RETURN TO THE BOLIVIA LENS AT AMERICAS.ORG
FEBRUARY-MAY, 2000
Globalization and War for Water in
Bolivia
Published by Jim Shultz, jshultz@albatros.cnb.net,
and Tom Kruse, tkruse@albatros.cnb.net,
in Cochabamba, Bolivia
Introduction
In the era of globalization, transnational corporations scour the
globe looking for opportunities for profit, putting people’s
livelihoods and the environment at risk, and severely undermining rights
and substantive democracy. However, this process is not inevitable;
successful resistance is possible.
Cochabamba, Bolivia, has recently become a dramatic example of both
the arrogance of international capital, and the potential for
substantial and successful resistance. Since late 1999, Cochabamba--both
the city and rural areas--have been the sites of a fierce battle to
regain control over a key resource: water.
The struggle turned on two things: privatization of the city water
system, and regulatory legislation that eroded local control over water
resources. The privatization was demanded by the World Bank, and
undertaken behind people’s backs in a very irregular fashion. Water
rates soared, and the city residents fought back. At the same time,
regulatory legislation threatened to severely erode local control over
water, and rural and indigenous people fought back. After 15 years of
neo-liberal rule, a combination of eroding living conditions and loss of
sovereignty and day to day humiliation, this was the “straw that broke
the camel’s back.”
Together this coalition--called the Coordinator for the Defense of
Water and Life, or la Coordinadora--scored an important victory over the
forces of neo-liberal globalization. The privatization has been
reversed, and the legislation is being amended. This may be the first
time in recent history that a spontaneous coalition of workers,
environmentalists, artisans, peasants, market vendors, water district
members, neighborhood organizations, local governments, and countless
others have come together to put a break on globalization.
The cost has been very high: at least 1 dead in Cochabamba, over 50
wounded, many are still missing, and lived under a state of emergency
that lasted until April 19th.
On this site you will find articles in English, Spanish, images
and solidarity statements on this remarkable process.
Bolivia Water War 1
A WAR OVER WATER
February 4, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: “The Democracy Center On-Line” 2/4/00
Syndicated, Pacific News Service 2/8/00
Summary: An on the scene report from the February 4-5 protest in
which the government of President Hugo Banzer sent police in the streets
to block a peaceful march against water rate hikes.
I’ve decided that the term “tear gas” doesn’t quite capture
the real experience involved. Even from close to a block away the white
smoke pouring from the canister causes severe burning to your eyes and
throat and immediately empties your nose of whatever snot you’ve
accumulated for months. At ground zero the gas makes you vomit and
nearly lose consciousness. Sometimes the canister projectiles hit people
and split their heads open. Fortunately, this morning I found myself
suffering from just the burning eyes and running nose class of symptoms.
This morning tear gas was the Bolivian government’s official response
to a huge popular revolt here, over something very basic: water. At this
writing, local news stations report one person dead (from a tear gas
canister to the head) and at least thirty five hospitalized.
WHEN WATER BECOMES A VEHICLE FOR PROFIT
In recent years “privatization” has become an economic theology
in Latin America, driven by a set of commandments written by the U.S.,
and the U.S.-dominated lenders, the Wold Bank and International Monetary
Fund. The commandments are simple. Thou shalt sell your public
enterprises to private corporations and investors, almost always from
abroad. Thou shalt allow those new owners to do what they will with
prices, wages and products. In exchange, supposedly, those businesses
will receive a fresh transfusion of foreign capital (and the IMF and
World Bank won’t cut off your international loans). Bolivia’s most
recent governments have been very obedient to these foreign
commandments, selling off everything from the national airline to the
electricity system.
But then there was water. Last year the Bolivian government sold off
Cochabamba’s public water system to a pool of British-led investors
who promised to pour millions of new dollars into expansion and
improvement. Last month the owners raised up their new signs (“Aguas
de Tunari”) on all their facilities and also raised up something else:
water prices, in many cases by more than double. Our own water bill, for
example, leapt from $12 per month in December to nearly $30 in January.
Similar increases hit almost everyone we know. By U.S. standards that
may not be much, but for the many Bolivian families who often earn as
little as $100 per month, these increases were catastrophic.
Cochabambinos, who had paid scant attention to the deal when it was
being worked out behind closed doors, were sent into shock and into
action.
In mid-January a four day “paro civico” (general strike) over the
water price hikes left the city at a total standstill - no cars, no
buses, no air flights or bus transport in or out of the city. It was the
kind of action that can only happen with broad popular support and it
culminated in a mass march to the city’s central plaza as thousands of
angry water users, urban and rural, gathered and chanted just outside
the windows of the government offices where protest leaders and
officials were negotiating. Some of those in the talks were reportedly
worried that the crowd might break down the door if they didn’t emerge
with some acceptable agreement. In the end what they agreed to was time,
to talk more.
A PEACEFUL MARCH MET BY RIOT POLICE
Today was the deadline for those talks, to be marked by a peaceful
mass march once again to the city’s center. Last night the Bolivian
government issued its response, sending more than 1,000 army and police
in from outside Cochabamba and declaring the march banned and illegal,
an especially loaded act from a President, Hugo Banzer, who in the 1970s
had ruled for 7 years as an unelected dictator, Bolivia’s companion to
Augusto Pinochet. One of the protest’s organizers, labor leader Oscar
Olivera, publicly declared that the government’s response was, “an
expression of fascism that reflects a total incapacity of the government
to have a dialogue.” The government officially retorted that the
marchers were just fringe troublemakers, not representative of the
people of Cochabamba, and that the water increases had really been
minor. Officials also asserted that the show of force was aimed at
protecting “the public”, an odd claim since it is the public which
is marching.
This morning thousands of protesters marched toward the police lines.
In the crowd I saw young and old, the poor and the middle class. They
included a friend who works as an accountant at the local university and
another who is a Catholic priest in his 70s, who walks slowly, even away
from exploding tear gas. Many were people from rural towns who walked
here on foot from ten miles and more away, despite government roadblocks
aimed at keeping them out. Anyone dismissing this as a crowd of
unrepresentative rabble rousers wasn’t paying very close attention.
The protesters were eloquent as reporters made their way through the
gas clouds seeking interviews. “We’ve returned to the 70’s, to the
dictatorship,” said one man choking from the gas. “If they don’t
want to serve the people why do they want to be in the government?”
asked a caller to a radio program. Live TV newscasts showed an unarmed
man being beaten by soldiers with a club and a long rubber whip. The
national government official in charge was also interviewed. “We are
not affected,” he said of the protests.
