Thu, 14 Jan 2010

Eliant campaign close to achieving target

LÖRRACH (NNA) – The Eliant campaign to collect one million signatures to influence European Union legislation with regard to various aspects of applied anthroposophy - including education, nutrition and agriculture, special needs education and social therapy, medicine and therapeutic disciplines - has almost reached its target.

The Lisbon Treaty, the EU’s revised charter which entered into force on 1 December, provides for citizens’ initiatives to influence EU policy-making if they can collect more than one million signatures from a “significant number of member states”.

However, although Eliant crossed the one million signature hurdle at the end of last year, that number also includes signatures collected worldwide from 159 countries. From within the EU, the campaign was still approximately 109,000 signatures short at the end of December.

The Eliant organisers have now appealed for a last push to gather the required number of signatures from within the EU: “We would be very grateful if you can help us do so, and in particular spread this news amongst your friends and acquaintances via email,” they write in an email sent out last week.

Countries where substantial numbers of signatures still need to be mobilised include Bulgaria, Greece, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, and Cyprus.

Eliant hopes to meet the target in the first quarter of the year and is planning a gala evening at the end of March to celebrate the event.

END/nna/cva

www.eliant.eu

Item: 100114-02EN Date: 14 January 2010

Copyright 2010 News Network Anthroposophy Limited. All rights reserved. See: www.nna-news.org/copyright/

More NNA reports at: www.nna-news.org/en/

Nicanor Perlas reinstated as Philippine presidential candidate

By NNA correspondent Walter Siegfried Hahn

MANILA (NNA) – More than a month after being disqualified, Nicanor Perlas has been officially reinstated as a candidate in the Philippine presidential elections set for 10 May.

The Philippine election commission Comelec announced in its resolution 8743 today that Perlas had been included in the list of candidates again.

Perlas, winner of the Alternative Nobel Prize and pioneer of anthroposophy in the Philippines, who has just celebrated his sixtieth birthday, had been excluded from the race in December on the grounds that he was allegedly unable finance a national campaign and mobilise sufficient support.

But a worldwide online campaign quickly generated 1200 supporters who compared Perlas with Vaclav Havel, Nelson Mandela and Al Gore. Perlas himself organised a demonstration in front of the Comelec building on 21 December during which he submitted his petition for reinstatement in the list of candidates.

A Comelec hearing on 28 December produced today’s decision. Perlas is the only candidate to have been reinstated. This means that there are now nine candidates running for president in the Philippines.

Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III, son of the national hero Benigno Aquino and the recently deceased former president Corazon Aquino, is currently leading in the opinion polls. Also doing well is former president Estrada who was forced to step down in 2001. He was subsequently convicted of plunder but was pardoned by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in 2007.

Another leading candidate is Manuel B. Villar who in the last three months catapulted himself to second place in the opinion polls after spending about 50 million euros (£44.5m, US$72.6m).

Whether Perlas, who has only been mentioned in the opinion polls once so far, can muster sufficient resources in the remaining four months remains to be seen. His exclusion from the list of candidates and the subsequent campaign for his reinstatement has probably created the best platform for him so far which he has used with great skill.

END/nna/wsh/cva

Links: www.nicanorperlas.com, www.truthforce.info, www.pagasa.net.ph

Item: 100114-01EN Date: 14 January 2010

Copyright 2010 News Network Anthroposophy Limited. All rights reserved. See: www.nna-news.org/copyright/

More NNA reports at: www.nna-news.org/en/