Water.
The most precious resource on the planet.
And yet, in many places, there has been a push to privatize it.
This was the case in 1999, in Cochabamba, Bolivia, when the city privatized the city’s municipal water supply.
The move came at the mandate of the World Bank.
The new company was a subsidiary of the US construction firm Bechtel and several other foreign corporations.
The company raised water rates more than 30% overnight.
A manager said “If people didn’t pay their water bills their water would be turned off.”
Protests exploded in January 2000.
Workers. Campesinos. Retirees. Even the middle class hit the streets.
They were organized under the Coordinator in Defense of Water and Life.
And they occupied Cochabamba’s main square.
Their only demand: Cancel the contract.
They held a general strike that lasted for four days.
Police cracked down. Tear gas. Rubber bullets.
200 protesters were arrested. More than 120 people injured.
Protests spread to other cities. Roadblocks shut down towns and highways.
President Hugo Banzer declared a state of siege, suspending constitutional guarantees.
Nighttime raids. Arrests against labor leaders.
And then… Víctor Hugo Daza.
He was a high school student in a crowd of protesters that April, when he was shot and killed by a Bolivian Army captain.
The act was recorded on camera. It reverberated across Bolivia.
Finally, the Bolivian government acquiesced.
On April 10, 2000, leaders of the protest movement signed an agreement with the national government, reversing the privatization.
The people had won.
This is episode 18 of Stories of Resistance — a new podcast co-produced by The Real News and Global Exchange. Independent investigative journalism, supported by Global Exchange’s Human Rights in Action program. Each week, we’ll bring you stories of resistance like this. Inspiration for dark times.
If you like what you hear, please subscribe, like, share, comment, or leave a review. You can also follow Michael’s reporting and support at www.patreon.com/mfox.
Written and produced by Michael Fox.
If you are interested in more information on the Cochabamba Water War, we recommend you check out the 2010 movie “Tambien La Lluvia,” featuring Gael García Bernal. It is a tremendous look back at that time, amid a scathing critique of how the Spanish, foreign companies, and white elites have always treated local Indigenous and campesino populations in Bolivia and across Latin America.
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