JUST OBEYING ORDERS
During a calm in the conflict I spoke to some of the young riot
police sent in from the Capital, La Paz, armed with canisters, gas
masks, shields and rifles. “I just follow orders,” explained Angelo,
a 24 year old wearing a full outfit of anti-riot gear. Local police
might have seen their own mothers or aunts in the protest crowds and may
have been less obedient.
“ If you were ordered to kill me right now, you would kill me?”
“Claro [for sure]”.
“Don’t people here have a right to protest having the price
of their water doubled.”
“Yes, we all have rights…I’m following orders.”
The question in Cochabamba this week is who, in reality, is
initiating those orders. Is it a police captain sent here from out of
town. Is it President Banzer? Or are those orders merely the natural
consequence of an economic theology, developed from afar and run amok
here, enough to send even old men and women into the streets facing tear
gas and bullets just to keep having water they can afford?
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 2
IN THE ANDES - ECHOS OF SEATTLE
March 23, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: In These Times, 4/17/00 (edited version)
Summary: A March update and summary of events in Cochabamba
including interviews with protest leaders and a look at the role of the
World Bank.
Cochabamba, Bolivia: Two months after huge street protests broke up
the meeting of the World Trade Organization in Seattle, the grassroots
rebellion over the rules of economic globalization erupted in the
streets again here in this city of half a million high in the Andes.
This time the globalization battle was over something very simple, the
price of water.
In 1999, under direct pressure from the World Bank, the Bolivian
government sold off Cochabamba’s public water system to a consortium
of British-led investors. In January, the new owners handed local water
users their monthly bills, emblazoned with a spanking new corporate logo
and hikes in water rates that for many families were more than double.
In a country where the minimum wage is less than $100 per month, many
users were hit with water bills of $20 and higher.
The new water company (Aguas Del Tunari) and its government allies
may have thought the residents of this valley city would take the
increases calmly. They thought wrong. In mid-January, led by a
newly-glued together alliance of labor, human rights and community
leaders, Cochabamba residents shut down their city for four straight
days with a general strike. All transportation came to a halt, roads
were blockaded, no buses were allowed in or out of town, and the
government was forced to the negotiating table, agreeing to a price
rollback and a two week deadline to work out the details.
Bolivian Troops And US Tear Gas
Soon after, however, it became clear that the government’s promises
were vanishing into thin air. Movement leaders announced plans for a
massive but peaceful march to the city’s Central Plaza on February
4th. Bolivia’s President, Hugo Banzer, who ruled the country as a
dictator from 1971-78 (a neighbor and close ally of Augusto Pinochet),
responded by bringing in more than 1,000 police and soldiers from
outside the city and imposing a military takeover of Cochabamba’s
center. For two days, while popular leaders and government officials
held tense negotiations, police showered tear gas and rubber bullets on
rock-wielding protesters, men and women, young and old, poor and middle
class. More than 175 protesters were injured and two youths blinded.
Almost all the tear gas used was manufactured in the U.S. and Embassy
officials here acknowledge that the US has donated gas here before to
use against protesters. Asked for this article if US-donated gas was
used against the water protesters, the Embassy responded with a
waffling, “to the best of our knowledge” no US-donated gas was used.
“Taking Everything And Turning It Willy-Nilly Into A Commodity”
The privatization of water is just the latest in a decade-long series
of sales of Bolivian public enterprises to international private
investors, the airline, the train system, the electric utility, as
government officials carefully toe the neoliberal line that “private
is better”. While the promises have been about an infusion of new
investment, the more obvious results have been a weakening of labor
standards, increases in prices, and reductions in services (the train
service is gone altogether).
Privatizing Cochabamba’s water was a major item in the World Bank’s
June 1999 country report for Bolivia, which specifically called for “no
public subsidies” to hold down water price hikes. Poor countries like
Bolivia only reject World Bank advice at the peril of being cutoff from
international assistance. In a process with just one bidder, local press
reports calculated that investors put up less than $20,000 of up-front
capital for a water system worth millions.
The question of privatization is a complicated one, a good idea
in some cases, a bad one in others. Yet, for the World Bank and other
international funders, privatization is less an analysis than a
theology, one that US researcher Thomas Kruse explains, “takes
everything and turns it willy-nilly into a commodity.” Here in
Cochabamba, says Kruse, “Water was the straw that broke the camel’s
back.”
Water or Food?
Tanya Paredes is a mother of five who supports her family as a
clothes knitter. Her water bill went up in January from $5 per month to
nearly $20, an increase equal to what it costs her to feed her family
for a week and a half. “What we pay for water comes out of what we
have to pay for food, clothes and the other things we need to buy for
our children,” she explains. It is worth noting that well-paid World
Bank economists in Washington will now pay less for water than Paredes,
about $17 per month, what they might spend on one dinner in a Georgetown
bistro.
Price hikes like these made support for the protests wide spread. “Everyone
took a role,” says Oscar Olivera, the Cochabamba labor leader who has
become the protests most visible leader. “Youth were on the front
lines, the elderly made roadblocks.” When protest leaders called on
the radio for a citywide transportation stoppage in response to the
police takeover downtown crackdown, little old women with bent spines
were out in the streets within minutes, building blockades with branches
and rocks.
The February uprisings forced government officials to promises a full
rate rollback and a review of the water company contract, a pact that
movement leaders want annulled entirely. “We’re questioning that
others, the World Bank, international business, should be deciding these
basic issues for us,” says Olivera. “For us, that is democracy.”
If the latest government promises also vanish into thin air more strikes
and protests are certain to follow.
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 3
BOLIVIAN PROTESTERS WIN WAR OVER WATER
April 7, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: San Jose Mercury, 4/8/00
Summary: An article written just after protest leaders climbed to
their third floor balcony and declared victory to thousands of cheering
supporters, the victory reversed by the government just a few hours
later with a declaration of a “state of siege”.
In a stunning concession to four days of massive public uprisings,
the Bolivian government announced late Friday afternoon that it was
breaking the contract it signed last year that sold the region's water
system to a consortium of British-led investors.
A general strike and road blockades that began Tuesday morning in
Cochabamba shut down the city of half a million, leaving the usually
crowded streets virtually empty of cars and closing schools, businesses
and the city's 25-square-block marketplace, one of Latin America's
largest.
