Whose “tool” are the NGOs?

[Mirrorsonic]

The case of the Non-Governmental Organization (International Mine Initiative), whose activity had been denounced in Iraq by a leader article in “Rizospastis” on the 13th of December 2003, opened a “Pandora’s Box” out of which the NGO-tinted corruption flowed. According to the charges that have been presented, this specific NGO provoked 9 million euros of losses to the Greek state, allegedly in order to clear mines in the regions of Lebanon, Iraq, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, with the involvement of employees of the Foreign Ministry in this case who misused state money. 14 other ministries apart from the Foreign Ministry “fund” dozens of NGOs, sometimes for projects that are beyond one’s imagination, from “voluntary fore-fighting” to the “Christianization of North Korea”.

What is being highlighted by the majority of the Greek bourgeois mass media in relation to the NGO scandal? Which politician is responsible for the funding, how much money was squandered, who benefited. Yes, all these things must be revealed, the investigation must be completed, but the case must not be restricted to this.

The question is who are the so-called NGOs useful for. We remember that when they first appeared, they were advertised as instruments of “participation”, as organs of the “civil society” in confrontation with the organized labour and people’s movement.

The European Union has supported and funded, through EU programmes, NGOs in order to propagandize rotten values and to implement its anti-people political line. The Greek governments of course have done the same.

We bear in mind that in the recent past in our country, a law assigned the implementation of programmes of community services to the NGOs. These programmes employed people with 5-month contracts and starvation wages in the municipalities, exploiting the need of thousands of unemployed workers for a day’s pay.

We also remember that, with the blessings of the mayors, municipal councilors that are aligned with ND, PASOK and the “leftwing” SYRIZA, many NGOs have undertaken activity in health-welfare such as: child vaccines, “Help at home for the old-aged”, etc. as a result of the lack or reduction or abolition of primary healthcare services. And they receive EU funding for this….

Foreign Ministries all over the world are funding the projects of such organizations, with the pretext of humanitarian activity, but with the real goal of opening new pathways for the multinationals to enter economic sectors in various countries. NGOs were created with purely political-financial activity which attempted to penetrate Eastern European and Balkan countries after the overthrow of the USSR, like the notorious “Open Society Foundation” of the billionaire George Soros.

Of course, there are also NGOs that do not belong to these categories, but they are exceptions to the rule.

The so-called NGOs are useful and substantial tools in the hands of the imperialist apparatuses, in the hands of the bourgeois governments. Sometimes they are used for the promotion of reactionary restructurings. Other times they set up mechanisms to implement the anti-people political line. Sometimes they present themselves as the protectors of the environment against the activity of the monopolies, but in the end they are revealed to be the pawns of the one or other competitor. And other times they are one of the most useful vehicles for imperialist infiltration with the mask of humanitarian assistance.

The KKE is in favour of voluntary activity and contributions when they serve the interests of the popular forces. It expressed once again its opposition to the content given to volunteering by the bourgeois class, which exploits the desire of people to make a social contribution and uses it against the working class and the popular strata.

[tuwix]

Your view of NGOs is oversimplified. There is variety of them. Some of them are pretty genuine (some education programs, for example) and some pretty detrimental. There is nothing bad in organization sharing a passion for movies, for example.