FW: World Bank, Bolivian Water Privatization and Martial Law

[sawicky@xxxxxxxxxx (Max Sawicky)]

>From those evil nationalist inside the Beltway
critics of free trade.

mbs


++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
global economy network
Campaign for America's Future
http://www.ourfuture.org
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

April 14, 2000

Attached below is a media backgrounder on the struggle and government
violence in Bolivia surrounding privatization of the public water system.
Last year World Bank economists told Bolivia that "no public subsidies"
should be allowed to keep water rates affordable.  When the Bolivian
government tried to privatize the water system in response by selling it
to the Bechtel corporation, massive protests began and the government
declared the equivalent of martial law on April 8.  You can learn more
about the Bolivian protests on the web at http://www.americas.org.

Also attached is a bio of Oscar Olivera, a Bolivian labor leader who is
the most prominent protest leader.  Olivera will be present at this
weekend's IMF-World Bank protests in Washington, DC and he will remain in
the US next week.  Please feel free to forward this information to
interested journalists or organizations.  If any journalists would like to
meet with Olivera please call Tom Matzzie at 202-251-8545 (cell phone) or
202-490-7009 (pager).  Olivera is also interested in meeting with labor
leaders, citizen activists and others.

=============================================
=============================================
MEDIA BACKGROUNDER

HOW BOLIVIANS TOOK THEIR WATER
BACK FROM THE BECHTEL CORPORATION

(Additional information and press-available photos posted at
http://www.americas.org)


Cochabamba, Bolivia

As thousands converge on Washington this week to protest the abuses of
economic globalization, from Bolivia comes the story of a corporate giant
being chased out by a popular uprising.  On Monday, following a week of
massive public protests that nearly brought this country of 7 million to a
standstill, the Bolivian government declared null and void the agreement
it signed last year selling the water system of its third largest city to
a subsidiary of the Bechtel Corporation.

	Like many poor countries, Bolivia is under heavy pressure by the World
Bank to sell its public enterprises to international investors, like
Bechtel.  In a closed door process rife with corruption, Bolivia has sold
off one public enterprise after another - the airline, electric utilities,
the national train service and finally the public water system for a city
with more than a half million people.

Price Hikes of More Than Double on the Poorest

	In January, just as the company posted its new logo over the door, it hit
local water users with rate hikes of double and more.  In a country where
the minimum wage is less that $100 per month, the poorest families were
being told to pay water bills of $20 and up.  Tanya Paredes, a mother of
five who supports her family knitting baby clothes, saw her water bill
leap by $15.  For the World Bank economists who told Bolivia last year
that, "no public subsidies" should be allowed to keep water rates
affordable, that's a light dinner in a Georgetown bistro.  For Paredes it
is food for her family for a week and a half.

Public outrage against the rate increases was huge and swift.  A
mid-January general strike and transportation stoppage, demanding reversal
of the rate hikes, brought the city to a total standstill for four days.
The government of President Hugo Banzer (who ruled Bolivia as a dictator
through much of the 1970s) promised that rates would be rolled back.  When
those promises evaporated, protest leaders organized a peaceful march on
the city's central plaza.  Banzer responded with police, tear gas and
rubber bullets, leaving more than left more than 175 injured and two
youths blinded.

The government then agreed to a temporary rate rollback and further
negotiations.  Water rights leaders and local economists began
scrutinizing the Bechtel contract, raising serious questions about the
numbers.  A leading daily newspaper reported that investors had put up
less than $20,000 of up-front capital for a water system worth millions.
In March, water rights leaders surveyed more than 60,000 local residents,
with more than 90% saying that the government should break the contract
and that Bechtel's affiliate should go.

"The Last Battle"

When the Tuesday April 4th deadline arrived for breaking the contract
arrived, the government and the water company refused to budge.  Once
again, Cochabamba ground to a halt, the streets empty of cars, the
schools, stores and businesses all closed.  Two days later, when protest
leaders sat down with top officials and civic leaders to negotiate, police
stormed the meeting and put the water rights leaders in jail.  "We were
talking with the Mayor, the Governor, and other civil leaders when the
police came in and arrested us," says Oscar Olivera, the protest's most
visible leader.  "It was a trap by the government to have us all together,
negotiating, so that we could be arrested."