The government's surprise agreement to reverse the water
privatization deal follows four months of public protest. It came just
as it appeared that President Hugo Banzer Suárez was preparing to
declare martial law, possibly triggering fighting in the streets between
riot police and the thousands of angry protesters who seized control of
the city's central plaza.
Greater meaning
While rumors are surfacing that the government might backtrack on
their promise, for Bolivians the popular victory apparently won over
water has much wider meaning. ``We're questioning that others, the World
Bank, international business, should be deciding these basic issues for
us,'' said protest leader Oscar Olivera. ``For us, that is democracy.''
The selling-off of public enterprises to foreign investors has been a
heated economic debate in Bolivia for a decade, as one major business
after another -- the airline, the train system, electric utilities --
has been sold into private (almost always foreign) hands. Last year's
one-bidder sale of Cochabamba's public water system, a move pushed on
government officials by the World Bank, the international lending
institution, brought the privatization fight to a boil.
In January, as the new owners erected their shiny new ``Aguas del
Tunari'' logo over local water facilities, the company also slapped
local water users with rate increases that were as much as double. In a
city where the minimum wage is less than $100 per month, many families
were hit with increases of $20 per month and more.
Tanya Paredes, a mother of five who supports her family as a
clothes-knitter, says her increase, $15 per month, was equal to what it
costs to feed her family for 1 1/2 weeks. ``What we pay for water comes
out of what we have to pay for food, clothes and the other things we
need to buy for our children,'' she said.
Public anger over the rate increases, led by a new alliance, known
here as ``La Coordinadora,'' exploded in mid-January with a four-day
shutdown of the city, stunning the government and forcing an agreement
to reverse the rate increases.
In early February, when the promises never materialized, La
Coordinadora called for a peaceful march on the city's central plaza.
Banzer (who previously ruled as a dictator from 1971-78) met the
protesters with more than 1,000 police and an armed takeover of La
Cochabamba's center. Two days of police tear gas and rock-throwing by
marchers left more than 175 protesters injured and two youths blinded.
February's violent clashes forced the government and the water
company to implement a rate rollback and freeze until November, and to
agree to a new round of negotiations.
Deal scrutinized
Meanwhile, La Coordinadora, aided by the local College of Economists,
began to scrutinize both the contract and the finances behind the water
company's new owners. While the actual financial arrangements remain
mostly hidden, the city's leading daily newspaper reported that
investors paid the government less than $20,000 of up front capital for
a water system worth millions.
Amid charges of corruption and collusion in the contract by some of
the officials who approved it last year, La Coordinadora announced what
it called la última batalla (the final battle), demanding that the
government break the contract and return the water system to public
hands. The group set Tuesday as the deadline for action.
Government water officials warned that private investors were needed
to secure the millions of dollars needed to expand this growing region's
water system. They argued that breaking the contract would entitle the
owners to a $12 million compensation fee, and pleaded for public
patience to give the new owners time to show the benefits of their
experience.
Among the vast majority of Cochabamba water users, however, that
patience had run out. Two weeks ago, an inquiry surveyed more than
60,000 local residents about the water issue and more than 90 percent
voted that the government should break the contract. During one of the
marches this week protesters stopped at the water company's offices,
tearing down the new ``Aguas del Tunari'' sign erected just three months
ago.
Tuesday, city residents took to the street with bicycles and soccer
balls -- only a few cars moved across town to take advantage of the day
off from work and school. By Wednesday, armies of people from the
surrounding rural areas, fighting a parallel battle over a new law
threatening popular control of rural water systems, began arriving,
reinforcing the road blockades, and puncturing car and bicycle tires.
Thursday night, with another day of wages lost and no sign of movement
from the government, public anger started to erupt.
Protesters arrested
A crowd of nearly 500 surrounded the government building where
negotiations, convened by the Roman Catholic archbishop, were taking
place between protest leaders and government officials. In the middle of
negotiations, the government ordered the arrest of 15 La Coordinadora
leaders and others present in the meeting.
``We were talking with the mayor, the governor, and other civil
leaders when the police came in and arrested us,'' said Olivera, La
Coordinadora's most visible leader. ``It was a trap by the government to
have us all together, negotiating, so that we could be arrested.''
In response, thousands of city and rural residents filled the city's
central plaza opposite the government building, carrying sticks, rocks
and handkerchiefs to help block the anticipated tear gas. Television and
radio reports speculated all day that the president would declare
martial law, and there were reports of army units arriving at the city's
airport.
Freed from jail early Friday morning, the leaders of water protests
agreed to a 4 p.m. meeting with the government, called by the
archbishop. At 5 p.m., government officials still had not arrived and
the plaza crowd waited tensely for the expected arrival of the army.
Suddenly and unexpectedly, the archbishop walked into the meeting and
announced that the government had just told him that it had agreed to
break the water contract. Jubilant La Coordinadora leaders crossed the
street to a third-floor balcony, announcing the victory to the thousands
waiting below, many waving the red-green-and-yellow Bolivian flag, as
the bells of the city's cathedral echoed through the city center.
"We have arrived at the moment of an important economic
victory," Olivera told the ecstatic crowd.
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 4
BOLIVIA UNDER MARTIAL LAW
April 8, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Distributed to international media via e-mail 4/8/00
Summary: An emergency alert to the media sent out just after the
Bolivian government’s declaration of a “state of siege.
As of 10 am Saturday morning Bolivia was declared under martial law
by President Hugo Banzer. The drastic move comes at the end of a week of
protests, general strikes, and transportation blockages that have left
major areas of the country at a virtual standstill. It also follows, by
just hours, the surprise announcement by state officials yesterday
afternoon that the government would concede to the protests’ main
demands, to break a widely-despised contract under which the city of
Cochabamba’s public water system was sold off to foreign investors
last year. The concession was quickly reversed by the national
government, and the local governor resigned, explaining that he didn’t
want to take responsibility for bloodshed that might result.
Banzer, who ruled Bolivia as a dictator from 1971-78, has taken an
action that suspends almost all civil rights, disallows gatherings of
more than four people and puts severe limits on freedom of the press.
One after another, local radio stations have been taken over by military
forces or forced off the air. The neighborhood where most of the city’s
broadcast antennas are located had its power shut off at approximately
noon local time. Through the night police searched homes for members of
the widely-backed water protests, arresting as many as twenty. The local
police chief has been instated by the President as governor of the
state. Blockades erected by farmers in rural areas continue across the
country, cutting off some cities from food and transportation. Large
crowds of angry residents, many armed with sticks and rocks are massing
on the city’s center where confrontations with military and police are
escalating.
