top executives.

Speaking to the Financial Times, the CEO of Bank of America, Brian Moynihan, declared quite openly, “We expect most of the benefits from tax reform to flow to the bottom line through dividends and share buybacks.”

As the World Socialist Website stated last year, Trump’s tax cut “is designed to massively transfer wealth from the working class to the ruling elite.” The tax cuts will be used as the pretext to bleed dry key programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps and Social Security.

The claim, promoted by the Trump administration, that the tax cut would lead to a boom in domestic investment and wage growth was a lie to begin with. Less than three months in, the numbers only make this clearer.

Shareholder buybacks were once rare occurrences, frowned upon as a form of market manipulation. They divert profits away from investment in new production, research and development, and capital improvement and use it for the entirely parasitic purpose of lining the pockets of the financial aristocracy.

It was only in 1982 that the US Securities and Exchange Commission provided a legal mechanism for buybacks. Since then, in step with the general financialization of the economy and explosion in stock prices, buybacks have grown in size, for the first time surpassing dividend payments in 1998, under the Democratic Clinton administration.

Buybacks are an expression not of the health of the economy, but its sickness. It is a signal that those who own the major companies believe that reinvestment in the economy will yield a smaller return than just pocketing the profits extracted from their workforce for themselves.

Consider the exponential increase in buybacks that occurred prior to the last financial crisis. In 2004, buybacks hovered around $120 billion a year. However, in the ensuing years they exploded, alongside the financial bubble—reaching over $500 billion in 2007 before crashing during the 2008 financial crisis.

Today, Wall Street demands more. The mood on “the street” is that those firms that do not funnel the money back to investors should be punished.

“Shareholders are going to be banging on doors saying we want some of that money,” Howard Silverblatt, analyst at S&P Dow Jones, told the Financial Times. As the Financial Times explained, “No matter that stock markets have set record highs of late, the expectation that spare cash must be returned to its rightful owners is putting managers under pressure.”

Speaking to the New York Times, Silverblatt explained, “I’m expecting buybacks to get to a record for 2018. And if I’m disappointed, there’s a lot of people with me.”

The reality is that the billionaires who will benefit from this vast squandering of money are not the rightful owners of this wealth. The massive sums, including trillions in off-shore money being repatriated under Trump’s tax plan, is the product of the labor of workers.

Although the Democratic Party has postured as an opponent of Trump’s tax plan, in truth the so-called liberal establishment, which benefits immensely from the surge in stock values, agreed with core aspects of Trump’s plan. In November, the New York Times published an editorial declaring support for corporate tax cuts. The Times wrote, “If Republicans worked with Democrats, they could reach a compromise to lower the top corporate tax rate.”

The top 10 percent of the population owns 84 percent of all stocks in the United States. Three men—Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet—have a combined wealth equal to that of the bottom half of the American population. The recently published 2018 World Inequality Report found that while the income share of the top 1 percent of US earners rose from 10 percent in 1980 to 20 percent in 2016, the share of the bottom 50 percent fell from 20 percent to 13 percent over the same period.

As 2018 unfolds, this gross inequality will only increase, allowing Wall Street to pocket over a trillion dollars while workers’ living standards continue to dive. Meanwhile, the grounds have been laid for a new economic crisis that will be larger than the last.

Historic defeat for social democrats in Italian election

Marianne Arens

In the European Union’s fourth-largest country, amid mass poverty and unemployment and growing popular disaffection with the centre-left parties and their pseudo-left apologists, Sunday’s parliamentary election in Italy resulted in a historic defeat for the governing Democratic Party (PD) and a victory for the right-wing and extreme-right parties.

Italy’s desperate levels of social distress—with youth unemployment at 30 percent—are largely the product of policies pursued by centre-left governments. While right-wing governments under Silvio Berlusconi were characterised by unrestrained corruption, the names of the centre-left prime ministers—Romano Prodi, Massimo D’Alema and Matteo Renzi—are inseparably linked to social cuts and austerity directed against the working class.

The main beneficiaries of Sunday’s election were right-wing and far-right forces—above all, Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement and the racist Lega led by Matteo Salvini. At 73 percent, voter participation was relatively low by Italian standards.

The right-wing parties’ electoral victory has deepened the crisis of the European Union because the Five Star Movement and Lega are either critical or oppose Italy’s membership in the EU. Financial observers also fear that an extended government crisis could lead to the collapse of Italy’s fragile banking system.

No party or electoral alliance secured the majority required to govern.

The PD, the former governing party, won just 18.7 percent of the vote. It now holds only 105 of 630 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and 50 of 315 seats in the Senate. Free and Equal (LeU—Liberi e Uguali), a split-off from the PD led by anti-mafia state prosecutor Pietro Grasso, won just 3.4 percent of the vote.

