Palestinian Reform Agenda:
Reproduces Corruption and Consolidates Agricultural Marginalization & Exclusion!!
June,
2005
Forward:
The terminology “reform” or good governance has become the
core of the debates and forums held by various intellectual,
developmental, socio-economic and political elites in the
Palestinian arena. Though calls for reforms are genuinely
Palestinian oriented, it is apparent that external
pressures and trends most notably American embedded targets
and interests constitute the main instigator of all this
attention and debate.
Calls for reforms have earnestly continued by the
Palestinian people for so many years however the essence of
the reforms we are going to expose in this short paper is
not and will never be consistent with the Palestinian
national interest and endeavor to achieve democracy,
political plurality and socio-cultural diversity. As a
matter of fact, the reforms that are explored herein emerge
from an external political agenda to restructure this region
and build the great Middle East, which only serves the
American strategic interests making use of the Iraqi model.
We wish
to bring to light the impacts of the reforms that are
promoted by the US Administration and have infiltrated the
Palestinian agenda forming prerequisites for a further
financial and political support to the Palestinian
Authority.
Ramifications of the Foreign- Oriented Reforms:
The official
socio-economic and developmental trends revealed by the
indicators of the Palestinian Authority budget for the year
2005 reflect the continued inflation of the PA bodies and
expenditures, which consequently create a new social stratum
that earns its living at the expense of the wide social
class. Thus, the gaps between classes will become larger and
the real interests of the grassroots will be totally
ignored. Furthermore, the governmental consuming
expenditure, which is funded by foreign and external grants,
loans and aid will be the core of the Palestinian national
economy. These indicators prove that the foreign- oriented
reform agenda occupies the central part of the terms of
reference for the desired reforms adopted by both of the
Palestinian Authority and the leaderships of some of the
non-governmental organizations.
In fact, the
imposed reform agenda constitutes a life board for many of
the icon elites in the Palestinian Authority, which share
with the visions, goals and strategies of the
foreign-oriented agenda. The latter aims at achieving the
following:
-
Destruction of the agricultural labor force and
transforming it to a “suspended” paid and cheap
labor force who have lost their agricultural
holdings, in other words transforming agricultural
workers to the “slaves” of the twenty first century
who work in the new “slavery” zone belts to the west
of the Wall.
-
The circulation of corruption and the rotation of
the interests and power relations among the
fortunate elites.
-
The continued exclusion and submission of the rural
areas to the intensive consuming structures and
patterns which are concentrated in the major
Palestinian cities.
-
The destruction of the existent cultural heritage of
values and principles in rural areas and the
imposition of a weird consumer culture.
-
Encouraging the internal migration from the rural
areas to the cities locating in the middle of the
West Bank.
-
Transforming the rural areas and the agricultural
sector to a garbage dump as well as transforming the
rural human capital to a “human natural reserves”.
-
The disengagement between the agricultural and the
public sectors which will result in the
privatization of the agricultural services and
processes and consequently depriving weak and
delicate classes of access to these services.
-
Enhancing the dependency of the commercial sector on
the commodities and inputs that are imported from
outside at the time the industrial sector will
continue to suffer from remarkable weaknesses.
The type of reform we need:
Reform and social change
are two wings for the Palestinian endeavor for
independence and democracy. They are an essential and
basic demand for all of the Palestinian people. They
must materialize the elements of the Palestinian
steadfastness, grassroots struggle for national
liberation and democratization. The true reform and
change can be achieved by:
-
Masses and grassroots tools not by the instruments
of the elites who depend for their living on
external grants and aid.
-
Reprioritizing of the Palestinian interests to serve
the interests of the grassroots and the productive
economic sectors.
-
Rationalizing the service sector to the extent that
can satisfy and meet the imperative needs of the
productive sectors.
-
Decreasing of the security forces and the government
related expenditure to the extent that can meet the
crucial requirements of security for the Palestinian
citizen.
-
The adoption and implementation of supportive
policies in favor of the productive sectors most
particularly the agriculture sector to enable the
latter to achieve the national food security.
-
Fighting of the structures and attitudes of the
Palestinian elites that are deeply involved in
financial and administrative corruption and taking
precautionary measures against the reproduction of
corruption in the Palestinian arena.