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 5
BLOODSHED UNDER BOLIVIAN MARTIAL LAW PROTEST LEADERS SAY U.S. BECHTEL
CORPORATION SHARES RESPONSIBILITY
April 9, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Distributed to international media and activists via
e-mail 4/9/00
Summary: An emergency alert to the media and activists sent out
on the second day after the Bolivian government’s declaration of a “state
of siege. The first direct link between the crisis directly to the
Bechtel Corporation.
Cochabamba, Bolivia: During the second day of martial law, declared
here Saturday following a week of widespread public protests over the
privatization of water, protests continued and hundreds gathered to bury
the body of a 17 year old boy killed here by the Bolivian army. Reports
from local press and from human rights monitors place the death toll
here at at least three and more than 30 others injured. Victor Hugo Daza,
the 17 year old, was killed just blocks from the city center by a bullet
wound to the head. Local press reports also identified 17 protest
leaders arrested and flown to a remote jungle prison, under the
government’s martial law actions. Soldiers continue to occupy the city’s
center.
The main leader of the Cochabamba water protest, labor leader Oscar
Olivera,, said Sunday that the San Francisco-based Bechtel Corporation
shares the blame for the deaths and injuries here. According to the
corporation’s Web site, Bechtel is one of the primary investors behind
the privatized water company, Aguas Del Tunari and its corporate parent
International Water Limited (Source: http://www.bechtel.com/whatnew/1999artsq4.html).
“The Bolivian government, ignoring the wishes of the people,
clearly demonstrated in the streets for five days, is protecting the
profits of the Bechtel Corporation [and other investors],” said
Olivera, reached where he is in hiding to escape government arrest. “The
blood spilled in Cochabamba carries the fingerprints of Bechtel.”
Late this afternoon it was reported that a high ranking Bolivian
official responsible for water matters, Luis Uzín, has announced that
the Bechtel affiliate had decided to leave Bolivia. That news, absent a
written agreement is being viewed with skepticism by water protest
leaders. A national government reversal of a similar announcement here
on Friday is what preceded the declaration of martial law Saturday
morning by President Hugo (who ruled Bolivia as a dictator from
1971-78).
A high level delegation representing the national government is
expected to arrive in Cochabamba Monday for negotiations to resolve the
water conflict, though it remains unclear if the leaders of the official
“Coordinadora” that leads the water protests, since most are under
arrest or in hiding. The Coordinadora reiterated its demand Sunday that
the government break its contract with the Bechtel-affiliated water
company, as well as lift immediately the state of martial law and
provide compensation to the injured and families of those killed.
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 6
PROTESTS AND VIOLENCE CONTINUES IN BOLIVIA AS SIDES SEEK AGREEMENT
TO END CRISIS
April 10, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Distributed to international media and activists via
e-mail 4/10/00
Summary: An update alert to 1300 media and activists.
Cochabamba, Bolivia: As many as six thousand protesters continued to
pour into the city’s central plaza Monday on the widespread public
unrest continues to bring normal life throughout the nation to a near
halt. The enormous uprising here was sparked initially by a public
battle in Cochabamba over the selling of the region’s public water
system to an affiliate of the San Francisco-based Bechtel Corporation,
but the strength of the water protests here sparked parallel protests
across the nation including a police strike in La Paz, the nation’s
capital, and marches by farmers regarding water, roads and other local
issues.
Those leaders of the Cochabamba water protest who were not arrested
and jailed over the weekend came out of hiding today to begin a new
round of negotiations with secondary level officials of the national
government. Late this afternoon details of an accord were released to
the media and public which includes, among others, the following
components: a) an agreement that the Bechtel affiliate, Aguas del Tunari,
will leave the country; b) that the dozens of civic leaders arrested
over the weekend will be released; c) the government will approve reform
of the national water law that is the object of rural protests over
maintaining local water control; d) financial compensation for the
families of at least six people killed in the past week and scores of
others injured.
The Bolivian official who negotiated the accord claimed on television
here that it had the support of Bolivian President Hugo Banzer. However,
given the turn of events Friday, in which a similar agreement over the
water company’s departure was promised by officials and then
rescinded, protest leaders appear to be taking a wait and see attitude
before calling off the general strike and transportation blockages and
asking protesters to go home. There has been no written agreement or
direct statement by Banzer as of yet, nor from Bechtel's affiliate here.
The thousands gathered in Cochabamba’s plaza appear to be growing more
angry as each day passes without a believable accord. Many have walked
to the city on foot from as far as 70 miles away.
Meanwhile, human rights groups tonight are expressing deep concern
about the possible escalation of government repression Monday night, as
government officials state publicly that they are preparing to more
aggressively enforce the "state of emergency" restrictions on
civil liberties declared here on Saturday by President Banzer.. Sweeps
late Friday night through private homes in the city resulted in the
arrest and jailing of more than a dozen civic leaders, most of whom were
then transported by air to a remote prison in Bolivia’s jungle.
President Banzer has appointed the second new Governor for the state
of Cochabamba in three days, Army General Walter Cespides. Cespides is
most known here for being at the head of the army’s violent repression
of civil protest in the Chapare region in April 1998 which left many
dead and injured. The Cochabamba Permanent Assembly on Human Rights
reported this afternoon that at unknown number of people who have been
arrested in the past three days are now unaccounted for and not present
in any of the jails or prisons in Cochabamba.
In addition, there are army troops posted at various entrances to the
city, just outside highway blockades erected and protected by hundreds
of peasants farmers from the rural areas outside the city. A
confrontation at a similar blockade near La Paz over the weekend
resulted in the deaths of at least two farmers and one soldier.
Meanwhile, throughout most of they city blockades streets remained calm
as children idle from closed schools played stickball and soccer in the
street. Women from various neighborhoods went door to door gathering
food and cooking for the thousands of protesters in the plaza.
Jim Shultz, executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org),
lives and writes in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
Bolivia Water War 7
WHILE BOLIVIA SAYS BECHTEL AGREEMENT IS BROKEN BECHTEL SAYS ITS STAYING
April 11, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center, (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Distributed to international media and activists via
e-mail 4/10/00
Summary: An update alert to international media disclosing a
major discrepancy between statements by the Bolivian government and the
Bechtel Corp. regarding their departure from Bolivia.
