A CONTINENT OF HOPE AND INNOVATION Patrizia Sentinelli Dear delegates, The first World Social Forum to take place in Africa is a unique opportunity to highlight the tremendous work that African civil society carries out everyday in spite of innumerable difficulties. An important step was already taken at the beginning of 2006, when Bamako, the capital of Mali, hosted one of the polycentric forums.

Patrizia Sentinelli

While our efforts as a movement continue over the years, my perspective has changed as a result of my new responsibilities within the Italian government.

A rewarding and intense job, it requires the capacity of giving coherence to initiatives, which I learnt through movement practices and. That coherence is necessary to consider my role as an instrument to make the government permeable to movement requests.

The message this forum conveys is clear: it is time for the world to consider Africa for what it is, a continent in political and social turmoil. Nairobi will contribute for this to happen, by trying to restore the political dimension that Africa deserves, and prevent it to be merely considered as the land "to be helped" through traditional international cooperation policies. Nairobi 2007 is also a chance to acknowledge the role of African social actors as promoters of innovation through their daily practices, which is one of the goals of the World Social Forum since its creation.

To fight poverty we must start from local communities, by offering peoples in many regions of the African continent the possibility of holding a leading role in their own recovery. And I'm thinking, for example, of the so many women who have worked to sustain local economies: we will have the opportunity to meet them and listen to their proposals in Nairobi, as well as we'll do in Bamako on March 2 and 3, at the world meeting of African women to be organized by the Italian Cooperation.

I hope that thanks to this World Social Forum the 'Northern world' will understand that for cooperation in the so called poor countries to be successful, the peoples of those countries must be consulted and heard, so as to understand the kind of social, economic and cultural progress to be pursued, without imposing what we think is right for ourselves.

The goal to be achieved in Nairobi is therefore the exchange, because we have a lot to learn and receive from Africa.

Apart from strongly denouncing the failure of liberal policies and the war that seems functional to keep those policies in force, I do hope that this Forum leads to concrete ideas on how to preserve our common goods – water, land, energy and food- and strengthen human, social and political rights in every country, and that these ideas can be applied in a positive and proactive way. I also hope the Forum allows for the convergence of three sectors, which are closely interrelated and essential to fight poverty: the environment, in the broadest sense of the word; the socio-sanitary sector, aimed at strengthening the local realities already working in Africa; and the educational-cultural sector, with a view to create a network of universities, education centres, municipalities, civil society and movements.

I believe in a kind of cooperation that does not come from the top, as it frequently happened in the past, but listens to Africa’s voice; an alternative to the competitive concept imposed by the liberal model, which can ultimately turn into cooperation among peoples and not only among governments.

To start putting this approach into practice, and at my initiative, the Italian government has decided to give also a financial contribution to the Nairobi Forum, which reflects an important commitment. Africa is a politically significant continent, with an active and organized civil society, which after centuries of submission – first to colonialism and then to liberal policies - wants to walk with its own legs and hold its own position in the global context, which it could not have so far.

Unlike in previous editions of the Forum, when only parliamentarians took part, the Italian contribution this year, through my participation - and therefore that of the Government - underlines the interest of my country in the world civil society represented in Nairobi. We are here not only to discuss but also to witness that through good practices it is possible to