News From NGOs

Upcoming Conference News

Society of Corporate Compliance

Compliance and Ethics Institute

September 13 – 16, 2009 | Las Vegas, NV | Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino

SCCE’s annual Institute is the primary education and networking event for professionals working in the compliance and ethics profession around the world. At this meeting, presenters have the opportunity to share their latest methods and strategies for developing and improving compliance programs in this rapidly growing and evolving profession. For all details please click here : - Institute

Pre-Conference Sessions will be offered on Sunday, September 13, 2009. The day is divided into two longer sessions: morning sessions and afternoon sessions. The longer timeframe allows for in-depth discussion and interaction covering topics in more detail. Post-Conference Workshops will be offered on Wednesday, September 16, 2009. The sessions are four hour interactive workshops designed to cover some of the most important and timely topics.

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• Goldman Environmental Prize Winners 2009
  (click on the above title to go to the story)
  
• Violence - A Special TI Report
• Second Annual Robin Cosgrove Prize Announced
• Transparency International Integrity Award 2008
• Global Witness Receives 2007 Commitment to Development Award
  
  
  
  

  Sri Lankan Journalist Murdered - Courageous Anti-Corruption Reporter.

  Photo: Lasantha Wickramatunga receiving the 2000 Integrity Awards from then TI co-founder Frank Vogl. This leading journalist was murdered in January, the BBC reported.
  
  
  
• A SPECIAL REPORT ON VIOLENCE AND THREATS
  from Transparency International
  
  ON THE FRONTLINES
  a report that highlights -
  Anti-corruption Activists - Fighting corruption at a price - Why anti-corruption work is targeted - Risks around the world - Protecting actvisits
  
  
• Fighting corruption at a price Fighting corruption on the front lines can come at a devastating personal price. Those who persevere in exposing corruption are often subject to grave physical threats and state scrutiny. In many parts of the world, anti-corruption activists are at constant risk by those who wish to silence individuals involved in the fight against fraudulent ruling powers and corporations.
  
  Looking back at recent events, Transparency International (TI) reflects on the precarious situations that those entrenched in the fight against corruption are faced with, from Gabon to Nicaragua, Zimbabwe to Bosnia and Herzegovina. In Sri Lanka violent threats and murder have been used to silence those who speak out against the political regime. In Gabon, four civil rights activists were detained, refused access to lawyers or medical care and consequently accused of “propaganda”. In Zimbabwe, activists speaking out against the regime this year have found themselves locked up for an indefinite amount of time and denied legal rights.
  
  The situation is escalating in many countries and TI is gravely concerned about the harassment and intimidation of all those involved in the front line fight against corruption. Why anti-corruption work is targeted Corruption undermines democracy, human rights, civil liberties and sustainable development and, as such, is often deeply embedded within varying factions of society. The fear of economic loss drives many to threaten and target anti-corruption advocates. Those involved in illicit enrichment through corrupt practices will often stop at nothing to protect their unlawful gains.
  
  Not only are fraudulent financial gains at stake, but reputations, influence and relationships as well. Exposing corrupt acts, therefore, becomes a significant threat. Where embezzlement goes hand in hand with nepotism or entrenched networks of corruption, it is even riskier to expose or even inquire about questionable practices. Activists, investigative journalists and whistleblowers are on the front lines as they work to deter and detect corruption both in the private and public sector. One telephone call to the media or one letter to the right public official from a worker who has decided to expose individual or institutional malpractice and a whistleblower can potentially bring a corrupt system to its knees. TI is lobbying for stronger measures to protect anti-corruption fighters from retaliation.
  
  Posted 02/11/2009
  
  
• Awards - announcements from NGOs regarding calls for nominations or individuals who have recently received awards in the area of ethics and anti-corruption.
  
  
• Appointments - NGOs can post available positions or publicize new job appointments.
• Meetings - We will publish advanbce details of important meetings organized by not-for-profit organizations.
  
  
  

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AWARDS

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 The Goldman Environmental Prize
Seven Grassroots Leaders Win

“The industrialization of Africa by leaders acting without environmental conscience will be the ruin of us.” Marc Ona, Libreville, Gabon

Grassroots environmental heroes too often go unrecognized. Yet their efforts to protect the world’s natural resources are increasingly critical to the well-being of the planet we all share. Thus, in 1990 San Francisco civic leaders and philanthropists Richard N. Goldman and his late wife, Rhoda H. Goldman (1924-1996) created the Goldman Environmental Prize. The Goldman Prize continues today with its original mission to annually honor grassroots environmental heroes from the six inhabited continental regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America.

The Prize recognizes individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. Each winner receives an award of $150,000, the largest award in the world for grassroots environmentalists. the prize has been awarded to 133 people from 75 countries. Prize winners are selected by an international jury from confidential nominations submitted by a worldwide network of environmental organizations and individuals. Previous Prize winners have been at the center of some of the world’s most pressing environmental challenges, including seeking justice for victims of environmental disasters at Love Canal and Bhopal, India; leading the fight for dolphin-safe tuna and fighting oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Since receiving a Goldman Prize, eight winners have been appointed or elected to national office in their countries, including several who became ministers of the environment. The 1991 Goldman Prize winner for Africa, Wangari Maathai, won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize.

2009 Winners

Maria Gunnoe, Bob White, West Virginia, USA: In the heart of Appalachia, where the coal industry wields enormous power over government and public opinion, lifelong resident Maria Gunnoe fights against environmentally-devastating mountaintop removal mining and valley fill operations.

Marc Ona, Libreville, Gabon: In Gabon, a country without a culture of civic engagement, Marc Ona led efforts to publicly expose the unlawful agreements behind a huge Chinese mining development project that threatens the sensitive ecosystems of his country’s equatorial rainforests.

