Back to local conditions, Drammen county
A political debate in Drammen.
On Monday September 14th 2009 Norway held parliamentary elections. It is at tradition that the schools that resemble college in the UK (pupils are 15-19 years old) arrange a debate, a so called school debate, where the parties debate a few weeks before the election. The debate usually last about two hours. Some days after the debate, the schools arrange an election where the pupils vote for a party that they would have voted for in the real election.
I am myself a member of the party Kystpartiet (KP, “Coastal Party”) in Vestfold county, and during the election campaign, I represented KP in two school debates in Buskerud county. Fampo is of course a politically independent organisation that does not support any specific party. The content of what I said in the debate, and how I was met by the school, makes it highly relevant to write about the debate om Fampo’s website.
First some background. On May 10th, KP in Vestfold county arranged an open meeting in the town Sandefjord together with Fampo. Sandefjord is the town where the Bildenberg group arranged their annual meeting in 1982. This meeting had a quite different purpose – to enlighten people about corruption and human rights violations in Norway. I could therefore prepare an opening to the school debate, where I mentioned the meeting in Sandefjord and told the listeners that the sinister issues that was the theme of KP in Vestfold’s and Fampo’s open meeting, was silenced by the seven parties represented in parliament. My first debate was at Drammen Videregående Skole (Drammen VGS, “Drammen college”) on August 31.. Drammen is the county capital of Buskerud county and one of Norway’s largest cities. Present were about 1400 pupils, some teachers, media and the police.
The reason for the presence of the police was that Vigrid, an organisation which is described as a nazi sect, and which participated in the election in Buskerud county, was allowed to participate in the debate. The police was present in case of any clash with anti-racist demonstrators. The debate started at 9 o’clock, but I arrived an hour earlier and could see how the scholl had arranged the parties in the debate. The 11 participating parties were arranged as they were percived to be situated in the left-right-axis. From left to right: Norges Kommunistiske Parti (Communist Party), Rødt (Red), Sosialistisk Venstreparti (Socialist Left Party), Arbeiderpartiet (Labour), Senterpartiet (Centre Party), Venstre (Liberal Party), Kristelig Folkeparti (Christian People’s Party), Høyre (Concervative Party), Fremskrittspartiet (Progress Party), Vigrid and Kystpartiet (Coastal Party).
KP describes itself as a centrist party. Drammen VGS placed me to the right of Vigrid! You may see a picture of me, the “right wing super-extremist” here and a video here. All the other parties were placed in a position that one may call sensible, and which seems to be generally agreed upon. I alone was placed in a demonstrative way. Did not the school like what I was going to say? (And did they know in advance what I was going to say??) Bjørn Aamodt, moderator and teacher at Drammen VGS opened the debate by refering to the debate in media about whether Vigrid should be allowed to participate or not. He quoted Voltaire’s famous words: “I disagree with what you say but will fight to the death to protect your right to say it.” If you do not count the opening appeal (2 minutes) and closing appeal (1 minute) that every party was given, I was only permitted to speak once during the debate. That means the out of the three themes that the pupils had chosen for the debate (school, immigration/integration and environment), I only got the opportunity to speak about one of the issues.
Here is what I said during my two opening minutes. What I talked about is cencored in Norwegian media, so being able to adress 1400 pupils is not bad.
I shall open by talking about something I suppose you have not heard about during the election campaign, viz. the enormous lack of justice which an ever groving number of Norwegians experience. No other European country hospitalises more people coercively, relative to population numbers. This includes several people who have been coercively hospitalised and medicated after having disclosed illegal conditions. And more and more Norwegians experiences a corrupt legal system in cases where they loose their children or their property.
I could have spoken about this issues for hours, but time only permits me to refer to this report [Holding up “Ytringsfrihetens Pris i Det skjulte Norge” (The Price of Freedom of Speech in The Hidden Norway)], where Dag Hiåsen from Sigdal [municipality in Buskerud] documents that the legal system was abused in order to displace the editor of the local newspaper Bygdeposten at Vikersund [village in Buskerud], when she wrote about abuse of power in Norway – for example in this article [holding up one of the attachments to the report], “Den siste sovjet-staten) [The last Soviet state], about the fisherman Kåre Torvholm from Sunnmøre [northwestern Norway], who fought for the coastal fishermen and against corruptien and illegal fishing, and whom the police at Sunnmøre wanted mentally investigated.
In May this year, KP in Vestfold arranged an open meeting in Sandefjord, about these conditions, and invited people to see the documentation. The parties in parliament have however silenced. these issues – when they should have been the first to adress these issues – in parliament. The exception is The Liberal Party; several LP politicians have presented rude lies about these issues. So we need a new parliament.
3.2% of the pupils who voted in the school election at Drammen VGS, voted for KP, much more than expected.
Erik Strand, November 08, 2009
Fampo 