PRESS RELEASE : National Alliance against the Privatization of Water in El Salvador 

“On the Occasion of the Global Climate Strike”
“Without Water, There Is No Future”

On the occasion of the Global Climate Strike, we as the National Alliance Against the Privatization of Water express the following: The world is in a global crisis, climate change, caused by a system which prioritizes profit over the needs of the people and the limits of nature. Climate Change is devastating the lives of millions of people around the world. Science warns that we will soon reach the point of no return that will put us on track towards a disastrous change in the climate and global warming from 4°C-5°C. In the region of Central America, it would rise from 5°C-6°C with catastrophic impacts on livelihoods, depleting the possibilities for adaptation.

This is, without a doubt, an alarming reality in it of itself – nevertheless, we must add to this global reality a national environmental crisis that places us in a moment of even greater risk and severity. According to environmental indicators, our country is experiencing significant deforestation, groundwater and air are heavily contaminated, and biodiversity is being lost to growing urbanization and an agribusiness that is out of control.

In addition to this, a weakened state that has been incapable of creating public policies and laws to address these issues, nor has it been capable of enforcing current legislation; to the contrary, we have a government that is in line with death projects, among them, the expansion of monoculture, thoughtless urbanization projects, the destruction of biodiversity within the small areas of protected lands and mangrove forests; in addition to taking actions that weaken the public sector and in turn strengthen the private sector – among these, the diverse forms of privatization and water being the most critical one.

Confronting this issue as the National Alliance Against the Privatization of Water, we join the global actions, linked to issues that are very heartfelt and significant at the national level, water is intimately linked and impacted by climate change.

We announce actions at local and national levels centered on raising awareness among the population but also to influence decision makers to do their job, which is to look after the wellbeing of the people who are the sovereign to whom they serve and therefore we demand:

Of members of the Legislative Assembly, to discuss and approve the General Water Law, which guarantees water as a human right and make sure that the regulatory body that is created be a public body.

Of the Executive branch to halt policies, plans and actions that promote the destruction of the ecosystems, which consequently undermines the capacity to adapt to climate change; therefore should also stop privileging the industrial and agro-industrial sectors who have historically polluted and degraded natural resources and have benefited economically by commodifying public goods; to avoid violations to the law of public information, and from all branches of government provide information on the environmental impact that projects will have.

Of the Magistrates of the Supreme Court, audit the compliance of the Legislature and the Executive branches to international conventions and treaties regarding the human right to water and to confront climate change.

Of the business, industrial and agro industrial sectors – who are the ones that, at the global and national levels, have led us to this global environmental and climatic crisis – to abandon their efforts to privatize water and their intentions to destroy ecosystems on which people's lives depend; as well as to comply with existing environmental laws.

Of the general public, to be aware of this issue and the serious impacts it has on the livelihoods on which we depend, and to participate in the activities in the week of the "Global Climate Strike" among these, the September 26th gathering in the plaza of the Divine Savior of the World.

As the National Alliance against the Privatization of Water, we will not rest in our fight to defend water and the environment which is what the lives of our people depend on!!

Water and the climate are not for sale, we protect and defend it!!!

San Salvador, El Salvador
September 16, 2019