NEW PROGRAMME FOR THE CITY

A small update of my political activities, which were also progressing in the last couple of weeks. In a small working group we managed to get the necessary input for the democracy and administration section of the programme of "my" political party for the local elections in March 2010. Still far away but in fact it is only 9 months in which we have to harvest the electional gains of the European elections of June 4th.

I wrote down my main points in a small document and forwarded it to my fellow working group members and I can say that the core of this document was finally sent to the committee which is drafting the text of the programme. On Saturday we have to defend it before this committee; first signs were that they are pleased with the input in such a short time.

Some of our main suggestions:

- every citizen of The Hague must be treated as equal individuals and not as member of a group (family, religion, ethnic or sexual minority); respect for the individual character of the other is a leading principle;

- there is the possibility to introduce an advising referendum on city level and a citizen poll in a specific part of the city, in which has to take into consideration the balance between the costs and the effects of a referendum;

- religion is a private matter; the city should not finance religious organisations in their religious activities;

- less regulation and bureaucracy on local level, but promotion of social awareness;

- the city should actively work on the international profile of the city of The Hague;

These are specific also my points because I think they are essential to make The Hague a dynamic city with diversity. Let's see what the others think.

A WEIRD EXPERIENCE

One of the weirdest experiences of my life was the day I went to see Lenin's mummified corpse at the Lenin Mausoleum at Red Square in Moscow. Picture a big brown box and a long queue of people waiting in front of it; most of them Russians, but also tourists. In small groups we were directed towards the entrance of the brown box by grim looking soldiers. Then, we were allowed in and in the middle of the dark room is a large glass box in full light with a weird looking body lying in it. It remains a mysterious place, the more because people are not allowed to take pictures.

Next Monday is the last day that I will go to Leiden University for my Russian-Studies course. The main objective of this course is to illustrate that the main leaders Russia has had over the years (Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great, Nicholas II, Lenin, Gorbatsjov, Yeltsin, Putin and all the others) all are leaders with a typical Russian characteristic: the welfare of the ruler and his "surroundings" is supreme and the people are expected to adapt for the prospect of national glory. The concept of property is relatively new to Russia and the people still have to get used to it; the ruling elite has control of the resources.

At first I considered it rather adventurous to bring all these very different people under one common denominator; are Ivan the Terrible and Yeltsin, Stalin and Peter the Great comparable? But in the end they all used their power with manipulation, discharging parliaments, assassinating critical journalists or opponents and other tricks of the trade to stay in power. Most of the mentioned rulers might not have been that much fun to live or work with (maybe after a few wodka in case of Yeltsin), but they are without doubt very fascinating.

Over the years I read a few books on Lenin and biographies of Stalin and Chroestsjov (I wrote about that before) and today I even saw the history of the Russian Revolution as a comic in a shop window downtown (had no money on me to buy it though). Reading all these books and knowing the history of Russia and the Soviet-Union made seeing Lenin in Moscow so weird. This is actually the person that had such an impact on the history of the world and you can almost touch him. And although weird, he still looks lifelike as if he would be asleep like Cinderella.

(The most striking thing was that he is actually very small; somehow you expect a person of his importance to be more impressive)

For rounding off my Russian course I have downloaded some footage of several leaders of Russia; thank god for subtitles. Anyway.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2b-Cfe7fPok
CORONATION OF TSAR NICHOLAS II (footage of 1896 !!)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzf3FRSbEUk
SPEECH LENIN - 1919



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLqplbwD644
SPEECH STALIN - 1937

LET'S BE CLEAR

A few weeks ago I reported that I joined the local working group on transport of my political party D66. I went to their first meeting and I must admit that I was a little disappointed. It was all too "technical" and I could do too little with my principles and beliefs; these were my main reason to join in the first place.


After I was contacted by several other local working groups I have decided to switch to the new working group on democracy and citizenship. Although I have not met the people in this working group yet (the first meeting is next week), I have got a good feeling that we will make something of it. At least I can work with my main principles and beliefs.


