Moderating the press conference (on the left Mr Assarid and Michel, on the right Mr Aguiriano, Director-general for DG EXPO (Thanks to my colleague Istvan for the pic)

This is a blog post I was supposed to write some time ago… But somehow I couldn't find the time to do it last week. Now I sit comfortably in my chair in lovely Strasbourg (yes, it's plenary once again), watching the Christmas market under the snow outside (or almost) and I can remember those sunny and bright days I spent in Lomé, Togo, at the end of November…

It all started with the boss (aka Steve) popping up in my office, a little bit embarassed. "Well, Florent, I'm afraid some people will be jealous…" Our sister unit, "the press" as we call it, had no French speaking press officers to cover a Joint Parliamentary Assembly in Togo… So we were asked to help them, and as French editor I was the first to get the offer.

It was a bit unfair, I must admit, as I already went to Tunisia for another mission last July. Missions are something rare in our unit, and two missions abroad in the same year was stretching the limits.

It took me about half a second to weigh up the pros and cons… And to accept the mission, of course not out of personal interest but to fulfil my duties and stay loyal to my beloved institution.

First times are always something special

I had never been to "black" Africa before and the first thing I would say now that I'm back is that I would like to return there. The country, as I could see during the 5 days of work and the 2 free days I had at the end of the mission, is really poor but people are extremely friendly. Yes, if there is richness in Africa, it's definitely the people.

The natural comparison that comes to my mind is always the one with China, where I went for several long trips. Togo seemed much poorer. Lomé is the capital and main city but you do not see more than 10 buildings in the whole town that have more than five or six floors. Industry and business seem to be non-existent. The hospital we visited with a delegation of MEPs and African, Pacific and Caribbean (ACP) MPs was hosting a lot of… Chinese doctors and nurses. Many people were sleeping outside, along the roads. And unemployment hits -officially- above 30% of the population (it may be even higher in reality). With 60% of the population being under 25, it would be the "land of hopelessness" if people had no such a positive attitude…

An impressive audience for the opening ceremony (thanks to my colleague Istvan for the pic)

I did not tell you yet what exactly I was doing there. So, here is the explanation. Elected representatives from the EU and the ACP countries meet twice a year, alternatively in Europe and in an ACP country, to discuss development. This has been decided in 2000, when both parties agreed in the Cotonou agreement on a stabile framework for their relations. The Joint Parliamentary Assembly, which gathers 78 MEPs and their counterparts from the 78 ACP countries, is a unique area of discussion for the representatives that control the governments' actions.

My job was the one of a press officer, as I said. I wrote press releases in French (another colleague took care of the English ones), something similar to what I do for La Une ("Headlines" page) maybe just a bit more factual and less free. I moderated the press conference and the press breakfast with the co-presidents of the Assembly, Louis Michel (Belgian MEP and former commissioner) and Assarid Ag imbarcaouane from Mali. And, last but not least, I was answering to journalists on the phone.

Ads for AIDS prevention were all over the place.

A premature conclusion

This blog starts to be too long, so let's come to a quick conclusion, if you've not already left. I discovered a new continent and a new job. I liked being in contact with MEPs and journalists. I did not like very much the writing of the press releases since there is no creativity behind it. And I liked following the multicultural debates (yes, in such an Assembly multiculturalism takes another significance!) on the impact of public debt on development, on the fight against malaria, on the Arab Spring, on the situation in the Horn of Africa…

The political situation on the spot was also very sensitive. The country is in a democratic transition, with the actual president being the son of the dictator that held power for 38 years. There was a big debate about nine MPs that were "dismissed" for changing their political party. MEP Louis Michel was rather in favour of this decision, many journalists again – a very hot topic. The reasons behind are quite complex and I can't go into details but it generated some hostile press coverage and rather virile interventions during the press breakfast. Another challenge to master – really interesting from a professional and personal point of view. Yes, you get the feeling you're in the political business and not only watching it from the outside!

Yes, you get the feeling you're in the political business and not only watching it from the outside!

We also got the chance to be invited for dinner by the Togolese correspondent from Radio France Internationale, and we spent the whole evening discussing the political situation. It was a really enlightening debate that offered us to understand the situation much more in depth.

