Not a Drop to Drink

By: Reyshimar Arguelles

Access to water is a human right, which is to say everyone couldn’t live without it. The United Nations considers it as part of its Millennium Development Goals, stating the need to “progressively reduce inequalities by tackling the discrimination and stigmatization that can lead to people being excluded from, or marginalized in relation to, water and sanitation access.”

If that is really the case, then privatizing the country’s water utilities comes off as anti-humanitarian. In a perfect world, no one in his right mind would suggest granting a private enterprise exclusive rights to distribute clean water for commercial and industrial use. But since we are living in such a perfect system where everything is dictated by the availability of capital, water is just one of many resources that can be commodified.

The logic of commodification involves the process of exchanging goods and services for profit. Corporate entities operate with the bottom line in mind and will always aim for whatever is beneficial to profitability.

Cost-cutting strategies such as downsizing and value-added strategies such as upselling auxiliary services are as typical as they come. But taking on government contracts is a whole other level of sordidness that hides under legalese and the need to recognize the contractual rights of service providers as though they mean more than the rights of households to clean water.

With all that being said, there is enough ground for collective anger against the water concessionaires who have been controlling Metro Manila’s water utilities since 1997 when then President Fidel V. Ramos issued Executive Order 311. Backed by the National Water Crisis Act of 1995, this order sought to facilitate the “privatization of any or all of (the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System’s) segments, operations or facilities, if necessary to make them more effective and innovative…” It also led to the creation of two water concessionaires, Maynilad and Manila Water. These are controlled by the country’s largest conglomerates, the Ayala Group and Metro Pacific Investments Corporation.

The contracts the Ramos administration entered into were made with good intentions in mind, considering that the country at that time was struggling with the effects of El Niño. But this fails to recognize other important factors that contributed to the government’s failure in responding effectively to El Niño. In a 2007 study by INSEAD, the MWSS was found to be “underperforming and burdened by large debts.”

State debt also affected the government’s spending capacity thereby prompting the private sector to jump in and take advantage of the crisis. There was also pressure from international creditors who wanted to exploit the pro-market initiatives that the Ramos administration had set into motion.

Of course, it did not end too well for the millions of people serviced by these concessionaires. The Water for the People Network said in a report by Bulatlat that Maynilad and Manila Water have increased their rates by as much as 583% and 973% respectively from 1997 to 2013.

The INSEAD study found that there was intense lobbying by the firms, allowing them to modify the terms of the Concession Agreement. Moreover, the leadership that succeeded the Ramos administration tolerated the opportunistic practices of the concessionaires and failed to establish safeguards that would have penalized them for their poor performance.

This softening up to the private sector has been nothing but inimical to consumers. When the MWSS refused to allow the concessionaires to raise their rates following a public outcry, Maynilad and Manila Water took this travesty to the bottom line to a Singapore-based tribunal, which recently issued a ruling in favor of Manila Water. The Duterte government, which has been aware of the issue since 2016, is requested to pay P7 billion to Manila Water.

Duterte refuses to abide by the ruling and has requested the Office of the Solicitor-General to exhaust all options to remedy the problem which has long haunted the households of Metro Manila with high water rates and poor services.

While it is not likely for Duterte to rescind the EO that led to the problem in the first place, he could at least take the concessionaires to task and have them answer for their hubris. And since people are already thirsty for justice, the least the current administration should do is to keep basic utilities out of the hands of big businesses. They have already had their fill.