Reclaiming public water 10 years after the 'Water War' (short version)
Inspiring and informative video debate amongst global social movement leaders as they assess progress and challenges in the dynamic international movement to reclaim Public Water.
Video filmed at the strategy seminar of the Reclaiming Public Water Network, Brussels, 1-3 February 2010.
See the long version of the video
Participants
V. Suresh - Practicing Advocate
in the Madras High Court. Also a human rights activist and one of the
National Secretaries of People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) one
of India's largest human rights bodies. Suresh has been appointed by
the Supreme Court of India as the Adviser for Tamil Nadu state on food
security and active in food security and water rights issues. He has
also been involved as the lead Concept and Programme facilitator for
the democratisation of water management in Tamil Nadu Water Supplies
and Drainage Board (TWAD) and other governance reform work leading to
democratisation of large, state wide government service delivery
departments. He is the Director of the Centre for Law, Policy and Human
Rights Studies, a research organisation currently completing a major
work on impact of globalisation on urban poverty and the impact on the
elderly.
Marry Ann B. Manahan - research associate with
Focus on the Global South (Focus), Philippines Programme. She joined
Focus in March 2003 and works on the commons (Reclaiming the Commons
Programme) such as information/knowledge, land and water, particularly
on how international financial institutions and corporations privatize
and appropriate the commons, reform or improvement of public utilities
and community-management of utilities and resources. Her work includes
development policy research, advocacy and action, and grassroots
capacity building as well as documentation of the responses of social
movements and broader civil society including alternatives mapping and
building.
Marcela Olivera - the Latin American
coordinator for the Water for All campaign at Food and Water Watch.
After graduating from the Catholic University in Cochabamba, Bolivia,
Marcela worked for four years in Cochabamba as the key international
liaison for the Coalition for the Defense of Water and Life. In 2004
she moved to Washington, DC for a year to work for the Water for All
campaign developing an inter–American citizens' network on water
rights. Named “Red Vida”, the network, which she continues to
coordinate from Cochabamba, assists water rights groups throughout
Latin America to coordinate their efforts to preserve or establish the
water as a public good and human right.
David Boys
coordinates Public Services International's (PSI) international work on
the utilities of water, waste and energy. Public Services International
is the global trade union federation representing 20 million working
people through trade unions in 160 countries. He helps unions develop
strategic plans and helps deliver labour’s position on utilities within
the United Nations, at the OECD, in the WTO, to development banks and
with other international actors. This work is done in collaboration
with pubic operators and with NGOs, national, regional and global. This
work has helped strengthen the position in defence of public services
and block a number of privatisations. PSI has worked closely with RPW
members to develop the public-public partnership policy proposal. David
is a member of the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Water and
Sanitation.
Moderated by Jeff Conant