Get out and you'll see!

Getting out of the office, meeting new colleagues, working directly with MEPs, being on the spot and not hidden behind a screen is always worth it, being it abroad or not, being it in Africa or not. Now I'm waiting for the next opportunity and, as it won't come before a long time, I just hope other colleagues will have the same opportunity and share their experience with us…

Where is the web heading? Thanks to Ludwig Gatzke for the pic @ http://bit.ly/tNLmG8

From Nicolas Princen, head of the web unit of the French Presidency

A company called Viewrz helped the French Presidency to tweet live some extracts of the video stream of the G20 meeting in Cannes. The principle is quite easy: you follow a debate, and whenever you find an extract interesting, you instantaneously send a message to the company, which will cut the last 30 seconds (or 20 seconds, one minute… this has to be decided in advance) of the video and send you a specific link to this short video. Then you just have to tweet it.

=> It would be great to use this kind of tool to cover our plenary debates. It's resource efficient (we need only one or two editors) and the format is nicer than a traditional coverage: you have a live tweet (for example one quote for each political group) and right after the debate you put it online as an article (in a kind of a Storify format). You can skip the boring/technical/empty parts of the debate and focus on the main political statements.

From TBWA 365, web agency

It was very interesting to have a look into the way of working and the logic of a private company, and I noted two things:

• They always start the briefings with their customers with a "cold", data-oriented analysis. It allows to assess the efficiency of a campaign/online strategy.
  => Maybe we should try to objectivise the efficiency of our actions in such a way. We do it but it could and should be more systematic: what were the most popular articles on the Parliament website this month? What worked on Facebook, what was the most retweeted? We need an analyst who does not work as an editor – and thus could be impartial. We could gather good practices and improve the efficiency of our coverage.
• TBWA advises to look for editorial partnerships rather than advertising campaigns. In 2014, the Parliament could write objective, neutral stories about the mandate and the upcoming elections and propose it to big newspapers. I know that journalists don't like it, but it seems newspapers do accept it for (obvious) economic reasons…

La Netscouade, web agency

Benoît Thieulin, CEO of this agency that is well-known for its involvement in the French presidential election campaign in 2007, shared his vision of the future of the web. A highly interesting speech from which I'd like to keep only the concrete points:

• The web is now coming back to more "intermédiation". In the last years, the trend was to try to communicate directly with citizens, but now people want to get some analysis. Hence the central role of journalists, bloggers etc. There is more space for indirect communication and we should not (only) aim at targeting citizens directly.

=> All our multimedia products (for example this one or this one) should clearly made available and customisable by internet users and journalists.

=> Our Facebook and Twitter content should be more "MEP-compatible" so that it can be re-used as much as possible.

• He also pointed out the "social television", i.e. the fact that people watch TV to get the news but comment at the same time on Twitter with their tablets.
  => This raise again the question of putting a twitter feed next to the plenary streaming to allow people to comment live.

Slate.fr, web newspaper

The editor in chief explained us how they explained complex issues in an easy, friendly and funny way. For example, for the scandal around French billionaire Ingrid Bettencourt, they put it in the form of a – fake – Facebook stream. It's really worth having a look!

=> Worth trying in order to explain the negotiations on the EU budget or the financial supervision package?

The Choucha refugee camp is run by the UNHCR. It hosted, when we went there, around 4,000 people. During the peak of the crisis, it had to give shelters to 20,000 refugees.

Well, in fact, it’s precisely because of the “Arab Spring” that I went there to get first-hand impressions. Democracy building is now a work in process in Tunisia and the changes brought a lot of challenges with them, not least with a sudden influx of immigrants fleeing the war in Libya. Tunisia shares 500km of borders with its neighbour and generously accepted all refugees, despite its own precarious situation.

No, I was not on holidays!

The reason why I went there is nonetheless not a personal one. An ad-hoc delegation of MEPs visited two refugee camps and met the Prime Minister and several other ministers in Tunis mid-July. This delegation was an interesting communication opportunity because it touched upon sensitive and “citizen-friendly” topics: immigration, humanitarian aid and the democratic changes in North Africa.

