After evaluating the results of the past World Social Forums, held first in January 25-30, 2001 in Porto Alegre, Brazil, and quite recently in January 16-20, 2004 in Mumbai, India, and the expectations that they raised, the NSF considers it necessary and legitimate to draw up a Charter of Principles to guide its operations. The principles contained in this Charter are to be respected by all those who wish to take part in the Forum. They are a guide to ensure a common orientation, serve as a guide to present and future generations of Nigerians in the consolidation of the values and beliefs necessary in achieving a “world without poverty” and with equal access to natural resources.
1. NSF is an open meeting place for reflective thinking, democratic debate of ideas, formulation of proposals, free exchange of experiences and interlinking for effective action by groups and movements of civil society that are opposed to globalised neo-liberalism and to domination of the world by capital and any form of imperialism; and are committed to building a Nigerian society directed towards fruitful relationships among Nigeria’s diverse nationalities, religions, social groups and those disadvantaged economically, politically as well as by gender and individually.
2. NSF builds on the certainty that “another Nigeria is possible” consistent with the proclamation at Porto Alegre that “another world is possible”. It therefore becomes a permanent process of seeking and building alternatives which cannot be reduced to the events supporting it.
3. NSF is a Nigerian process. All the meetings that are held as part of this process therefore have a national dimension.
4. The alternatives proposed at the NSF stand to replace the process of globalization commanded by the large multinational corporations and by the governments and international institutions at the service of those corporations’ interests, with the complicity of national governments. They are designed to ensure that globalization in solidarity will prevail as a new stage in world history. This will respect universal human rights and those of all citizens - men and women - of all nations and the environment and will rest on democratic international systems and institutions at the service of social justice, equality and the sovereignty of peoples.
5. NSF brings together and interlinks only organisations and movements of civil society in Nigeria, but does not intend to be a body representing the Nigerian civil society.
6. The meetings of the NSF do not deliberate on behalf of the NSF as a body. No one, therefore, will be authorised, on behalf of any editions of the Forum, to express positions claiming to be those of all its participants. The participants in the Forum shall not be called on to take decisions as a body, whether by vote or acclamation, on declarations or
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The Charter of Principles of the Nigeria Social Forum is an adaptation of the Charter of Principles of the World Social Forum. It was formally adopted at the inaugural meeting of the Nigeria Social Forum (NSF) held in Lagos, Nigeria on 29th May, 2004
proposals for action that would commit all, or the majority, of them and that proposed to be taken as establishing positions of the Forum as a body. It thus does not constitute a locus of power to be disputed by the participants in its meetings, nor does it intend to constitute the only option for interrelation and action by the organisations and movements that participate in it.
7. Nonetheless, organisations or groups of organisations that participate in the Forum’s meetings must be assured the right, during such meetings, to deliberate on declarations or actions they may decide on, whether singly or in coordination with other participants. NSF undertakes to circulate such decisions widely by the means at its disposal, without directing, hierarchising, censuring or restricting them, but as deliberations of the organisations or groups of organisations that made the decisions.
8. NSF is a plural, diverse, non-confessional, non-governmental and non-party context that, in a decentralised fashion, inter-relates organisations and movements engaged in concrete action at levels from the local to the national, sub-regional to the regional to build another world.
9. NSF will always be a Forum open to pluralism and to the diversity of activities and ways of engaging the organisations and movements that decide to participate in it, as well as the diversity of genders, ethnicities, cultures, generations and physical capacities, providing they abide by this Charter of Principles. Neither party representations nor military/paramilitary organisations shall participate in the Forum. Government leaders and members of legislatures who accept the commitments of this Charter may be invited to participate in a personal capacity.
10. NSF is opposed to all totalitarian and reductionist views of economy, development and history and to the use of violence as a means of social control by the State. It upholds respect for Human Rights, the practices of real democracy, participatory democracy, peaceful relations, in equality and solidarity, among ethnicities, genders and peoples, and condemns all forms of domination and all subjection of one person by another.
11. As a forum for debate, NSF is a movement of ideas that prompts reflection and the transparent circulation of the results of that reflection, on the mechanisms and instruments of domination by capital; on means and action to resist and overcome that domination; and on the alternatives proposed to solve the problems of exclusion and social inequality that the process of capitalist globalization with its racist, sexist and environmentally destructive dimensions is creating nationally, regionally, internationally and within countries.
12. As a framework for the exchange of experiences, NSF encourages understanding and mutual recognition among its participant organizations and movements, and places special value on the exchange among them, particularly on all that society is building to centre economic activity and political action on meeting the needs of people and respecting nature, in the present and for future generations.
13. As a context for interrelations, NSF seeks to strengthen and create new national, regional and international links among organisations and movements of society, that - in both public and private life - will increase the capacity for non-violent social resistance to the process of dehumanisation the world is undergoing and to the violence used by the State; and reinforce the humanising measures being taken by the action of these movements and organisations.
14. NSF is a process that encourages its participant organisations and movements to situate their actions, from the local level to the national level and seeking active participation in international contexts, as issues of planetary citizenship, and to introduce onto the global agenda the change-inducing practices that they are experimenting with in building a new Nigeria in a new world in solidarity.
Operating Guidelines of NSF
Mode of Work
- Advocacy and mobilisation
- Research and documentation
- Meetings, workshops, seminars and conferences
- IEC materials
- Capacity building
- Rallies and mass action
National Steering Committee
There shall be a National Steering Committee for the Forum which shall be composed of at least fifteen persons elected to reflect the geopolitical balance, gender and national spread (at least two from each geopolitical zone - one man and one woman). The National Steering committee shall implement the policies of the Forum, supervise and co-ordinate the activities of the Forum.
Secretariat
There shall be a Secretariat of the Forum responsible for sharing of information and the day to day running of the movement.
Standing Committees of NSF
There shall be three Standing Committees for the Forum:
a. Advocacy and Mobilisation Committee
Research and Policy Committee
Civic Education and Empowerment Committee
5. Elections
The members of the National Steering and Standing Committees shall be elected by the General Assembly. At least 30 percent of the National Steering Committee shall be women.
Tenure of the Committees
The tenure of the members of the National Steering and Standing Committees of the Forum shall be for a period of two years. Members shall also be eligible to stand election for further term(s).
At the expiration of the tenure of the committees, a General Assembly shall be called for the purpose of electing new officers.
Meetings
The General Assembly shall meet at least once every year. The committees of the Forum shall call meetings as the need arises.
