I strongly recommend to anyone who wishes to put in perspective Pat's attacks on this Advisory Commission and on the current Executive Team to read an article he penned about CDS in April 2008, entitled "Virtual Zimbabwe", that can be found on his, blog, here: http://slpatroklus.blogspot.ca/search?q=zimbabwe. In it, he asserts that CDS is "... turning into a 'Virtual Zimbabwe'; elections take place but they are rigged in advance to support the incumbents. The opposition (who won the election) are routinely abused, personally attacked and hounded from office." The most relevant passages (worth comparing with his positions as LRA in 2012 and as past - and possibly future - Chancellor) to the workings of this commission is as follows:
"In the past few weeks members of the RA have either proposed or passed the following:
1. The RA has changed the election rules so that voters cannot eliminate factions they don't approve of. This means the by-election will be fought under different rules from the January election. We do not know who of the incumbent factions will be running in the by-election. We know that the DPU intend to stand and that Simplicity and NuCARE have said they won't. We shall see. The point is that the incumbents have changed the rules and this could benefit them should they choose to stand in the by-election. Sadly, the Scientific Council, the defenders of the Constitution and citizens' human rights, have chosen to allow this to happen.
2. The RA has raised the minimum faction size from 3 to 10% of the population which means the bar has been raised so that the minimum faction size is now 7. (I can't find a link to this on the CDS Forums page so this may have been decided by the RA without any public debate at all.) There's been a ridiculous smoke screen raised around this one. The change has allegedly been made to prevent the CSDF from splitting into two or three 'micro-factions' and gaming the electoral system which favours smaller parties. There is no CSDF plan to do this; it's an invented rumour to build support for this anti-democratic change. What it does though is prevent any new factions from forming on the same basis as the ones that fought the election in January. The incumbent factions only needed three members then, so why should the bar be raised now? There were, apparently, rumours that other people were going to start up a new faction to run in the by-election hence the need to raise the bar and prevent them from being able to stand; the Beathan/NuCARE coalition currently running the RA will brook no opposition. Again, the SC has failed to prevent this and has consequently failed in its duty to protect the Constitution and the founding documents and the human rights of CDS citizens. This is clearly an abuse of the powers of the RA. By sanctioning this change the SC has given carte blanche to the RA to rig this by-election and future elections. Now that they've been given their head I shudder to think what oppressive laws this Unrepresentative Assembly will come up with.
3. The RA seriously considered changing the Constitution to eliminate the two vacant seats the CSDF won in the January election 'for the time being' to pretend that there were 5 and not 7 seats. This would have made it easier for the Rump Assembly to achieve a quorum at meetings and pass further constitutional amendments. This would have completely ignored the January election result and disenfranchised the voters who chose the CSDF in the January elections. Fortunately the RA did not pass this outrageous proposal (I've christened it the 'Zimbabwe proposal') but it indicates the complete lack of democratic temperament in some members of the RA.
This Unrepresentative Assembly is out of control. They are passing legislation on a whim and most of it never appeared in their election manifestos. They claim to 'fear the CSDF' despite the fact that we resigned our seats and gave up any power we had. They have moved to rig the by-elections in such a way that the CSDF, and any other opposition, will be disadvantaged. The Scientific Council has, inexplicably, allowed this to happen. In the face of legislative tyranny we have a toothless judiciary incapable of defending the citizens' rights."
Six months later, in another one if his articles, entitled "Four Years of Virtual Democracy", also to be found on his blog here: http://slpatroklus.blogspot.ca/2008/10/ ... cracy.html Pat was updating us on the progress of CDS:
"So, how is the CDS? Six months ago I was comparing it to Zimbabwe, how is it faring now? Well, things are certainly quieter than they were six months ago! The last set of elections, held in July, returned three representatives each from the Citizens' Social Democratic Faction (CSDF) and the Democratic Pragmatists' Union (DPU) and one from NuCARE to the Representative Assembly (RA) - our legislature. The RA has met approximately fortnightly since then but I think it would be fair to say that attention has shifted elsewhere; the RA is no longer 'the only game in town'. For most of the CDS's history, if you wanted to get something done you went to the RA. This was partly due to the nervousness around executive power and the unwillingness to grant any kind of power to an executive branch which could potentially be abused. The CDS didn't even have an executive branch for much of the time with executive-type powers being shared between the RA and the (old) Guild (a quasi-corporatist structure with powers over building and finance). The establishment of the Chancelry as the institution with executive power, and in particular the active stance taken by the current Chancellor, has shifted attention away from the RA. It's no longer the RA that 'gets things done' but the Chancellor and his very capable team. This has been a positive development so far. It allows those who are interested in events organisation, for example, to work with a team that can get things done and who have the legitimate authority to do so. This is not to denigrate the work of previous Chancellors who have also made their contribution, it's just clear that the institution is really showing its promise now that we have had time to get used to it.
So, Zimbabwe no more Perhaps the CDS is more like a country recovering from a period of temporary insanity? Like France after the excesses of the Revolution, the Terror and the guillotine? Or Britain after the industrial strife, power cuts and three-day working week of the 1970s? Or the Venezuelans when they wake up from the disaster of Chavez's Presidency?"
Verba volant, scripta manent...