Hence it was decided to cover the delegation a bit more in-depth and live: a pilot project aiming at sending a Webcomm editor with the delegation was set up. I had the chance to be chosen, mainly because I was French-speaking, active in our social media activities and following quite closely the Arab revolutions. My responsibility was to underline the activities of MEPs outside Brussels, on the spot, giving a human touch and trying to make use of the possibilities of Twitter regarding live coverage and direct interactions.

A trip into distress and hopelessness

I was quite excited to leave for three days with a delegation and the reality was up to my expectations. From a personal point of view first: of course, we all see images from refugee camps on TV, we all know what happens in certain regions of the world, but it’s totally different to be on the spot, in the desert, talking to refugees whose biggest problem is, in the end, that they “lost hope”. It’s very different to sit in your sofa with a coke and some crisps, watching the news on TV, and to sit in a tent with humanitarian actors and refugees, with 43°C, in the middle of a sandstorm.

I was shocked by the living conditions in refugee camps and ashamed by the absence of reaction from the EU (this is not only a personal opinion, this is also what the whole delegation stated, asking for more resettlement). Reporting back about what I saw was a -small- consolation, but I couldn’t avoid thinking that the same evening, I could sleep in a good bed and fly back home a few days later, to find family, friends, a house, a job and, more important than everything else, dreams and projects for the weeks, months and years to come.

Communicating live on the spot, a track to follow

43°C, sandstorms every day... The hell for refugees. The Tunisian army takes care of the security of the camp since some riots led to several casualties in May.

From a professional point of view, the delegation was also a rich experience. Sharing three days, from 8AM to 11PM with MEPs allows you to develop a different relationship than the one you can have, for example, in a short interview. You’re not only facing a politician (i.e. a public figure), yourself being in an official position. You’re also facing the private person behind. Yes, our representatives are just human like you and me ;)

The communication project worked very well. It seems the Parliament’s followers on Twitter enjoyed the experience a lot. I tweeted about 170 times in the three days, sent live some 60 pictures taken on the spot with my iPhone. The followers got background information, quotes from MEPs, impressions… We also proposed to them to ask their questions to the MEPs. In the end, the feedback was very positive, from the point of view of the followers as well as from the one of MEPs.

One interpreter even came to me the third day (there was a crew of interpreters together with us), telling me that from the beginning he was quite shocked by my attitude, thinking I was taking pictures for myself and sending text messages to friends all the time! I’m afraid that he was not the only one to have this impression and some ministers could have got the same when we met in Tunis…

In conclusion, I think the experience was worth it and could be repeated regularly. The Parliament could identify a few interesting delegation to cover more in depth every year. Would you have some interest following it or would it be too much?

If you want to know a bit more about the delegation:

We published a Focus on the Parliament’s website

You can read all the tweets on the French Twitter feed Europarl_FR

You can have a look at the pictures taken on the spot

You can read the common statement made by the delegation

You can read the debates on Facebook with our fans (here or there) and read the chat with MEP Judith Sargentini

And you can have a look at the announcement Steve made on this blog in July!

Believe me, it's better in picture than in real life!

14 May, 13:55, in front of the Permanent representation of France in Brussels. Tens of people were queuing on the street to enter the room where French Prime Minister François Fillon was to give a speech to European civil servants.

I was also queueing, considering the fact that you can not see your Prime Minister in real life every day. I thought about a boycott because the invitation had only been sent to the French administrators working for the EU institutions, not to the assistants, giving the taste of a medieval society where privileges still exist. However, curiosity was a more powerful magnet…

Despite the fact that my name turned out not to be on the lists of invited people, I was able enter the building after chatting with the person responsible for the security. And then I had the great honour to wait 50 minutes in a crowded, burning hot room to see, in the end, an exhausted, even breathless man holding a 15 minutes speech.

I had the great honour to wait 50 minutes in a crowded, burning hot room to see, in the end, an exhausted, even breathless small man holding a 15 minutes speech.

The content of the speech was even more disappointing. François Fillon reminded us that we’re “representing France” within the European institutions… Of course, he meticulously chose his words so that he can not be accused of denying the “raison d’être” of European civil servants, i.e. independence and defence of the general European interest. But the tone of the speech was clear and Mr Fillon did not even mention the community aspects of European integration – as if the EU were a merely intergovernmental organization.