Matteo Renzi declared his resignation as PD leader Monday evening. The alliance he led, which included a group around Giuseppe Pisapia (Insieme) and the pro-EU +Europa, won just 22.9 percent of the vote and came in third place behind Berlusconi’s right-wing alliance and Grillo’s Five Star Movement.

Matteo Salvini, leader of the Lega (formerly Lega Nord), asserted his claim to the post of prime minister on Monday. His party has “the right and the duty to govern in the years to come,” said Salvini. With 17.4 percent of the vote, Lega outperformed its alliance partner Forza Italia (14.0 percent), led by Silvio Berlusconi. The fascist Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy) of Georgia Meloni, which is also part of the alliance, won 4.3 percent.

With a total of 37 percent of the vote, this alliance emerged as the largest. Berlusconi announced his intention to appoint his party colleague Antonio Tajani as prime minister. Due to a conviction for tax avoidance, Berlusconi is no longer allowed to hold public office.

Instead, Salvini could become prime minister. After Hungary’s Viktor Orban, Austria’s Sebastian Kurz and the Czech Republic’s Andrej Babis, this would result in another notorious racist and xenophobe becoming head of government in the EU.

The Lega Nord emerged in the 1990s and campaigned for the separation of the richer northern parts of Italy, “Padania” in the Lega Nord’s propaganda, from the poorer south. Even then the party conducted virulently xenophobic campaigns. Under Salvini, the party expanded nationwide and adopted an anti-EU, far-right and racist programme modelled on Marine le Pen’s National Front in France.

However, the right-wing alliance will not be able to form a government without another coalition partner. It is also possible that the alliance will fall apart.

One option discussed prior to the election has been ruled out: a “grand coalition” of the PD and Berlusconi’s Forza Italia. The two parties, which have taken turns at the head of successive governments since the early 1990s, no longer even have a third of the vote between them.

Along with Salvini, Luigi de Maio, the lead candidate for the Five Star Movement, has also claimed the position of prime minister. With 32.7 percent of the vote, the Five Star Movement emerged as the strongest party and the winner of the election. It gained support in the impoverished South in particular.

A map of Italy, divided according to the party that won in each region, reveals a new kind of division: in the north the blue of the right-wing alliance can be seen everywhere, with two exceptions, Tuscany and South Tyrol, where the Democrats still have a base of support.

But in the South and Southeast there is only one winner: the Five Star Movement, which won 49 percent of the vote in Campania, 48 percent in Sicily, 44 percent in Apulia, 43 percent in Calabria and the Basilicata, and 42 percent in Sardinia. The M5S will control more than a third of the seats in parliament, with 225 of 630 in the Chamber of Deputies and over 100 in the 315-seat Senate.

The Five Star Movement exploited the fact that it has yet to join a government in Rome, and benefited above all from widespread dissatisfaction with the other parties. M5S, which pursues a hard-right course on refugee policy and the selection of its international allies, claims to be a party that is “neither left nor right.” M5S did well among young voters, who have only experienced governments led by the PD and Forza Italia while unemployment has destroyed entire regions and forced many young people to emigrate.

The 31-year-old de Maio attempted during the election campaign to present M5S as ready for government. He spoke in front of top businessmen and investors and downplayed his party’s traditional anti-EU stance. The party also eliminated a passage from its programme banning the formation of coalitions with other parties. “It is time to enter government,” stated de Maio. His party would not “leave Italy in chaos,” but would hold consultations with all political forces.

In the EU, the media and on financial markets, the Italian election result triggered unrest. On the same day that a decision in favour of a continuation of the Merkel government in Germany was finalised after more than five months, a new crisis broke out—in Italy.

Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung remarked that the election results were “bad for Italy and bad for Europe.” Since Brexit, “the third most important country in the EU, and once the most European friendly of all” now threatens “to go off the rails with an irrational, anti-European populism.” Handelsblatt warned, “After the Italian election, the country risks a debt collapse.” France’s Le Monde described the result as an “earthquake,” while la Depeche feared that Italy could become “an ungovernable country.”

Future developments are largely in the hands of President Sergio Materella, a 76-year-old jurist and PD politician. He is holding back-room talks with the political parties and will task one with forming the government, which, if successful, will have to secure Materella’s approval of the cabinet before it is voted on by parliament. An initial indication is expected on March 23, when parliament’s two chambers meet for the first time and elect their presidents.

The Italian election outcome is the result of the deep-going dissatisfaction among the population with all previous governments. The dominant feelings are anger and disappointment with parties that call themselves left but carry out the bidding of the banks and major corporations.

