http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/Letter-from-Lisbon-Lessons-for-Goa/articleshow/38502391.cms
The news from Portugal is full of doom-and-gloom on its foundering economy, but you would not know it from walking the streets of Lisbon. Of course, data doesn't lie: Portugal's debt is more than 125% of its GDP, and unemployment is more than 15%. While the country recently exited its unpopular international financial bailout (assembled by the European Union and International Monetary Fund) and officially emerged from recession last year, the fact is educated young Portuguese feel compelled to leave the country at the rate of one every five minutes, almost 1,30,000 last year alone. But the eye doesn't lie either: Lisbon visibly buzzes with terrific, youthful energy and gleams like never before with a huge number of new restaurants, charming multipurpose kiosks, ambitious boutique hotels and restaurants, and a wide range of new museums and other tourist attractions built by both private and public sectors, often working in collaboration. It is the safest capital in Europe, and one of the cleanest and greenest in the world, featuring a welcoming, broad-minded cultural openness that is a model for every country. None of this is by accident, and much is the direct result of policy decisions made by the popular three-term mayor, Antonio Costa (the son of anti-colonial Goan writer, Orlando Costa). The former minister, and vice-president of the European parliament, has engineered a dramatic turnaround in Lisbon since first being elected mayor in 2007. Now he is favoured to take over his party, and win the post of prime minister in the 2015 national polls. Earlier this week in his office in the magnificent, rococo Sitio da Camara (City Hall), Costa laid out elements of his strategy for Lisbon that have wound up paying such dividends, even during a national recession. "We recognized that we had to increase the visibility of the city in this time of crisis," Costa said, "So we devoted a lot of attention to the public spaces, to renew areas that were decaying, to bring in as much new energy as we could." The mayor sought to counteract brain drain, and focused on the city's universities. Now Lisbon is full of young people from around the world—especially other European countries from where student enrollment has doubled—who take advantage of reasonably-priced, multilingual, international-standard higher education. This is an ideal strategy for Goa—and Goa University is doing a creditable job under vice chancellor Satish Shetye—but all the other institutions in the state could also be profitably ramped up to compete. To improve quality of life so that all these new students will stay on, and also to attract tourists, Lisbon focuses on cleanliness and the environment. It is remarkably garbage-free, and the once-seedy Tagus riverfront has been wonderfully upgraded with scenic walking and bicycle lanes, and broad promenades lined with new restaurants and nightclubs. The river itself has been cleaned up to such an extent that dolphins have returned to the city after decades, and recreational fishermen are ubiquitous again. Meanwhile Goa has gone in the exact opposite direction, with garbage accumulating everywhere. The main reservoir might be critically contaminated with manganese, but officialdom favours polluters over those who drink its water supply. Unlike the Tagus, the Mandovi dolphins are being actively driven away by law-violating casinos, and astonishingly high levels of fecal contamination that make the river dangerous for even humans to swim in. Rather than acknowledge and fix, Goa's government denies the obvious. Antonio Costa boosted Lisbon's economy by actively developing a hub for budget airlines like RyanAir and EasyJet. This option is on a platter for Goa from Air Asia's Tony Fernandes (whose father was also a Goan) but there are clear, ominous signs that it is another opportunity that is going to be squandered by a state leadership that talks new investment and new jobs, but seems actually interested in the same old land grabs, scam "infrastructure-building", and greedy, corrupt nexuses that have destroyed so much of India's potential. We can see that it does not have to be this way, that there are alternatives. If the Goan mayor of Lisbon can achieve as much as he has in a time of dismal recession and cutbacks, and a national economic collapse, surely the 21st century Goan leadership can manage at least as much in a state that has every advantage, in a time of historic opportunity for state and country. History will judge whether this generation of government lived up to its challenges and opportunities. For now, in Goa unlike Lisboa, it is not looking good. (The writer is a widely published author and photographer.) -- #2, Second Floor, Navelkar Trade Centre, Panjim, Goa Cellphone 9326140754 Office (0832) 242 0785