Finally, after the speech I shook hands with him – but it didn’t change the disappointing feeling I got from this meeting with my head of government. Let’s just hope this does not announce even more disappointing days for the European Union.

Have a look at the EP from the outside... We need it! (Pic from Gerlos @ http://bit.ly/heflyG)

You won’t believe me if I tell you that my last trip to China made me think about the EU and my job in the European Parliament. Indeed, China and EU do not have a lot in common, if we look at the culture, the political structure, the level of political engagement, the freedom of press etc. However, I had a strong experience there which made me think of what I sometimes – even if to a smaller extent – can experience here in Brussels.

I was in China for the wedding of Chinese friends. It was a good opportunity to travel around the country, mostly in the South, but at the end we came back to Beijing, where we spent two days, before taking the plane back to Brussels.

And it’s only when I landed in Europe that I heard that some – shy – demonstrations were cracked down by the police in Beijing. Nothing surprising, you will tell me, as everyone knows the censorship that takes place in China (I experienced it while working in China Radio International in the summer 2006…). However, it echoed something that happens everyday at work: when I open Le Monde every morning, the French newspaper I get in the office, I learn some new things that happened or are happening in the EU institutions and in the European Parliament…

Yes, I do believe in the power people outside the institution can have. They may need us but, for sure, we need them as well.

Not that I don’t know what happens in the house where I worked but being here on the spot does not necessarily mean that I can see and hear everything. Lost in the day-to-day workflow or in the mysteries of a big administration, I miss some major political debates and issues. Damn, it’s sometimes much better to be outside the institution to look into it, to understand it and… to be free to say what you want about it!

This is not a plea for freedom of expression in the EP, don’t misunderstand me. It’s just that we work here under particular constraints – those being neutrality, transparency, objectivity. And it’s good so but it can not replace opinion, criticism, well-documented journalism… Yes, being outside the Parliament allows YOU to communicate very efficiently about what we do, what we are and why we matter (or not).

Yes, I’m an insider, explaining the European Parliament from the inside. And yes, I do believe in the power people outside the institution can have. They may need us but, for sure, we need them as well.

Accidents do not always happen to others and they also do not always happen in your home country… Keep the 112 in mind! (hfb on Flickr http://bit.ly/eKcbaH)

Our job is in part to show citizens that what the EU does matters to them. Yes, we try to be “citizen-friendly”, even if sometimes we know we won’t convince everybody about what we write… But, on the 11 February, let me tell you about my experience of 112, the European emergency number.

11 February is the European day of the 112, the emergency number that works all over Europe. Because yes, accidents do not always happen to others and they also do not always happen in your home country…

I remember very well the first and only time I used this number. At that time, I was living in Lille, in the North of France. We went – with my girlfriend – to the Belgian Ardennes for New Year’s Eve. Some friend had rented a house for partying all the night. We enjoyed the party very much and slept on the spot. The next day, 1st of January, we drove back home in the evening. It was already dark on the highway, with fog. Suddenly, something black appeared in the car’s light just in front of us. No time to think, no time to react. We drove over what seemed to be a coat – I just had this quick thought that if it were a person, I could not have done anything to avoid driving on it. On the hard shoulder, a car, all lights off. It could have been there for a long time, but somehow you could tell immediately that this car had just crashed. It’s maybe because of all the pieces of the car that were lying on the road, or maybe because you get that awful feeling that something terrible happened.

Breathe deeply, take your cell phone and call… 112.

We stopped on the hard shoulder to call the emergency services. In this kind of situation, you don’t really react in a reflective and objective way. Too many things are going through your mind. Breathe deeply, take your cell phone and call… 112. That may be a detail, but this number automatically came into my mind because I saw an communication campaign a few days before. Otherwise, I won’t have known who to call: French emergency numbers are 18 and 15, but they do not work in Belgium (I still don’t know the emergency number in Belgium…).

So I called the emergency services that asked me to check more precisely what happened. Fortunately some other people were arriving on the spot, one guy went to see into the car and I passed the information to the doctors. To be honest, I’m grateful that I did not have to go to see inside the car that was half the length it was before the accident.