The week long civil unrest sparked by water privatization that
paralyzed much of Bolivia began to come to an end Tuesday morning
following a signed agreement between protest leaders and the government.
However, that agreement is now in dispute due to a communication just
released by Bechtel and it’s London partner, International Waters
Limited.
Central to that agreement is a Monday letter from Bolivia’s
Superintendent of Basic Sanitation, Luis Guillermo Uzín Fernández, to
Geoffrey Thorpe, the head of Bechtel’s subsidiary, "Aguas del
Tunari". The letter states that, because Thorpe and other company
officials have now left Bolivia the government is retaking control over
Cochabamba’s water system and "I communicate to you that said
contract [between the company and the government] is rescinded."
However, early Tuesday Bechtel released a statement vie e-mail, to
the hundreds of people who have written to the corporation demanding its
departure from Bolivia. That statement, referring people to a release
from its London partner, International Waters Limited, does not refer in
any way to the company leaving Bolivia. To the contrary, the statement
declares, "We are in urgent discussions with local leaders to
determine an appropriate resolution to the water shortage problems
facing the Cochabamba region. We remain flexible in our approach and
hopeful that the government and community can reach consensus on a
solution that allows the water delivery system to be expanded and
improved."
Much of the turmoil of the past week has been caused by promises made
by government officials about the water company’s departure, followed
by reversals of those promises later. If that happens again, additional
civil resistance could easily break out again, for the fourth time in as
many months.
NOTE TO REPORTERS: Contact the Bechtel Corporation’s corporate
headquarters in San Francisco [415-768-1234] and ask about this direct
conflict in the corporation's public statements and that issued late
yesterday by the Bolivian government. Please send me copies of anything
you write and any additional information you obtain, to be shared with
reporters in the Bolivian press following this story.
Bolivia Water War 8
TEXT OF STATEMENT BY BECHTEL CORPORATION
Released: April 11, 2000
In response to your e-mail message about Cochabamba, we provide the
following statement issued Tuesday morning, the 11th, by International
Water Ltd., a water development company owned by Bechtel Enterprises and
Edison S.p.A. Edison S.p.A., an affiliate of Group Montedison, is
Italy's largest private energy services company. Aguas del Tunari,
mentioned below, is the IWL-led consortium that negotiated the
Cochabamba water concession. If you
have further questions or comments, please contact IWL's London
headquarters at (44-171) 766-5100. Alternatively, you may send e-mail to
mail@iwltd.com
We are saddened by the violence that has occurred in Bolivia this
past week.
We are also dismayed by the fact that much of the blame is falsely
centered on the government's plan to raise water rates in Cochabamba,
when in fact, a number of other water, social and political issues are
the root causes of this civil unrest. Several of these factors have all
led to the tensions on display throughout the country:
- proposed water legislation (unrelated to the Aguas del Tunari
concession) that requires farmers and others to obtain permits for
water extraction
- unemployment and other economic difficulties facing Bolivian
citizens
- a government crackdown on coca-leaf production
- and police protests over salaries.
We are in urgent discussions with local leaders to determine an
appropriate resolution to the water shortage problems facing the
Cochabamba region. Currently more than 40% of the region's citizens have
no direct access to water resources. We were invited by the government
to participate in a privatization program to develop long-term solutions
to provide safe and affordable water and wastewater services. During the
past several months we have been part of a number of meetings with
government and community leaders to identify acceptable options to ease
the transition from public to private management. We remain flexible in
our approach and hopeful that the government and community can reach
consensus on a solution that allows the water delivery system to be
expanded and improved.
International Water
11 April 2000
Bolivia Water War 9
ARMY SHOOTERS IN CIVILIAN CLOTHES FIRE ON CROWDS
April 12, 2000
Author: Tom Kruse
Sources Include: Los Tiempos (Cochabamba), 12 April 2000.
Summary: Dressed in civilian clothes, an army officer with a high
powered rifle fired from behind Military Police of the Seventh
Airtransport Division lines into crowds of protesters. He has been
placed very near to the near fatal shooting of Richard Ledezma.
In the Water War
in Cochabamba, Bolivia, the government of former dictator Hugo Banzer
has been pulling out all the dirty tricks practiced and refined during
the dictatorship. (Banzer came to power via a violent coup in 1971 and
ruled until 1978; in 1997 he came to power via elections in which his
party got only around quarter of the votes cast.)
Even before the
declaration of the state of emergency Friday April 7th, houses were
ransacked, leaders illegally detained, with no charge filed, defamation
campaigns waged, etc.
Most disturbing
are recent revelations of military personnel in civilian clothes
shooting into crowds from behind Military Police lines. In the three
nearby pictures, you can see a captain Robinson (or Roberto) Iriarte
dressed as a civilian, walking behind Military Police lines as they were
shooting tear gas into crowds, crouching down, and firing live
ammunition in the crowds of protesters.
Robinson (or
Roberto) Iriarte is captain in the Bolivian Army, and was using a
standard Bolivian Army issue FAL rifle. Gen. José Antonio Gil, the
commanding officer of the Seventh Division, from within whose ranks
Iriarte was firing, claims he has no idea what Iriarte was doing among
his troops, and that he gave no order for him to be there.
The commander of
the Armed Forces, admiral Jorge Zabala at first tried to cover up and
deny the evidence, later only reluctantly accepting the obvious. The
leader of the Banzer's ruling ADN party, Guillermo Fortún commented
simply, "hay esas cosas en la vida [in life these things
happen]."
The images were
captured by a local PAT television film crew, which has subsequently
received numerous death threats. There has been serious denunciations by
local press and civil organizations, who are calling for the dismissal
of the Minister of Defense Jorge Crespo.
Today's press (12
april) have placed this Robinson (or Roberto) Iriarte Lafuente at the
same time (16:15 on Saturdary 8 April) and within a 100 meter straight
line of where Richard Ledezma fell wounded by a rifle fire. Richard
remains in a coma.
There are reports
of other sharpshooters in civilian clothes, and all local commentators
have agreed that they could not have acted without orders from higher
up. Old dictators never die, it seems, they just change clothes and
shoot into crowds.
Bolivia
Water War 10
BLAME THE BECHTEL CORP. NOT NARCOTRAFFICKERS FOR BOLIVIA UPRISING
April 12, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org),
Executive Director, The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Syndicated by
Pacific News Service, April 12, 2000
Summary: A refutation of the
claims made by Bolivian officials Monday that the week’s uprisings
over water were organized and financed by narcotraffickers, a spin
widely published in the U.S. on Tuesday.
