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UID:Indybay-18492848
SEQUENCE:18520730
CREATED:20080415T023400Z
DESCRIPTION:Bechtel Profits From Dirty Water in Ecuador\nEcuadorian delegation comes to 
 tell dirty secrets\n\nCesar Cardenas and Augusto Parada are coming from 
 Ecuador to the United States April 11-24, 2008 with a mission. They want to 
 expose a well-kept secret. Shortly after Bechtel was thrown out of Bolivia 
 for hiking water rates and making farmers pay for rainwater, the World Bank 
 helped facilitate a similar water contract for Bechtel in Guayaquil, 
 Ecuador. That was in 2001. For seven years the residents of Guayaquil 
 suffered periodic water cut-offs – that is, if they were lucky enough to 
 live in neighborhoods and homes that had water connections at all. 
 Sometimes families were cut-off because they couldn't afford to pay their 
 bills. Other times, the water just didn't arrive because the water system 
 is so old and unreliable. To make matters worse, when water did come from 
 the tap it was often unfit for human consumption. Due to water 
 contamination, a Hepatitis A outbreak struck the city in 2005.\n\nToday, 
 inspired by a citizen's assembly that is re-writing Ecuador's Constitution, 
 the residents of Guayaquil are determined to take back control of their 
 water system. Bechtel, realizing the privatization scheme was a failure, is 
 now trying to sell-out to another private corporation, flee the country 
 with the profits and leave its debts and contractual obligations behind. 
 Cardenas and Parada say, “no way!” They are determined to hold the 
 company accountable. They will be touring Washington, DC, Boston and San 
 Francisco with this message. Their organization, the Citizen's Observatory 
 for Public Services (Observatorio Cuidadano de Servicios Publicos) has 
 filed a complaint with the World Bank and the oversight agency, the 
 Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO). The Citizen's Observatory has carefully 
 collected the bills of thousands of residents that owe debts to the water 
 company. They have brought a legal demand to city officials that argues 
 that the water debts of these consumers should be canceled or forgiven. 
 And, they have argued that more than 300,000 of the poorest water consumers 
 in Guayaquil are in need of a revised, more just and egalitarian water rate 
 structure. \n\n\n https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/04/14/18492848.php
SUMMARY:Ecuadorians Tell Dirty Secret of Bechtel's Water Privatization
LOCATION:Modern Times Bookstore\n888 Valencia Street\nSan Francisco, CA
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/04/14/18492848.php
DTSTART:20080422T020000Z
DTEND:20080422T033000Z
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