The rest is only a typical story of a fatal car accident in Belgium (I won’t go into the question of the quality of Belgian roads here, nor into the broader question of road safety… So many things could be said and criticized). But what I learnt is that, in some unexpected and stressful situation where lives may depend on the rapidity of your reaction, you’re quite happy that a European campaign like the one for the 112 came to your mind. So spread the word about this number, it could save lives when you’re abroad!

[The 112 is on Facebook as well!]

New Year, new start! prb10111 - awol on Flickr http://bit.ly/fkYkc2

1) I promise to take the time to do the things I should do in a correct way. Or, to be concrete: when tired or too busy, it happens that I don’t spend much time on the articles I write for the Parliament website. Not that I want to go home, but more because I’m interested in other things… like thinking about our Facebook strategy or looking for nice tweets. Quality matters, it’s an everyday challenge that should be reminded regularly.

2) I should learn to say “no”. I have tremendous difficulties to do so, therefore I have so many things to do that I don’t do them all properly – that’s also link to the first point. Narrower focus at work means better production and more satisfaction in the end.

3) I/we should stick more to the news when writing for the Parliament website. Of course, this is not something I can decide on my own. However, I can push for more reactivity in our agenda setting: usually, we write about something once the Parliament has debated or voted about it. This is logical but, unfortunately, it always happens a few weeks too late, when everyone’s attention is focussed on a new topic. Good communication is on-time communication, and there is space for improvement. Let’s try to change mentalities!

Good communication is on-time communication, and there is space for improvement.

4) Be more direct on Facebook. The best posts are often the most spontaneous ones. Sure, we can not post whatever we want, we have to find a “parliamentary angle”, we have to write proper English and we’d like to stay creative. However, when something is in the news, we should put it on Facebook as soon as possible and in a very direct way so that people react spontaneously. With the last rise of fans, we saw new people on our page who aren’t necessarily very informed about Europe. Let’s give them the opportunity to join the debate and let’s avoid making them tired too quickly…

5) Last but not least, I should be more creative, on the Parliament’s website as well as on other social media (Facebook, Twitter). It’s so easy to become stuck in a rut and produce what we’re asked to produce as civil servants… I’m better in managing a project, meeting deadlines or organizing things than in thinking “out of the box”. It needs time and a certain disorder, as Jean Monnet mentioned in his Mémoires. Let’s try to go a bit against my character!

For those who would like to check whether I stick to these resolutions or not, you can read the Parliament’s website in French, our Facebook page and the French Twitter feed… I’d be happy to have some feedback!

Silent sitting - Is that what our Facebook fans did to protest? But against what? (On Flickr @ http://bit.ly/9FyjLh)

All European countries have to cut budgets and reform the pension schemes, so the strikes and demonstrations are quite normal. After all, it’s part of the political process and in our institution, we have to take it into account – and feel it ourselves too. When strikes are foreseen in France, the first sector to be affected is transport. On Monday, no trains ran in Belgium and French trains were very few as well. Some flights were cancelled. So a lot of colleagues had to take the car to go to Strasbourg… where public transports were also affected by some demonstrations in the city centre in the course of week.

Nothing but normal, you may think. And I agree.

But what surprised me more during this week was the strike on our Facebook page. Not a strike by Facebook itself, no, but by our Facebook community. It started last week. We desperately tried to provoke discussions, open debates… And we didn’t get a lot of feedback: 10, 20 comments, sometimes up to 40. We tried to find out why, we had a crisis meeting in the middle of the week to look for a new tone, new and sexy topics. There was nothing to do; the discussions didn’t really take off, apart from some provocations, criticisms and complaints (always by the same people). Sadly, this was a strike without any claim. A silent strike, actually.

This was a strike without any claim. A silent strike, actually.