Bolivia, that
landlocked country high in the Andes, which few in the U.S. ever think
about, has been in the news. A week of enormous, often violent, civil
uprisings here left at least seven people dead, more than a hundred
others injured and flashed pictures of the nation abroad that made
government leaders here very nervous for their and the nation’s
foreign image. Quick to put blame in the easiest place possible,
government spokesman, Ronald MacLean, told the few international
reporters here Monday, “I want to denounce the subversive attitude
absolutely politically financed by narcotraffickers.”
For reporters
and editors who have never been here it may be an easy line to swallow,
but it would take about two minutes on the ground to figure out how big
a lie the Bolivian government seeks to spin. The issue in the past week’s
uprisings had nothing to do with drugs, it was about water. The culprits
weren’t narcotraffickers hiding out in the jungle but the
well-tailored executives of the Bechtel Corporation sitting smugly in
their downtown San Francisco offices a hemisphere away.
The roots of the
uprisings here began last year when, under heavy pressure from the World
Bank, the Bolivian government sold off Cochabamba’s public water
system to a Bechtel subsidiary, “Aguas del Tunari”. The details of
the deal are secret, with the company claiming the numbers are
confidential “intellectual property”. What is very clear, however,
is that Bechtel’s people here were intent on getting as much as they
could as fast as they could out of the people’s pockets in South
America’s poorest country. Within weeks of hoisting their new
corporate logo over local water facilities the Bechtel subsidiary hit
local water users with rate hikes of double and more. Families earning a
minimum wage of less than $100 per month were told to fork over $20 and
more, or have the tap shut off.
Tanya Paredes, a
mother of five who supports her family as a clothes knitter was hit with
an increase of $15 per month. For Bechtel’s CEO, Riley Bechtel, that’s
snack money at Fisherman’s Warf. For Parades it’s her family’s
food budget for a week and a half.
It should have
come to nor surprise to Riley Bechtel or the Bolivian government that
increases like these would send people into the streets, which it did.
In January Cochabambinos shut down their city for four straight days
with general strikes and transportation stoppages. The Bolivian
government promised to force rates down to put, seeking to end the
protests, promises broken within a few weeks. When thousands tried to
march peacefully here on February 4th, President Hugo Banzer
(Bolivia’s Pinochet-style dictator for most of the 1970s) returned to
his old ways, calling out the police and hammering people with two days
of tear gas that left 175 injured and two youths blinded.
After months of
promises made and broken by the government and Bechtel’s company, the
people of Cochabamba made it clear they’d had enough. In a popular
survey of more than 60,000 residents last month, 90% said it was time
for Mr. Bechtel’s subsidiary to go and return the water system to
public control. When residents here staged a final city shutdown
starting last Tuesday, the Bolivian government came to the corporation’s
rescue, saying the company must not leave.
When the
protest, overwhelmingly supported by people here, refused to back down
after four days the Bolivian government declared a “state of siege”
arresting protest leaders from their beds in the dark of night, shutting
radio stations down in mid-sentence, and sending soldiers into the
street with live bullets. On Saturday afternoon when 17 year old Victor
Hugo Daza was killed by a shot through his face it had finally come to
the ultimate penalty for challenging Bechtel’s control of local water
- death. As protest leader Oscar Olivera said in a statement afterwards,
“The blood spilled in Cochabamba carries the fingerprints of Bechtel.”
It is true that
the strength and international attention of Cochabamba’s water
protests did embolden, and become linked with, other protests around the
country, marches by people in the countryside over a new law taking away
control of rural water systems, a police strike in the capital city of
La Paz, complaints about unfinished highways in other areas of the
country. But when people marched 70 miles on foot from small towns to
joint the protest, when women came door to door in my neighborhood
gathering food donations to cook and take to the people at the conflict’s
center, narcotrafficking had about as much to do with it as Elian and
Fidel.
In the middle of
the protest, the mayor of a small town outside of the city explained to
me, “This is a struggle for justice, and for the removal of an
international business that, even before offering us more water, has
begun to charge us prices that are outrageously high.” Late Monday it
appeared that Bolivians had gotten their way, as government officials
released a letter it had sent to company executives, accusing them of
fleeing the country and therefor nullifying the contract they signed
last year.
Tuesday morning
Bechtel released a statement of its own. Like the Banzer government,
Bechtel sought the pin the blame on anything but themselves. “We are
also dismayed by the fact that much of the blame is falsely centered on
the government's plan to raise water rates in Cochabamba,” said the
$12 billion per year corporation, “when in fact, a number of other
water, social and political issues are the root causes of this civil
unrest.” Bolivians may be mad about a lot of things, but it was
Bechtel’s greed and Bechtel’s price hikes that was the centerpiece
of the protests this past week, and the damage and death left behind. If
Riley Bechtel has any doubt about that he can come here. There are about
100,000 angry Bolivian mothers who would love nothing better than to
steer him straight.
Jim Shultz,
executive director of The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org) lives
in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
April 29, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org)
Executive Director, The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: The Democracy On-Line 4/29/00
Summary: In late April, Bechtel’s International Waters subsidiary
released a new statement, directly as a letter to Jim Shultz and The
Democracy Center, accusing us of reporting "misconceptions".
Bechtel also posted the letter on its corporate Web site. This letter is
The Democracy Center’s response.
Dear Readers:
Apparently the e-mail messages that many of you have sent in the past
weeks to Mr. Riley Bechtel, regarding his corporation’s role in the
Cochabamba water uprisings, have gotten his attention. On Tuesday I
received a lengthy public response from Mr. Didier Quint, the head of
Mr. Bechtel’s subsidiary that oversaw the corporation’s fiasco here
in Bolivia. I know that many of you have received the same letter.
Bechtel’s subsidiary also submitted a shorter version as a letter
(accusing me of "misconceptions") to the San Francisco
Examiner, in rebuttal to my article published there and in the Toronto
Star.
Today I am releasing my response, included in full below. Those of
you who know my work well know that I do not take accuracy lightly. My
reports from Cochabamba this past month have been based on my personal
eyewitness accounts and extensive interviewing from the center of
action, on occasion at personal risk. I stand by each one. In contrast,
Bechtel’s response was written from the quiet of far off London and is
riddled with numerous, profound, and documentable misstatements of fact.
