/ 25 June 2010

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before

Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before

Has Toronto gone overboard in treating the G20 meeting there as a marketing opportunity?
Michelle le Roux examines the case

Is it “normal for . . .host countries to showcase ‘all their country has to offer'” or, as the critics say, is it all a waste of money and “the world’s most expensive photo-op”?

No, these speakers were not discussing the World Cup, but rather that other international spectacle that kicks off in Toronto this weekend — the G20. But like the World Cup, the billion-dollar price tag to host this weekend’s gathering of 20 world leaders (working out at a $1-million per minute for this sitting of the global political and economic gabfest) has caused bitter division and much debate among the residents of Toronto.

The lightning rod for those who consider this a colossal waste of money in these still dire financial times is the $2-million fake lake. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government has decided that the world’s media should enjoy the great Canadian outdoors indoors. So, the international media centre includes a fake lake, complete with fake dock, canoes, trees, Muskoka deck chairs, and (not to be confused with the audio feed of the G20 meetings themselves) an atmospheric audio recording of the call of the water fowl the loon (again, not to be mistaken for some of the delegates).

The outcry against the “Experience Canada” expo has been vocal (not least by those having the audacity to mention the fact that Toronto does, after all, find itself on the shores of the Great Lake Ontario), and the inevitable lists of causes on which that money could better have been spent followed.

The defence of this expenditure followed an equally predictable line: that this was a unique marketing opportunity, one in which the world’s eyes would be upon Toronto and that immeasurable future tourism and commercial gains would follow from a safe, well-executed event. But so far no one knows the true final cost. It will certainly be more than was originally budgeted for. The benefits may turn out to be elusive or difficult to quantify. Sound familiar?

The showcase has also seen Toronto’s downtown homeless population cleared out of the area and other Potemkin-village techniques used to ensure that G20 attendees are spared the sight of some of Toronto’s pressing social issues. Strip clubs have been forced to close and brothels are reportedly relocating to the suburbs to avoid increased police harassment.

Then there are the expected crowds of protesters concerned with a wide ideological range of issues, from anarchists to vegans, poverty and free-trade activists, and everyone else with a view on the meeting. For the record, its agenda is ostensibly concerned with the global economic recovery, further coordinated stimulus steps, mooted austerity measures, and proposed banking and securities oversight and regulatory reforms, including adjustments to leverage and capital requirements to ensure bank liquidity and reduce market risk.

The most controversial issues — the bank-levy tax and China’s refusal to adopt fully flexible exchange rates to date — appear consigned to the political side channels. Most tellingly, development policies affecting the overwhelming majority of the world’s population are totally off the table for discussion this time around. They are not a priority.

In anticipation of protest violence, the Toronto police have invested in a long-range acoustic device or LRAD that, when set to its siren mode, generates a sound blast as loud as 145 decibels. The latest in crowd control technology, it literally knocks people off their feet. And could burst their ear drums, induce seizures or impair their balance for life.

Under pressure from civil-society groups, the police have indicated that they might just use the LRAD as a “communication device” but have given no assurances that they will not engage the siren if needed to disperse protestors. And we thought the vuvuzela was the noisiest hearing-impairing devices around these days.

The Toronto police have also angered civil-liberties groups by blanketing the downtown precinct with CCTV cameras, threatening to jam wireless or cellular telephone signals to prevent protesters (and presumably everyone else) from communicating with each other, erecting a 3m-high ring-of-steel fence around the meeting site, installing snipers and, most recently, removing sapling trees deemed to have weapon potential.

This overt militarisation and over-militarisation has caused a storm of criticism and not just for its pricetag. Canadians are troubled by the conservative, exclusive, unwelcoming image it creates for a nation that considers itself the opposite.

Playing host should mean the opportunity to give one’s guests a lived and personal experience of one’s core values. But perhaps these hosts do not get to prioritise but have to yield to their guests’ demands? The warm South African welcome currently enjoyed by our World Cup visitors hopefully means that they see a nation united in diversity, while they cannot miss our gross economic inequalities that are in plain sight. One or two might even wonder whether it was all worth it as they drive past informal settlements to take their seats in a gleaming stadium that meets Fifa’s standards.

Official hospitality, as extended in these global gatherings, comes at what true cost to the more material challenges facing a nation? As that famous credit card advertising campaign might put it: “Fake lake: $2-million. Hosting the World Cup: $4,3-billion. Showing our true selves: priceless.”

Michelle le Roux is a member of the Johannesburg and New York Bars and co-author of Precedent & Possibility: The (Ab)use of Law in South Africa