Was it better this week? Yes, a bit, but not how we expected it. We didn’t reach 200 interactions for one single post so far, despite it’s a plenary week with a lot of interesting stuff: visit of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, vote on the extension of minimum maternity leave to 20 weeks, Sakharov Prize for freedom of thought…

Do I have an explanation for that? Not really, and I’d like to have some feedback from you. The only explanation I have is that we got used to a high level of interactions. September was a very good month. Our Facebook community was incredibly active and the quality of the debates was very good. It’s then difficult to come back to normal…

Do I have too high expectations now? Well, that’s also a good motivation to move forward, after all…

This Monday, the French newspaper Le Monde wrote a dossier about Facebook. “Is it the dream of an interconnected world of 500 million ‘friends’ that comes true? Or is it the birth of a controlling superpower much more frightening than the one from George Orwell in 1984?” Good questions, indeed, even if in the end, the journalist only seems to consider the worrying aspects and not the opportunies.

Big Brother is watching you - by thefoxling on Flickr

Am I going to start a plea in favour of Facebook? Not really. I’m also concerned by privacy considerations. To be honest, I was quite sceptical about Facebook before working for the European Parliament. I had no profile and didn’t want to have one. I changed my mind when I was told I’ll have to manage the Parliament Facebook page… I entered the FB world as a private person at the same time I started considering it for professional purposes.

Mark Zuckerberg was the youngest billionaire ever in the world. He refused a proposal of 1.5 billion dollars for buying Facebook when he was 22. Now, Facebook is worth 40 billion dollars and that could rise up to 100 billion in 2015. Am I going to earn a lot of money while working on Facebook for the European Parliament? After all, I’m just two and a half months younger than Mark…

But despite the article in Le Monde, I don’t think Facebook is – only – about money. Of course, as a huge business, it’s also about money. But if you look at what people do with Facebook, then you can see some reasons of hope.

#pdfeu showed some good practices. The British Foreign office uses social media to connect 16 000 civil servants around the world and give information to citizens like travel advice. Some citizens try to connect refugees with their families and friends.Some others try to raise awareness about violation of LGBT rights in the world. Civil society organizations like Avaaz, GetUp or MoveOn are also on Facebook to defend and publicize their projects. Facebook can’t then be reduced to a tool designed for and used by single users; it’s also a great platform to organize social movement and – let’s use the world – democracy. The European Parliament tries to find its very own place in the Facebook galaxy, providing a discussion forum on European matters and fostering debate among citizens and between citizens and their representatives.

The European Parliament tries to find its very own place in the Facebook galaxy, providing a discussion forum on European matters.

That’s exactly these opportunities that are totally absent of Le Monde’s dossier. Of course, Facebook will never replace social interactions in the real world, it will never replace the physical act democracy requires – the vote. But nowadays, the concept of democracy is much broader than it was, say, 10 or 20 years ago. The social networks occupy an empty space in the political landscape.

Maybe the problem is that speaking about democracy is not as sexy as worrying about Big Brother… Let’s hope journalists will try to put both aspects together next time to give a more accurate image of what social media are.

I don’t think people will join in a total virtual game which requires a real commitment.

The new game launched by the Schuman foundation allows you to choose your nationality, your political group and the parliamentary committee you’d like to belong to. You’re then an MEP and it’s up to you to organize yourself, to network, to take initiatives… Different forums make it possible to debate with the member of your political group or your committee. You can submit draft resolutions, ask questions to the Commission, submit complaints to the European Ombudsman… From time to time, you’re asked to vote on a resolution.

I would have like to enter this kind of world while taking part in an online game on politics!

This morning, I was for example asked to vote on an EU-Ukraine agreement. I checked what my political family said to this, what was also said in the committee… And I cast my vote. We’ll see what will happen.

The principle of the game is really good and very similar to reality. In fact, it leaves a lot of place for initiatives for the “virtual MEPs”. You’re really at the centre of the process. Unfortunately, you also need a lot of time to join in and really enjoy the game. As an actor, you can’t just wait for the others to move forward.

Hence my question: has this game been designed for “normal citizens” or is it for EU geeks? The concept of helping people understand the EU through online games is a very good one (there will even be an award to the best player: a week-end in the European city of his/her choice). Nevertheless, I don’t think people will have the time and the will to join in a total virtual game which requires a real commitment! The target group of such a game is probably limited to Euro enthusiastic people. And if you have the time and will to be political active, you will probably prefer to do it in real life…

However, I can recommend you to log in, join the game and make your own opinion. It is a good idea, honestly. It had only needed to be a bit more graphical, a bit more sexy. For the next legislature perhaps?