PREPARATIONS are now in full swing for the second phase of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) to be held in Tunis from November 16 to 18 in Tunisia but against a background of low participation by African nations. The first phase of the summit was held in Geneva in 2003.

The just ended second preparation committee meeting known as prepcom2 held in Geneva, Switzerland, shows the seriousness in which the international community is taking the summit.

The WSIS is aimed at addressing issues surrounding information and communications technology (ICTs) and their use in development (ICT4D).

The main difference between WSIS and other world UN summits is that it has been organized in two phases. The first in 2003 and the second in Tunisia.

The first session was mainly concerned with principles and an overall plan of action, with the second expected to focus more on practical implementation. This has also enabled controversial issues to be deferred from the first to the second session.

The prepcom2 had two processes running - the government plenary and the civil society programme. The civil society groups at the 2003 WSIS came up with their own declaration, highlighting the vested interest of their constituencies. Much of their perspective still succeeded in being incorporated in the official Declaration Plan of Action.

The main issues on the government plenary agenda were the political chapter and the plant of action. The political chapter is a commitment document by governments and the plan of action will ensure the commitments are carried out. The main debate was on the Digital Solidarity Fund - a document offering the financial mechanisms.

However as preparations go on, the term information society still remains remotely strange to many African nations, Zimbabwe included and this could explain why there has been a disappointingly low participation by the region. Even media coverage has been painstakingly low.

"Many governments have been reluctant to give the private sector and civil society a formal voice in international decision making processes, arguing that the sovereign nations can only be represented by governments," notes David Souter when he did a review and analysis of the WSIS 2003.

Although the summit's themes are primarily developmental, most delegations are dominated throughout the process by telecommunications specialists from communications ministries and telecommunications regulatory bodies and diplomats. This was true for Zimbabwe, which was represented by among others Zimbabwe's ambassador to Switzerland and Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (Potraz) Director General Cuthbert Chidoori. The civil society from Zimbabwe and the private sector were conspicuous by their absence.

However governments who have paid more attention to the overall WSIS process such as South Africa tend to also include representatives of frontline development ministries. South Africa also had a large contingent of participants from the civil society.

The media has been equally silent in Zimbabwe and many other African nations. In Zimbabwe this could be attributed to factors such as the lack of a national ICT policy, the lack of knowledge by journalists of the new ICTs, the diminishing press freedom which has seen a number of local publications shut down as a result of restrictive media laws and the delay by government in opening up the airwaves.

Community radio stations have proved to be a traditional ICT used for development worldwide. In South Asia, women use various forms of ICTs - video, phone, wireless, internet radio in their daily work and through it successfully change the lives of people in the communities they work for.

So because in Zimbabwe the issues of WSIS have not been put on the agenda by both the government and media, the civil society has also taken a back seat and so has the private sector.

This is unfortunate because the WSIS touches on fundamental human rights issues which a tripartite stakeholder need to dialogue on so that Zimbabweans become part of the international information society.

The meeting in Geneva brought out shocking revelations of human rights violations by some countries in trying to block the free flow of information.

The meeting looked at how for instance China and Tunisia were blocking websites, arresting, detaining and torturing Internet users and owners. In China for example, over 400 Beijing internet cafes were shut down during the panic over SARS and very little if any have been allowed to re-open.

This is according to a book handed over to participants during a discussion on human rights and information society called the China Rights Forum. The book outlines horrendous stories of human rights violations by China which impedes on free flow of information.

Similar alleged human rights violations in Tunisia brought out the whole debate on why it was chosen as a venue of such a crucial summit. Tunisia volunteered to host the summit as early as 1998 because then it had invested in vast ICT infrastructure compared to other African countries.

The International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) which went on a fact finding mission to Tunisia from January 14 to 19 has issued a damning report calling on Tunisia to greatly improve its implementation of internationally agreed freedom of expression and other human rights standard if it to hold the WSIS in November. IFEX is a global network of 64 national, regional and international freedom of expression organizations based in Toronto, Canada. The Media Institute of Southern Africa regional chapter is one of the members of IFEX.

The report recommended among other things that Tunisia should release editor of a weekly paper called Al Fajr, Hamadi Jebali and hundreds of prisoners like him held for their religious and political beliefs and who never advocated or used violence.

It also asked for the release of the seven-cyber dissidents known as the Youth of Zarzis who, following unfair trials, have been sentenced to heavy prison terms for allegedly using the Internet to commit terror attacks.

It has also been asked to end arbitrary administrative sanctions compelling journalists Abdella Zouari to live nearly 500 kilometres from his wife and children and guarantee him his basic right to freedom of movement and expression. It called on Tunisia to stop blocking websites and putting internet cafes and internet users under police surveillance, release banned books, end censorship and lift arbitrary travel ban on human rights defenders and political activists.

Tunisia was also urged to take serious steps toward lifting all restrictions on independent journalism and encouraging diversity of content and ownership of the press and promote genuine pluralism in broadcast content and ownership. The report said Tunisia should allow independent investigation into cases of torture allegedly perpetrated by security.

Some delegates at the meeting were hopeful that the WSIS could offer opportunities to inform the international community of these unrelenting attacks on freedom of expression in Tunisia and to campaign for the protection of this basic right before and after the WSIS.

But the report fears the Tunisian government which heavily invests in public relations campaign and in establishing groups it falsely calls NGOs would use the WSIS to improve its image while continuing to conceal its human rights record.

The report places the number of civil society groups in Tunisia at more than 8 000 but says reliable sources maintain that there are less than a dozen truly independent groups. The authorities do not recognize most of them and their leading figures are under continuous police surveillance and harassment.

The Tunisians were ready to counter the report, saying the fact that IFEX members were issued out with visas and entered Tunisia meant the country had nothing to hide.

The meeting also gave an insight into issues like Internet governance, gender, youth, African participation, millennium development goals, private sector participation and financial mechanisms among others. The next preparatory meeting is scheduled in September in Geneva and Highway Africa is currently conducting national workshops in the southern Africa to increase civil society participation and media coverage of the WSIS summit.

The road to Tunisia is still open to Africa's participation. Zimbabwe's government, civil society, private sector and the media can still play a part in this international process.