In an article entitled, Taking Back the Power: The Real War on Terror, (July CP), I make the statement that, "In Bolivia, Bechtel's takeover of that country's once publicly-owned water works has brought the country to its knees..." The statement is misleading. I neglected to specify that this incident occurred in Cochabamba, Bolivia's third-largest city and more importantly still, that Bechtel was forced to withdraw from Cochabamba due to a popular citizen uprising. This omission is especially glaring in light of the article's premise - that when citizens take action and responsibility, they can "take back the power" from corporations.
In the late 1990s, the World Bank conditioned debt relief and other assistance to Bolivia on that country's agreement to privatize the public water system of Cochabamba. In 1999 the California-based Bechtel was granted a 40-year lease to take over Cochabamba's water through its subsidiary, Aguas del Tunari. In January 2000, only months after the takeover, Aguas del Tunari hit citizens with enormous price increases. The ensuing popular uprising was violently repressed by government troops, leaving a 17 year old boy dead and over a hundred injured. Bechtel was eventually forced to leave Cochabamba due to relentless public pressure and citizen dissent.
Jim Schultz of The Democracy Center in Cochabamba, with whom I conducted an interview during the "water wars" in 2000, describes the sequence of events there: "...Hundreds of people worldwide sent emails to the corporation's CEO demanding that the company leave. It was also becoming clear that the people of Cochabamba would not back down. Bechtel's officials fled the country, the water contract was canceled and a new, publicly controlled water company was installed. Cochabamba's water revolt became an international symbol of popular resistance to global economic rules imposed from above..."
In November 2001, Bechtel filed a $25 million legal action against the Bolivian people-an amount roughly equal to the cost of hiring 12,000 public school teachers. The "request for arbitration" filed with the little-known International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), an arm of the World Bank, seeks compensation for the Bechtel's "lost opportunity to make future profits" In August of 2002, more than 300 citizen groups from 41 different countries filed an International Citizens Petition with the World Bank, demanding that the doors of its secret trade court be opened to public scrutiny and participation. As of mid-March 2005, the ICSID case is pending.
Privatization of water and other natural resources has become an alarming global trend. A strong case can be made that in the not-so-distant future, the oil wars of today will be replaced by water wars. These battles have already begun in the developing world.
Sandy Leon Vest is a Renewable Energy Advocate