-Tim Whyte

Another year, another annual meeting. Once again MS invited grassroots activists to come and spend 4 days in a luxurious hotel. Speakers discussed MS policy and progress, and more generally poverty and education. The activists listened, understood as best they could, ate cough drops, daydreamed, wrote poems, stared at the ceiling, and spoke to each other in the breaks. Some asked questions, but these were definitely a vocal minority. Once again I was left wondering how MS can talk so much about grassroots participation and have such a hard time finding it.

This year MS gave prizes to its most active male and female participant. Or as they were dubbed in the AM newspaper, "the Best
Participants." Is it a coincidence that winners were from well-educated, Kathmandu backgrounds?

One of the "Best Participants" remarked at the end of meeting that it was difficult to say many of things she wanted to say in Nepali. All of the appropriate words were in English. To me that says it all. We create an environment for discussion that is fundamentally foreign to the villages where we work in this country. And then we applaud those who can manage to cross the great language barrier between the two.

Of course, most participants never really cross it all. Our "winners" are people who were born on this side. A few others have made the journey through years of experience in the INGO world. Most of the activists struggle to understand what the meeting is about. This was what our PAB chairman concluded in his review of the meeting – the level was easy for some and almost impossible to understand for others. They may be there in person, but they never really participate.

It is ironic if you think about it. It is not that the grassroots activists don’t have anything relevant to share. They are doing the actual work in the villages! But they don’t have the words to discuss policy the way it is expected. So they sit still and come to understand that that their stories and experiences are unimportant here. MS would never actually say this, of course. We write very long policies using very long policy words about how we value intercultural cooperation and participation. But when it comes to actually talking to people from other cultures, they should do it in our language, at our hotels. Talk about marginalization – imagine spending four days listening to speeches one does not fully understand, yet being told that this is "very important" for the future of the country.

Many participants are bound to feel inadequate and irrelevant in the Annual Meetings. No matter how many kind words and good intentions, they will not feel at home until they speak this language themselves. They might wonder whether clever MS will keep loving them. Perhaps they would be driven to write poems praising MS to the sky and begging it not to leave them. Or perhaps, after 10 annual meetings they will start to speak MS develanguage also. This is I suppose is what MS hopes for. That we will help the partners "develop the capacity" to discuss policies from Copenhagen.

Wouldn’t it be better to develop MS’ capacity to discuss reality in Nepal?