I hope those of you interested will read my response closely. As the
letter points out, Bechtel, in addition to all of the other damage it
has contributed to in Cochabamba, is now demanding a $12 million
compensation payment in exchange for leaving. I think that is
intolerable. If you are interested in sharing your own opinion about
that demand or any other aspect of the matter, I encourage you to do so
directly via e-mail to:
Mr. Didier Quint Mr. Riley Bechtel dplquint@iwltd.com rbechtel@bechtel.com
Send a copy to: Bechtel Public Relations Division globrep@bechtel.com
Again, my response to Bechtel is included at the end of this note.
Copies of Mr. Deider’s letter to me and to the Examiner (along with as
my original article) have been posted by Bechtel on its corporate Web
site at:
http://www.bechtel.com/whatnew/bolivia.html
Thank you for your ongoing interest and support.
Jim Shultz The Democracy Center
MY RESPONSE TO BECHTEL
April, 29, 2000
Mr. Didier Quint Mr. Riley Bechtel Managing Director Chairman and CEO
International Water LLC Bechtel Enterprises
(via e-mail)
Dear Mr. Quint and Mr. Bechtel:
This letter is in response to Mr. Quint’s April 25th e-mail to me
and his letter to the San Francisco Examiner, regarding the civil
uprising over water prices in Cochabamba. While I appreciate your effort
to share your views on this matter, it is disappointing to see the
extent of your misunderstanding of the basic facts and your
unwillingness to accept any responsibility for your actions here. From
your offices in London and San Francisco I am sure you had to rely on
your companies’ local representatives for information. It is clear
they have briefed you very, very poorly.
To be clear, most everyone in Cochabamba would agree with your
assessment about the need for more and better water. Cochabambinos are
anxious to solve their water problems and many once had high hopes that
your company would help to do this. You are also not alone in your
questioning of the Misicuni dam project. Your account of your secret
negotiations with the Bolivian government provides much more detail then
had been available publicly and I have shared it with civic leaders and
journalists here.
Most importantly, your account confirms what water rights leaders
here have been saying for months - that the contract agreed to by the
government was a failure from the start, a virtual guarantee that
thousands of poor families would be hit with water rates they could ill
afford. But let’s be clear on one other point. While you complain
bitterly about that contract, you are just as much a party to it as the
Bolivian government. You negotiated it, you signed it, and you
implemented it, knowing well the injustices and social eruptions it
would cause. You did not enter into that contract as an act of public
spirit. You saw an opportunity to make a profit here and you took it.
One additional point you left out of your summary - your companies also
demanded and won a provision in that same contract guaranteeing you,
come hell or high water, an average 16% annual return on your investment
(contract annex #5), leaving Bolivia’s poor to bear all the financial
risk.
That said, let me now address your profound misstatements of fact
about the public protests and your water price hikes that triggered
them:
1) You state, "Several wealthy interests paid poor people –
many bussed in from outside the area – to demonstrate against the
concession." Apparently your local representatives failed to inform
you that, during the seven days of protests here in early April,
protesters blockaded all highways in and out of Cochabamba. There was no
bus service, commercial or otherwise, or any other ground transportation
entering or leaving the city. Not even bicycles were allowed through
without having their tires flattened. If you have any doubt about my
account you should consult with the Bolivian government, which
specifically cited the blockades as a reason for its declaration of a
"state of emergency" on April 8. Before you make this claim
again I suggest your provide your proof. I spoke personally with many
who came here from the rural communities, on foot from as far as 40
miles. No mysterious unnamed interests paid them to do so. They came to
reclaim control of their water.
2) You state: "The Coordinadora [the civic alliance that led the
protests] was mostly composed of people and organizations having an
interest in the parallel water market or being part of the most affluent
sector of the population." The Coordinadora’s affluence will
certainly be news to its members. The coalition is led by the union that
represents minimum wage factory workers. Its members also include
organizations of peasant farmers, environmentalists, youth, and others.
Could you explain which of these groups you count as affluent?
3) You state, "Opposition to the proposed new water law also
came from coca leaf growers who, the state asserted, were supported by
their cocaine connection." It seems hypocritically convenient that
you would so blatantly criticize the Bolivian government on the one hand
and yet so readily parrot their false political spin on the other. I
have shared your charge in the past few days with many people here who
participated in the protest and I think the best response comes from
Franz Pedrazas, a local taxi driver. You raised his water rates last
January from $10 per month to $20, an increase equal to more than what
he earns in a day driving a cab for 12 hours. Regarding your charge that
nacrotraffickers were behind the protests he says, "It’s a big
lie. I’m not a narcotrafficker. If I were why I would I be driving a
cab? The farmers aren’t narcotraffickers either."
4) Finally, you state: "The typical rates for water and sewage
services rose 35%. Low income residents were to pay 10% more and the
largest hikes (106%) were reserved for the highest volume users, the
most affluent." After four months I am still looking, with no
success, for someone here who had a rate hike of just 10%. I have
interviewed dozens and dozens of families about their rate hikes. Even
among the poor, rate increases of at least 100% were the most common and
many people suffered increases much higher. Your claim will be big news
to Mr. Pedrazas, the cab driver, to Tanya Paredes, a mother of five who
knits baby clothes for a living (her increase was 300%), and thousands
of others. If you don’t wish to believe my account I would gladly send
you copies of the local newspaper investigations that also confirm the
extremity of your rate hikes.
As a parent, one of the lessons I have tried to teach my children is
the importance of telling the truth and of accepting responsibility,
rules that should apply as well to large corporations. The people of
Cochabamba have suffered four months of upheaval because of your conduct
here. A 17 year old boy is dead. Two youths are blinded. More than 100
are injured. Those who opposed you had their homes ransacked in the dark
of night and were flown off to a remote jail in the jungle in an effort
to silence them. In your defense you rely on lies and seek to blame
everyone from peasants to well-drillers. Whatever credibility you had
left has only been tarnished all the more.
I tried, as did many other journalists here, to reach your local
representative, Mr. Geoffrey Thorpe, for comment during the uprisings.
Neither my calls nor anyone else’s were returned. In fact, on several
occasions, he hung up on those few reporters who managed to reach him.
You may also find it of interest that, while the people of Cochabamba
were having their blood spilled on the streets, your subordinates were
busy taking away the water company’s computers and financial and
personnel records. Your subordinates also left behind bank accounts that
were empty and more than $150,000 in unpaid bills. On top of all this
suffering and damage you now have the audacity to demand a compensation
payment of $12 million from the Bolivian people.
