FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – 16 March 2012

The resounding message from people’s
world water forum: Reclaim public water!
Two international forums on water issues happened in Marseille, France the week of 12 Marchthat – like reflecting pools, mirrored the different values of those attending.
Intimidating guards presided at the iron-gated entrance to the commercialised World Water
Forum; delegates who paid up to €700 to attend passed through stringent security screening,
while limousines carrying heads of state and corporate VIPs glided through. Inside, a vast trade
show marketed the latest in high tech water systems. This event, held every three years, is run by
the World Water Council, a corporate think tank whose founders include the World Bank and theprivate utility giants Suez and Veolia. Water privatisation was promoted in many discussions; highlevel policy roundtables were invitation-only.
Across town at the free Alternative World Water Forum (Forum Alternatif Mondial de l’Eau),
which was made possible by small grants from regional bodies, young people, indigenous leadersand public service workers shared their views with academics, social justice advocates and retired
citizens in a series of open forums housed in a sprawling warehouse complex. Here the talkfocused on really implementing the new United Nations’ Human Right to Water and Sanitation as
a common good, not for corporate profit.
Public Services International trade union members from more than 30 countries joined with civilsociety allies in calling for the establishment of a legitimate United Nations-led water council andforum where public water policy can be created in an inclusive atmosphere free of corporate
influence.
PSI’s European arm, the European Federation of Public Service Unions, announced that its
members will use the European Citizens’ Initiative, a new instrument for participatory democracy,
to implement the Human Right to Water and Sanitation in the EU. The first aim is to collect one
million verifiable signatures from at least 11 member countries in one year.

 See page 2

Public Services International is a global trade union federation representing 20 million working women and men who deliver vital
public services in 150 countries. PSI champions human rights, advocates for social justice and promotes universal access to quality
public services. PSI works with the United Nations system and in partnership with labour, civil society and other organisations.

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Such citizen initiatives are increasingly important. In Italy, unions and civil society groups
organised a referendum last year in which 96 percent of voters opposed, and thus blocked, water
privatisation. A recent unofficial referendum in Madrid, Spain, showed that 98 percent ofresidents oppose the sale of their public water utility. In Thessaloniki, Greece, workers and citizen
groups have organised in neighbourhood cooperatives to buy shares in the water utility which thegovernment proposes to sell (for a fraction of its real value) under austerity pressure.
PSI’s most recent research confirms two key points: privatisation does not facilitate water access,nor does it bring new investment. PSI calls on all governments and international agencies using
public funds to cease the false privatisation promises and move to deliver safe, affordable public
water systems using public funds and public management.
PSI also calls on donor and development agencies to focus their efforts on the poorest countries
which really need international solidarity support. And PSI asks governments to support thepublic-public partnership concept which allows best-practice exchanges between public utilities.
PSI general secretary Peter Waldorff notes: “There are still more than two billion people who
don’t have access to safe water and sanitation in their homes. PSI is committed to continuing thestruggle for water justice until we reach universal access to water and sanitation. It is not justabout life, it is also for dignity and equity.”
PSI decries the choice of Korea as the host of the 2015 commercialised water forum – this is acountry which does not recognise the rights of water workers to organise, which illegally andviolently suppresses these workers, does not allow vibrant civil society engagement and which isleading a mercantilist approach to the UN green economy negotiations.
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Public Services International is a global trade union federation representing 20 million working women and men who deliver vital
public services in 150 countries. PSI champions human rights, advocates for social justice and promotes universal access to quality
public services. PSI works with the United Nations system and in partnership with labour, civil society and other organisations.