Released the next morning, protest leaders cautiously agreed to another
negotiating session Friday afternoon.  As thousands of angry people
gathered in the city's plaza, many armed with sticks and rocks, the
government failed to show and rumors spread that army units were preparing
to enter the city.  Suddenly the Archbishop received a call from the
Governor with news that the Bechtel contract would be broken, an
announcement made to enormous cheers from a third floor balcony.  The
thousands gathered below and the whole city began an enormous victory
celebration, one that did not last long.

Within hours government officials were saying that the water company's
departure was not confirmed.  The company issued an announcement that it
wasn't leaving.  At midnight the Governor went on TV, resigned, and in
tears declared that he did not want to be responsible for the "bloodbath"
many saw coming.  Throughout Friday night the homes of the protest leaders
and their families were invaded by police, with half the leadership
arrested and flown to a remote jail in the Bolivian jungle. On Saturday
morning Bolivia awoke to news that President Banzer was declaring a "state
of emergency", equivalent to martial law.   Throughout the morning radio
news reporters warned that police and military were entering their studios
as their broadcasts went dead.   Power was cutoff to the area of the city
where broadcast antennas are located.

>From hiding, the water rights leaders that remained free repeated their
demand for Bechtel's departure.  Thousands of farmers and their families,
waging a parallel campaign over control of rural water systems, began
walking to the city from as far away as 70 miles.  Military units called
out to enforce Banzer's orders fired not only tear gas but bullets.  At
least two were killed, and more than 100 injured, just in Cochabamba,
including a 17 year old boy killed by a shot in the face.  Still,
Bechtel's affiliate refused to go, its leaders hanging up on reporters who
tried to reach them.  Olivera issued a statement saying that the
bloodshed, "now had the fingerprints of Bechtel."

Victory!

On Monday, April 10, with Cochabamba's shut down in its 7th day, thousands
of people continued to crowd the central plaza and also fortify the
highway blockades cutting off access in and out of the city.  Women went
door to door gathering food to cook for the protesters.  As the sun set
news reports broke the story of that the government had signed an
agreement, declaring that Bechtel's representatives had fled the country
and had therefore broken the contract.  Members of the Bolivian Congress
flew to an emergency session in La Paz to ratify the changes in the rural
water law demanded by the people from the countryside.

As the people of Cochabamba awoke last Tuesday morning, life was beginning
to come back to normal, with mini-buses running up and down the city's
hillsides and people running to catch them to make their way to work.
Yet, as movement leader Olivera says, "We do not live in the same
Cochabamba that we did three months ago, the people are together, they are
mobilized.  As people in the US gather in Washington, they have a new and
powerful model to look at, globalism without rules being challenged and
beaten from the bottom up.


==============================
==============================
OSCAR OLIVERA

A Leader of the Bolivia Water Protests

Oscar Olivera is head of the Cochabamba Federation of Factory Workers. A
45-year-old machinist, he says he did not expect to become a national
voice against multinational institutions and corporations, but the
protests against water-price hikes by the privatized company Aguas del
Turani made him a national figure.

Olivera was forced into hiding, escaping detention hours before President
Hugo Banzer imposed a state of emergency and rounded up protest leaders.
After four days of hopping between safe houses, Olivera emerged Wednesday
after verbal assurances we would not be arrested. He traveled Thursday to
La Paz to seek a visa to participate in the march in Washington.

The Cochabamba union leader was a member of the "coordinadora," the
citizen body that was negotiating with the government and private company
and Olivera quickly became the voice of the people.  "I think that when
the economy is globalized, it is important to globalize the fight for the
people," he told the international press while seeking his visa to march
in Washington.



The global economy network is a project of the Campaign for America's
Future.  America's Future is on the web at http://www.ourfuture.org.

To unsubscribe send an email to Tom Matzzie at the Campaign for America's
Future <matzzie@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>.