Rizwana Hasan, Dhaka, Bangladesh: Working to reduce the impact of Bangladesh’s exploitative and environmentally-devastating ship breaking industry, leading environmental attorney Rizwana Hasan led a legal battle resulting in increased government regulation and heightened public awareness about the dangers of ship breaking.

Olga Speranskaya, Moscow, Russia: Russian scientist Olga Speranskaya transformed the NGO community in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia into a potent, participatory force working to identify and eliminate the Soviet legacy of toxic chemicals in the environment.

Yuyun Ismawati, Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia: As waste management problems mount throughout the Indonesian archipelago, Yuyun Ismawati implements sustainable community-based solutions that provide employment opportunities to low-income people and empower them to improve the environment.

Wanze Eduards and Hugo Jabini, Pikin Slee Village and Paramaribo, Suriname: Wanze Eduards and Hugo Jabini, members of Maroon communities originally established by freed African slaves in the 1700s, successfully organized their communities against logging on their traditional lands, ultimately leading to a landmark ruling for indigenous and tribal peoples throughout the Americas to control resource exploitation in their territories.

Comment from Publish What You Pay - Revenue Watch Institute

"Marc Ona's courage as a campaigner for responsible resource management has helped the people of Gabon hold their government to account," said Julie McCarthy, Revenue Watch deputy director. "Revenue Watch and the entire global transparency movement are delighted to see his leadership recognized."

As Publish What You Pay coordinator, Ona promotes public disclosure and citizen participation in the management of Gabon's natural resources, often at great personal risk. Ona and several colleagues were detained for nearly two weeks in January, following a campaign of official harassment against activists who have raised concerns about the use of public funds. The detainees were released after an outpouring of international criticism, including formal letters from the U.S. Congress to the president of Gabon. Ona has also been barred from international travel on several occasions by Gabonese authorities since he attempted to visit New York City for a Revenue Watch conference in June 2008.
Gabon has endorsed the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), a global initiative for greater openness in the oil, gas and mining industries. "Successful implementation of the EITI requires the free and independent participation of civil society," said Anthony Richter, chairman of the Revenue Watch Institute and also a member of the EITI governing board. "Marc Ona and campaigners like him play a vital role in the EITI at the country level, where the process is crippled if it does not include the voices and interests of the citizens who seek improvements in their daily lives."

RWI hopes that the contributions of activists like Ona to accountable governance and development in Gabon will encourage the government to remove restrictions on civil society engagement in natural resource policy debates going forward.

Posted 04/27/2009

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Robin Cosgrove Prize for Ethics in Finance Announcement

Deadline for Essay Submissions - May 31, 2009

The Robin Cosgrove Prize for Innovative Ideas for Ethics in Finance is open to young people, aged 35 years or younger, throughout the world. They are invited to submit creative papers setting out analyses, projects or proposals for innovative ways to promote ethics in finance and banking, especially in emerging markets. 

The management of the Prize is under the supervision of the Observatoire de la Finance/International Finance Observatory, which is a Swiss not-for-profit foundation based in Geneva.  The Observatoire, working in cooperation with Dr Carol Cosgrove-Sacks, Robin’s mother and a former director in the United Nations in Geneva, has set up a distinguished international Jury to evaluate the papers submitted for the Prize. The Jury will allocate the prize money of USD20,000.

Applicants are invited to submit their papers electronically by May 31, 2009.  For more details on this competition, please visit the Robin Cosgrove Prize website. 

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The Transparency International annual Integrity Awards are the most prestigious awards to anti-corruption fighters. Fighting corruption – be it at the village or the national levels – demands courage.

TI 2008 Integrity Award Winners

Transparency International’s (TI) Integrity Awards honour the work of these courageous individuals and organisations that make a real difference in the fight against corruption. From accountants and public prosecutors to government officials and pharmacologists, their backgrounds may be diverse, but the message is the same: corruption can be beaten.
TI’s 2008 Integrity Awards pay tribute to two remarkable investigative journalists, David Leigh and Roman Shleynov, whose untiring determination to expose corrupt dealings in the face of formidable odds serve as inspiration to the anti-corruption movement.

David Leigh

Investigations Editor at the Guardian (UK)

“The OECD rightly harangues Britain for a dire record on tackling bribery – especially as the government is the worst offender”.
David Leigh (Guardian )

Roman Shleynov

Investigations Editor at Novaya Gazeta (Russia)

“It is not criticism of the Kremlin itself that endangers Russian journalists, but the threat they pose to an old system of relationships that benefits a tiny minority of people. And that will not be permitted.”
Roman Shleynov (New Statesman)

Global Witness Receives 2007 Commitment to Developement Award

The Commitment to Developement Award, sponsored by the Center for Global Development and Foreign Policy magazine has honored Global Witness for its hard-hitting investigative reporting which has exposed the links between corruption, conflict, and the natural resource trade.

Global Witness has crusaded to stop the plunder of rain forests in Cambodia and Burma and helped to bring the problem of conflict diamonds in Africa to the world's attention. Its first investigation of illegal timber sales by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia shut down that trade in 1995. A headline-making Global Witness report in 1998 showed how rebels in Angola were financing a deadly civil war by selling diamonds. That work, along with a January 2000 report by Partnership Africa Canada, another crusading NGO, on the role of diamonds in the civil war in Sierra Leone, figured prominently in the establishment of the Kimberley Process to certify diamonds that are not mined from conflict zones.  Global Witness was also a founder of the Publish What You Pay campaign, which seeks transparency about how resource-rich governments spend their share of mineral revenues.

Global Witness is now continuing to expose corruption in various areas, including corruption in the natural resource trade, ending impunity, and the role of financial institutions in money laundering.  The three co-founders and their 35 member staff post new articles daily on their website trying to keep global leaders on their toes. 

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