The last few days I thought: "OK, I am talking about principles and beliefs, but what are they?"' (good question, isn't it?). I sat down with a piece of paper and wrote what my main goals and principles are in relation to local democracy and living in an international city. Here is what I came up with:

1. The citizens of The Hague should be treated as individuals, not as members of a group (family, church, ethnic minority, sexual minority, etc.); everyone should be treated with respect and is responsible for his or her own development; respect for one-another should be the leading principle;


2. The city of The Hague should support those individuals who cannot make use of their rights because they are discriminated or lack specific knowledge, f.e. language courses for immigrants, protection for people who suffer from domestic violence, support for gays against discrimination;


3. Religion must be regarded as a private matter; religious organizations should receive no support from the city council; discriminatory statements based on religious freedom should not be tolerated; support to churches should be limited to support for the conservation of cultural heritage;


4. Integration of ethnic groups must not be regarded as a goal in itself but as a means to create a tolerant, live-able and durable society; integration cannot be forced upon people; the city should no longer support segregation by financing separate societies, organisations, etc. which solely support contacts among members of a specific group; these activities should be financed and organised with other means; supported organisations should at least have clearly defined goals and regularly be controlled thoroughly;


5. Living in a city must be made simpler and easier for all; less regulation, less bureaucracy, less prohibitions; new prohibitions, etc. should only be introduced if effective enforcement by police etcetera can be guaranteed; soft drugs should be legalized; better coordination between city institutions, more attention for quality instead of quantity and better use of the modern means of communication (internet);


6. The Hague is an international city, where individuals of every country and ethnic group should find a pleasant home; large groups see The Hague as a temporary home and do not invest in the society - more activities should be directed at the growing number of expats and their needs;


7. Initiatives in the city can only be taken in cooperation with the communities in the region Haaglanden; initiatives to enhance this cooperation leading to a more (cost-)efficient and effective policy must be taken; better use of best practices in comparable cities in The Netherlands, Europe and around the World;


8. I am sceptical about the possibilities to involve all citizens; the turn-out for elections, referenda, etc. are disappointing and it seems "pulling a dead horse" to get all citizens interested in issues; when people are not interested in making use of their basic rights as citizens, f.e. vote, it is not a good thing to introduce referenda; referenda cost a lot of money, only extreme groups are interested in the outcome and the turn-out is usually too low to actually force the city council to follow the result; referenda should only be used if there is a clear choice between two alternatives (not yes or no, but option A and option B); city council should take their responsibility and make a decision;


9. All initiatives to increase dynamism and diversity must be welcomed.

I wrote this down in 10 minutes and I am sure that I have not thought things fully through; there is room for improvement in a later stage.

CHECKING REGISTRATIONS

The last few weeks I have started to take my political activities up a notch. With the European elections and the community elections coming up this year and next year the political parties are taking up their campaigning activities and so does the party that I joined a year or two ago, D66. As a social-liberal party they have the following guidelines for their political points of view:

- trust in the self-relying power of people;

- think and act international;

- reward performance and share prosperity;

- strive for a sustainable and harmonious society;

- cherish the fundamental rights and shared values;

On paper this is beautiful and very impressive, but in practice it is not always easy to act in line with all these guidelines. In essence, it is completely in line with my own views as a liberal with high regard for the person of the individual in our current society. I joined a working group on public transport in the city of The Hague; I volunteered to be president of a voting office here in town for the European elections on the 4th of June of this year and I volunteered to write some texts for the campaign for the European elections. I would have liked to have contributed to the special D66-web log on the 4th of June but it is not possible and not democratically sound to combine contributing to a web log and president of a voting office. You have to keep these activities carefully separated.

Our member in the European Parliament, Sophie in 't Veld has been very active in the field of gay rights on a European level; she was even arrested during a demonstration in Moscow. I am confident that she will be again chosen to be an MEP; if we can rely on the polls she will be joined by someone else. She will receive my vote because she is also very active in the field of privacy protection, especially vis-à-vis the US.

Later more on my activities.