In Italy, Matteo Renzi and Paolo Gentiloni have imposed the dictates of the banks and corporations with the assistance of the Jobs Act labour market reform, the slashing of anti-poverty programs for the elderly and social spending cuts. They actively participated in NATO’s military build-up and the militarisation of the EU, and backed the war threats against Russia. In Libya, a former Italian colony, Foreign Minister Marco Minniti (PD) concluded a pact with the Libyan coastguard to block refugees from crossing the Mediterranean.

The PD’s electoral debacle is due above all to this right-wing, anti-worker record. Given the absence of a progressive and socialist alternative, right-wing parties were able to profit in the election.

The electoral alliance Potere al Popolo (Power to the People, PaP), secured just 1 percent of the vote. Having served as a fig leaf for right-wing governments for years, the pseudo-left is no longer capable of presenting itself as an alternative. Its role models include Alexis Tsipras of Syriza, who as Greek prime minister has imposed a vicious austerity programme.

Rifondazione Comunista, the chief political force behind PaP, was a member of Romano Prodi’s government from 2006 to 2008, which laid the groundwork for the current policies of war and social austerity. Immediately thereafter, the rise of the Five Star Movement began.

University of Essex Masters Scholarship for Select Countries

Application Deadline: 30th September 2018

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries:  Bangladesh, Canada, China, Ghana, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Russia, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, USA and Vietnam can apply for these scholarships.

To be taken at (country): United Kingdom

Eligible Field of Study: Courses offered at the university

About the Award: The University of Essex scholarship will be awarded to any international student from the aforementioned countries, who underwent first degree overseas and is self-funding their postgraduate studies. Awards will be made on the basis of grades obtained in applicants’ first degree, so all applications for relevant courses will automatically be considered. The scholarship is awarded as a partial tuition fee waiver and is available for students on postgraduate taught Masters courses (excluding MBA).

Type: Masters

Eligibility: In order to apply for one of these scholarships, applicants must satisfy ALL of the following conditions:

• be classified as an international student for fee purposes
• be entirely self-funding their studies
• be applying for a full-time Masters course in 2018/19 (excluding MBA)
• meet the academic criteria in the table above

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: Bangladesh:£4,000, Canada:£2,000, China:£2,500, Ghana:£4,000, Hong Kong:£2,000, India:£4,000, Indonesia:£4,000, Japan:£3,000, Jordan:£2,000, Kazakhstan:£3,000, Malaysia:£4,000, Nigeria:£4,000, Norway:£3,000, Pakistan:£4,000, Russia:£2,000, Taiwan:£3,000, Thailand:£2,000, Turkey:£4,000, USA:£2,000 and Vietnam:£4,000. Paid as discount on tuition fee

Duration of Scholarship: Payable for the first year of tuition fees.

How to Apply:  If applicants meet all the eligibility criteria and firmly accept the offer by 30 September 2016, then they are automatically awarded this scholarship. Applicants will be notified of the award by the end of October 2016.
No need to complete an application form.
We’ll assess your eligibility based on the academic transcripts and certificates that you submit with your application for your place at Essex.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Essex, UK

Important Notes: University of Essex Scholarship applications cannot be considered for candidates unless they have already applied for and been offered a place to study at the University. Eligibility of candidates will be based on the academic transcripts and certificates submitted with application for your place at Essex.

UN-OHRLLS Voices of A Brighter Future for Journalists from Least Developing Countries (Fully-funded to Lisbon, Portugal) 2018

Application Deadline: 16th March 2018

Eligible Countries: Afghanistan, Angola, Bangladesh, Benin, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Kiribati, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Niger, Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tuvalu, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Vanuatu, Yemen, Zambia,

To Be Taken At (Country): Lisbon, Portugal

Type: Contest

Eligibility:

• Submissions must have been published or broadcast between 16 August 2017 and 16 March 2018. Please read the guidelines for submissions in full.
• this competition is only open for journalists who are nationals from Least Developed Countries.

Selection: Entries will be judged by a high-level panel from the United Nations, sustainable energy and media sector.

Number of Awards: 3

Value of Award: Three winners of the ‘Voices of A Brighter Future’ competition will have their work featured by the United Nations and other news outlets, with travel and expenses covered to report from the Sustainable Energy for All Forum in Lisbon, Portugal 2-3 May 2018.

How to Apply: Apply Here
Before applying, it is important to go through the Terms and Conditions on the Program Webpage (see Link below).

Visit the Program Webpage for Details

Award Providers: This competition has been made possible with the generous financial support of the Government of Norway.