By Daniel Kanu
Assistant Politics Editor
The Our Water Our Right Coalition comprising over 10 groups has written to the World Bank demanding to know its role in plans by the Lagos State government to move ahead with its clandestine Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) agenda in the water sector despite popular opposition in the state and beyond.
In a statement by the Head, Media and Campaign, Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria, Philip Jakpor, it noted that the World Bank is sadly going into partnership with Lagos State government blindly ignoring the position of the majority that the project is not in the best interest of the people rather anti-people.
Signatories to the letter are the Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN), Corporate Accountability International, Child Health Organisation, Citizen’s Trust Advocacy and Development Centre, Health of Mother Earth Foundation, Peace and Development Project (PEDEP), Women Environmental Programme (WEP), Climate Aid Initiative, and Public Services International, among others.
The letter, written to the World Bank Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer, Joaquim Levy, specifically asked three fundamental questions that wanted to ascertain the water infrastructure initiatives the Bank and its institutions like the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), International Development Association (IDA), Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) “are supporting, planning to support, or considering supporting in Lagos?”
Also issues regarding plans by World Bank to seek meaningful input from civil society on any meaningful initiative that will solve the Lagos water crisis as well as how the Bank is planning to institute and maintain meaningful transparency policies to ensure all Lagosians can understand its efforts in the state were raised?
The group expressed concern that the Lagos State government is moving forward with its pro-PPP agenda in the water sector, disregarding the people of the state, who have been united in condemning the move in strong terms.
In the letter, the group drew the attention to issues raised last December by UN Special Rapporteur Léo Heller on lack of transparency in the Lagos water policy, quoting his letter in December 2016.
Leo letter noted that “For more than a decade, the Government has adopted a hardline policy according to which the solution would seem to [be] only [to] attract private capital, notably via public-private partnerships (PPPs). Numerous civil society groups have urged the Government to guarantee their right to participate in these processes.”
Heller had revealed further that, “….the alternatives proposed by civil society are not given meaningful consideration, while negotiations to initiate PPPs between public authorities and private investors have reportedly occurred in secret.”
The groups explained that it knew that the World Bank has promoted water privatization, including PPPs, in Lagos over the period referred to by Heller, but that Levy’s recent visit to the State Deputy Governor and other indicators suggests that the World Bank Group may once again be supporting deeply unpopular water infrastructure PPPs and other privatization plans in Lagos.
The letter which was delivered to the World Bank Washington office is said to have been acknowledged as received by its representative.
