What is the importance of Stockholm’s Global Eritrean Youth Dialogue Conference?

By Fesseha Nair

The author of this article has been following the Eritrean Youth in social media – Smer and others.

Smer is a social media or a platform for discussion on the situation of the Eritrean people suffering under a totalitarian regime. It is different from Ether media like TV, Radio and Television. TV, Radio and Television are organized institutions with policies of edition and production with professional journalists.

It can be an investigative or informative for the society it serves. Both are platforms for expressing your views and ideas about the social life in one country and the world. If the Eritrean Youth are meeting by the social media what is the need of organizing dialogue conferences? Meeting by the social media is not enough to do practical things which need a new dialogue for deeper discussions on concrete initiatives and procedures to promote the democratic change the Eritrean people aspires. It is a dialogue that enhances
the principles all the youth agree.

What is dialogue?  Dialogue is the flow of meaning which enables the true meaning or deeper significance of something to flow and come into being.

Isn’t the Smer Paltalk for dialogue? No, it isn’t it is simply conversation without policy and no
guidelines, no procedures of production or simple social communication without contents. But dialogue is a method through which the partners reveal their natural intelligence. Dialogue gives different interests an opportunity to interact in a non-adversarial way when opposing issues are in conflict/ at stake.

Dialogue is different from conversation or debate because it encourages diversity of thinking and opinions rather than suppressing these ideas.  It supports the progressive emergence of mutual understanding of the problems facing the Eritreans to remove the dictatorship and search for consensus, the youth of dialogue conference in USA and the dialogue conference in Debrezeit/ Bishftu- Ethiopia are good examples
regardless of their modes of organization.

In practicing dialogue, there is no precondition or an agreement that one persons or organization’s concepts or beliefs should not take precedence over those of others, but also common agreements cannot be sought at the cost of individual integrity. A dialogue is a flow of meaning let those who do not agree come and flow their ideas in the dialogue conference.

What is the main objective of the Stockholm Global youth Dialogue Conference? It is a wake up call for uniting all the youth associations mushrooming at this time of democratization in Eritrea. It can be a tool to solve the problems hindering us to face dictatorship and safe our people from the harsh and killing policies of the mafia type ruling system.

The Stockholm Youth Dialogue Confernce can be a part of the previous conferences where all can come together listen each other and start to think creatively and organize themselves towards the next step- with common objectives and responsibilities.

The Eritrean Youth Smer Paltalk has been an arena of attacks and counter- attacks. It has been
an arena of pronouncements and judgements.

It should have been a public opinion builder instead of contaminating the already hate politics inEritrea.

But Smer has also its positive effects. It has attracted the youth to come and join discussions and air out what they have seen and experienced under the totalitarian regime and its criminal actions.

The coming Stockholm Eritrean Youth Dialogue conference is not about pronouncement or judgement. ( Deber zeit or USA Confernce versus Stockholm) each other but rather it is listening for a deeper awareness and understanding of what actually is taking place in Eritrea.

If the Stockholm dialogue conference come to unite these partners/USA, Debrezeit andStockholm it a step forward.

I hope this will happen and this a good sign moving towards resolving the problems facing us in removing the dictatorship inEritrea.

Stockholm Conference is owned by Eritreans it a test for us if we can conduct a national youth conference. I hope it will never come out to conclusion by dictation but sufficient consensus.

Sufficient consensus is when the majority agrees and the minority reservations are respected and kept for coming discussions. It will be a genuine dialogue between the youth organizations with
structure of partnership and cooperation.

The Youth conferences held in USAand Ethiopiaare all opportunities and the Stockholm dialogue Conference is the continuation of these conferences.

I call all the political and civil society organizations to support such dialogue conferences bringing our youth in one track of partnership and cooperation.

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Posted by farajat on Aug 18 2012 Filed under Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry