News briefing
Written and translated by: Committee for Justice
Geneva: 30 June 2021
The Executive Director of the Committee for Justice, Ahmed Mefreh, participated in a webinar hosted by the New Tactics in Human Rights organization, entitled “Good Governance and Accountability”, which was held on the 30 June, via Zoom and was streamed live on Facebook.
Mefreh said in his intervention that if there is a political will to modify the behavior of the regimes and respond to the aspirations of the people, there will be oversight, transparency and laws that respect rights and freedoms and fight corruption. “Even if there is no political will and the popular will exists, we will find that there are moves to change the reality,” he added.
“But if the political systems deliberately block the popular will and restrict its activity, we will find that there is a spread of corruption, lack of oversight, lack of good governance, and other diseases that will lead to the existence of repressive and authoritarian regimes.”
Mefreh pointed out that the solution is not simply to promulgate new laws. “Our region is excellent at writing laws and constitutions. But in the end, the lack of political will to implement such laws has led to corruption, human rights violations, and repression of society.”
Mefreh added that the principles and standards of good governance can certainly be applied as long as the demands exist, pointing out that what happened in the Arab Spring and its aftermath of movements demanding change is nothing but a first breath.
“As long as there are aspirations of the Arab peoples to change the situation, the demands for change will continue, and change is inevitably coming.”
