Roy's Blog - Time for change at ISF

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Posted by: Roy Stemman	6/7/2008 4:31 AM
The International Spiritualist Federation (ISF) has a make-or-break opportunity this week to put right some of the wrong decisions it has made in the past year or two, when its Executive Committee holds its Biennial General Meetings (10-11 June) during its week-long Congress in Eastbourne, UK. If it is to regain the confidence of many of its members and reassure the rest of the Spiritualist movement that it has the collective wisdom to continue running an organisation that has flourished for over 60 years, the Executive Committee must: Take away the life membership of its disgraced former president, Mervyn Johnson, who is currently serving a prison sentence in Sweden for child rape and other offences and Change the venue for its 2009 Convention Week from Sweden to another country If it chooses not to do so, then it must: Resign and allow new blood to take the helm and guide the federation away from the perilous waters for which it is currently heading Since I first reported that Mervyn Johnson (real name Wright) was facing very serious charges – which subsequently led to his imprisonment – I have received many complaints from ISF members who cannot understand why the Council has not thrown Johnson out of the federation and why it has decided to hold next year’s Convention Week in Sweden “as a show of support for some of our members there”. The problem is that this demonstration of support appears not to be for the victims of his actions but for those individuals who tried to defend Johnson during his trial. Among those who have expressed their disbelief to me that the ISF Executive Committee could behave in such a cavalier way are Mia Ottosson, Mervyn Johnson’s ex-wife; a young woman who was one of Johnson’s victims; and the Board of Karlstads Spiritualistiska Förening Oceanen (KSF Oceanen), which expelled Johnson on 1st June 2006 and has since withdrawn its affiliation to the federation. It apparently notified the ISF of Johnson’s expulsion and the reasons for it, yet he was appointed the federation’s president a month later. Garth Willey resigned as vice president of the ISF earlier this year, for similar reasons, and the Spiritualist body is even being described on some Internet forums as an organisation that supports paedophiles. Now is the time for action. The ISF Executive Committee must correct its mistakes or resign and let others, with greater wisdom, take over at the top.

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