Silver LiningThe Way to Achieve MDGs [Archives:2005/876/Opinion]
By Mohammed Hatem al-Qadhi
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Last week I attended the UNDP launch for video and posters within the framework of UNDP's Advocacy Campaign for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
The campaign, being implemented under the motto of “Let's work together for a better Yemen by 2015”, aims to build momentum and enhance ongoing national efforts to cope with the pace towards achieving the MDGs by 2015.
According to the UNDP press release, the posters and video which have been distributed and shown during the event aim to promote public awareness about the MDGs and stimulate collaborative action at all levels to make current national efforts a success. These materials also guide and inform decision makers to establish pro-poor policies, to make progress at all development fronts, and to increase public participation to ensure reaching the MDGs by 2015.
The most important thing is how to publicize these MDGs, generating awareness of the masses towards the urgency of achieving them. The speakers in the event, like the minister of Human Rights Amat al-Aleem Assoswa and World Health Organization representative Hashim al-Zain stressed on the importance of the media in raising public awareness to the MDGs and the consequences of lagging behind and failure to meet them.
I completely agree with the outstanding minister of human rights who stressed the need to change the media discourse on human rights and development issues at large into a practical one and the pivotal role media can play in advocating campaign for the MDGs.
Yes, the role of the media in this regard is very instrumental in creating awareness and raising public attention towards the eight goals which are all, according to international experts, a priority for Yemen right now.
Sometimes, I feel that we are very much involved in politics and the arguments of politicians and neglect very important development issues like poverty, unemployment, water problem, health, education tc. These are the key issues of development which we have, as journalists , to focus on and address all the time.
We know that the role of the broadcast media is very much influential in a country plagued with a high rate of illiteracy. The TV and radio which are still monopolized by the state can play a vital role in advocating the MDGs and drawing attention of both the policy maker and public opinion. I have heard some officials complaining that media does not cover development issues very much. But, when you go to this or that official and try to interview him on such development issues, he/she disappears. We need both the international and local officials to be responsive to journalists and provide them with the needed information. I have to say that only very few Yemeni officials like the foreign minister Abu Bakr al-Qirbi and minister of human rights Amat al-Aleem Assoswa who can be easily accessed.
Both the Yemeni officials and international experts share concerns over the inability of Yemen to reach these goals by 2015. The government of Yemen roughly estimated in 2002 the amount of money needed for achieving the goals at $ 80 billion and that around $50 billion out of that will be made by Yemen, which is, according to experts, difficult to meet unless new resources are made available and reform is carried out to cost cut expenses and curb corruption. These new resources can not be made available unless we create a good environment for foreign and even local investors. We have to improve the security, judiciary system, curb bureaucracy and corruption and above all put limit to the power of the president's cronies at the power center who want to share investors with no capital but the so-called “protection”. So, who is this stupid guy that will come to invest in a country wherein he needs some big guys to protect. We , of course, do not need a miracle to stop such crooks who are damaging the country for their own benefit. It needs a political decision from the president himself.
I believe here is the key to create a good environment for investments that will generate enough resources to achieve the millennium goals. We have no choice but either way: to face this challenge or let the country fail and the system collapse.
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