Review
previous electronic activism
campaigns and home pages
Organising
- effectively
Back in January
2005 our electronic activism campaign featured MISA’s Advocacy
Campaign Model as a tool to help us in our advocacy and organizing
work.
Just lately
in Zimbabwe we’ve seen a couple of events and campaigns launched
in what appears to be a haphazard manner without due consideration
to the many elements that go into making protests and campaigns
successful.
I’m not
too sure what you think, but 50 women turning out for a protest
in downtown Harare doesn’t give me much confidence that the
organizers did their best to reach out and communicate with their
constituencies and in so doing build as much support as possible.
Take a look at this report
which comments on the recent WiPSU
protest.
And then there’s
been the Save Zimbabwe Campaign. I got an email recently from the
Save Zimbabwe Campaign Task Force with the title line being “Save
Zimbabwe in Five Minutes”. If only it were that easy! The
Save Zimbabwe Campaign emailed a flyer asking Zimbabweans to make
a noise during lunchtime – either hoot your horn, whistle,
clap your hands, bang pots and so on.
VOA’s
Studio 7 reported
on the dismal uptake of this campaign, saying
The less-than-impressive
results of protests called in the past two weeks by the Save Zimbabwe
Campaign, a coalition of civic organizations and opposition parties
have raised doubts as to the effectiveness of the ad hoc opposition
organization.
It leaves me
wondering how well the Save Zimbabwe Campaign Task Force communicated,
lobbied and encouraged participation in the lunch time make a noise
protests. It has shades of hastily pulled together stayaways, which
always flop because the organizers just don’t get the fact
that you can’t snap your fingers, or send out a few flyers
and emails and expect your idea to take flight.
More worrying
of course is the intimation that
Differences
of opinion over the strategy had emerged within the organizational
membership of the Save Zimbabwe Campaign (Studio 7’s report)
Wouldn’t
it be great if civil society could agree on something, anything?
Even a lunchtime “make a noise” campaign!
Another aspect
worth commenting on is the language used in the resistance movement
in Zimbabwe. The Save Zimbabwe Campaign should know that we don’t
want to “cry” for freedom, we want to SHOUT for it.
Nor is our noise a symbol of our “distress” it is a
symbol of our DEFIANCE.
Again, we make
available online the Advocacy Campaign Model which should be used
as an integral tool when organizing events and campaigns.
Please click
here.
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