Privatisation Doesn't Hold Water
The World Bank in Ghana: Up Close and Personal
In the last few years, it’s become possible to mark time both by international summits, be they G-8, FTAA, WTO or a multitude of others, and the anti-globalisation protests that have sprung up around the barbed wire fences. Still, many people living in the West have chosen to keep their distance, maybe because it’s tough for them to discern a clear cause of the anger that can turn today’s calm city streets into tomorrow’s battlegrounds.
This is why I want to share an experience I had with another Canadian, Sarah Malan, while on a study abroad program to Ghana, West Africa. The journey sharpened my perspective of the reality behind the rhetoric: the fighting that takes place between the summits.
Working with the National Coalition Against the Privatization of Water
Sarah and I spent January to April of 2003 as interns for the National Coalition Against the Privatization of Water (NCAP), a civil-society movement formed in 2001 to oppose the joint World Bank-Ghanaian government plan to privatise urban water supplies by leasing the public utility to two foreign corporations. What follows is not meant to be a self congratulatory tale of my journeys in an exotic locale; rather, my intent is for people to learn how organisations like the World Bank operate on the ground.
Seeing the World Bank Up Close
Two weeks into our placement with NCAP, Patrick Apoya, the Coalition member with whom we were working, burst into the conference room to tell us that the Water Sector Restructuring Secretariat (WSRS) – the government body that was facilitating the privatisation process in Ghana and is funded by the World Bank – had come to town that very day to hold a public forum about the privatisation plan. Apoya, dismayed that he couldn’t make it himself, told Sarah and I and another member of the NGO to go on behalf of NCAP.
After registering our attendance, we tried to find out why no one from NCAP, or from the broader NGO community, had been told about this meeting. The registration clerk told us that the man charged with sending letters out to local stakeholders was semi-literate – a strange choice for a communications position. Even stranger was that despite these apparent communications difficulties, government representatives from all over the region and the local and national media all knew about the meeting.
Despite our lack of preparation and numbers, we (naively) hoped that, in the time allotted for open debate, we would be able to force the WSRS representatives to address the concerns of NCAP – namely, that the current plan to privatise would prevent low income communities from receiving clean drinking water which in turn would lead to increases in illness and mortality.
Civil Education or Propaganda?
As the proceedings got underway, we began to doubt the extent to which this would be an educative and democratic public forum addressing all perspectives of the privatisation issue. We were alarmed when the first two hours were devoted to a pair of fancy PowerPoint presentations delivered by WSRS members highly trained in the art of PR. Even more alarming, they preached only in English about the benefits of “private-sector participation” – the euphemism used for the privatisation scheme – when only well-educated Ghanaians speak English.
At the conclusion of these speeches, the so-called open debate began. Our chance at last. The chairperson explained the simple format: anyone in the audience with a comment could raise his or her hand, and, once chosen by the chairperson, could come to the front and speak.
Unfortunately, in addition to being simple, this format was also unfair, undemocratic, and far from an open debate, mainly because the WSRS always had the last word after anyone spoke.
This structural bias was used to full effect when, after I spoke, the PR experts used a devastating array of rhetorical flourishes, distorted facts, outright lies, and personal attacks about me being a foreigner. The main speaker even walked down the aisle to where I was sitting, like a game-show host, and launched into a comedic tirade about how little I, as a white Canadian, actually knew about this issue. The paradox of my position as a white foreigner was revealed: on the one hand, as a visible representative of the West, my thoughts could carry great weight. On the other hand, when my status as an outsider was turned against me, my mountain of credibility was transformed into a yawning pit. I wasn’t allowed to defend myself or my position. I had to be restrained by another member of my NGO.
They Won the Battle
Notwithstanding our minimal opposition, the faces of the two WSRS speakers were split by smug smiles as the government reps in the audience congratulated them. The coverage they would receive from the national television station contributed to their smarmy ecstasy – the programming would clearly demonstrate that privatisation was the way to go.
This conclusion to the day’s events left me seething, as even at that early point in my placement I had no doubts that many Ghanaians would suffer the ill effects of unsafe drinking water if the privatisation were carried out.
This is Reality
As I slowly uncurled my fists, a part of me was saying that this was a great learning experience. I had gained some valuable practical experience for my degree in International Development Studies. At the end of the day I wasn’t staying in Ghana; I was returning to Canada, where I could have safe drinking water almost anywhere and anytime I wanted.
But another part of me recognised that meetings like this one – meetings where it is just so clear where the money and power lie – are happening all the time, everywhere in the world, and often on a larger scale. This is why activists encircle international summits carrying angry placards: so that no one can ever walk away from a meeting that concerns the livelihoods of hundreds, or thousands, or millions of people thinking that he or she has covered all the angles, as the WSRS speakers were able to do.
If we raise our voices in passion and conviction, they will listen.
Jeff's story was first published in the McGill Daily.