I am afraid that the misconceptions in this matter are not mine, but
yours. Despite your apparent views to the contrary, the people of
Cochabamba are not stupid, nor are they misled. It may not be the public
relations message you would like to project, but the facts speak for
themselves: You came here to make a profit, agreeing to a contract that
insured water rates far beyond what people could afford. You implemented
those rates, provoking exactly the social eruption you anticipated. Even
as people here died demanding that you leave you refused to go and hid
behind the violent repression provided for you by your partners in the
Bolivian government.
I assume your letter was intended to make you and your actions sound
reasonable to a public audience. If you actually want to have your
behavior be reasonable I encourage you to stop spinning misinformation,
return what you have taken, reconcile your unpaid bills, and withdraw
your demands for $12 million from those so ill-able to afford it. I will
share this response publicly, as you have your letter to me.
Sincerely,
Jim Shultz Executive Director The Democracy Center Cochabamba,
Bolivia
# # #
Bolivia Water War #12 BEHIND THE
NEW GLOBALIZATION PROTESTS LIES AN OLD DEMAND, DEMOCRACY
May 4, 2000
Author: Jim Shultz (JShultz@democracyctr.org)
Executive Director, The Democracy Center (www.democracyctr.org)
Published: Syndicated by Pacific New Service 5/4/00
Summary: A wrap-up piece reflecting on the experience of being in the
center of back to back April protests, in Bolivia and in Washington, DC,
over the issue of economic globalization.
BEHIND THE NEW GLOBALIZATION PROTESTS LIES AN OLD DEMAND, DEMOCRACY
Watching coverage of the protests in Washington DC last month it
would be easy to have the reaction, "Now what is this all
about?" For most people the names World Bank, International
Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization are signals to change the
channel or move on to something a little closer to home. However, what
erupted in Seattle last December and marched on to Washington in April
is not some passing fancy. It is, in fact, the start of an important,
worldwide political movement and, while its slogans and messages may
still be rough, the issues that movement raises are among the most
important we will face for much of the new century.
Within the U.S. much of the last century was marked by one citizen
effort after another aimed at curtailing the abuses and excesses of
corporations and the marketplace - child labor laws, the regulation of
monopolies, the right to organize unions, minimum wage laws, consumer
protection, environmental protection, and more. All these have been
important steps forward in U.S. economic life. Today, as the economy
turns more and more global by the week, individual nations are becoming
less and less able to set such rules.
Steadily, the economic decisions that affect our daily lives are
leaving the hands of governments we elect and falling into the arms of
multinational corporations and global economic institutions that we do
not. The movement we saw being born in the streets of Seattle and
Washington is an echo of all those same fights for economic justice,
only this time the issues and the battles have gone global.
As thousands of students, working people, environmentalists and
others were preparing to gather in Washington, from far off Bolivia came
a powerful example of what that protest was about. Bolivia, in many
ways, is the poster child for what happens when a poor country is left
to the whims of global economic planners. This little-thought-of land of
high mountains and lush jungles is saddled with a huge international
debt which benefited mainly the wealthy but now bears down on mainly the
poor. The cost of paying the annual interest on that debt cuts deeply
into revenues that could be used for health, housing or education.
Similarly, at the command of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the
Bolivian government is about to change the national labor laws,
weakening the right to organize unions and other worker protections.
Then there is the issue of "privatization". For years the
World Bank has pressed hard on poor countries like Bolivia to sell off
their public enterprises to international investors. Fearful of losing
access to World Bank credit, the Bolivian government has eagerly
complied. One by one it sold off the national airline, the train system,
and electric utilities. Last year it traded away the public water system
in Cochabamba, a city of more than half a million. In a secretive,
one-bidder deal, a 40 year lease was sold to a subsidiary of San
Francisco-based Bechtel Enterprises.
It took little time to understand what all this elaborate global
economics meant to the mostly-poor families who live here. Before
Bechtel’s subsidiary even finished hoisting its new logo over local
offices, it hit local water users with rates of double and more. Franz
Pedrazas, who supports his family driving his taxi 12 hours a day, seven
days a week, had his rates doubled, an increase equal to what he makes
in a day. Even in the U.S. it seems unlikely that consumers would take
calmly a utility increase equal to a day’s pay. Cochabambinos, many
earning a minimum wage of less that $60 per month, reacted with unity.
They shut down their city with a one week general strike and took to the
streets to demanding water rates they could afford and democratic
control of the water system.
The reaction of the government, the corporation, and the World Bank
was a case study of the New World Order. Bolivia’s President, Hugo
Banzer (who ruled the country as dictator for most of the 1970s)
declared a "state of emergency", pulled the plug on radio
stations, sent soldiers into the street (killing a 17 year old boy and
injuring hundreds more) and tried to blame the water protests on "narcotraffickers".
Bechtel’s subsidiary refused to leave, lied about how much they had
increased water prices, and hid behind the government’s repression.
World Bank director, James Wolfensohn, asked about the Bolivian water
uprising at a Washington news conference, defended the Bank’s price
increase policy with cool, clueless economic theory. "It's just a
fact that if you give public services away," said the $300,000 per
year Bank head, "that does lead to certain waste."
In Cochabamba the protests ended in victory. Amidst a flurry of
finger pointing between Bechtel and the Banzer government, the
corporation fled from its offices and turned its attention to trying to
snatch a $12 million exit payment. The leader of the water protests,
Oscar Olivera, accepted an invitation to come to Washington where global
justice advocates were just beginning to gather. Standing next to him in
the middle of the Washington march, I asked the 45 year old machinist
what he thought of the nation’s capital. "It looks just like
Cochabamba," he told me, "young people and police
everywhere."
It was, in fact, the young people, that gave real life to these twin
protests on opposite sides of the equator. Beneath the economics, the
slogans, the street confrontations and the rest, young people in Bolivia
and in the U.S. smelled what the young always notice first, the
arrogance of power. It is true that setting the rules for the new global
economy will not be easy and the issues are not all so simple. Yet
beneath it all there is once principle that is simple. People, regular
people who work for a living, want a say in the decisions that shape
their economic futures. They believe that these decisions should not be
simply left to the arrogant commands of Banzer, Bechtel, the World Bank,
or the IMF. The issue in the streets of Cochabamba and Washington last
month was an old one - democracy.
RETURN TO THE BOLIVIA LENS AT AMERICAS.ORG
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