« Press Release: People's Health Movement PHM - re-establish health and equitable | Main | ...and speaking of hope... »
July 20, 2005
The Right to Water and the Right to Health
In a session yesterday afternoon on Water as a Human Right, we heard from activists from Mexico and Bolivia about the global and local water struggles they have engaged in, and then Anil Naidoo and I announced the need for a UN Treaty on Water as a Human Right, and talked about the work that is going on to make this happen. A very heated and somewhat frustrating discussion ensued among the sixty or so participants. One of the key issues seems to be that people feel that a UN Treaty will not give us what we want, and we should not have to ASK for our rights. But of course, as we see our rights trampled everywhere in everyway, securing some limited safeguards such as this Treaty is a way to support grassroots struggle. And, as in any campaign, the process of building coalitions and moving towards a common goal, in itself, is an important part of bringing about change.
After the session we were asked to put together an article for the People´s Health Assembly newspaper that comes out at here everyday, so Anil and I, with the help of Sherri Norris and Angel Valencia of the International Indian Treaty Council, set ourselves up in a smoky, atmospheric little bar, and wrote this little news item about it:
PHM Should Join the Global Campaign for Right to Water Treaty
An international group of water activists today called upon the PHM to join a new initiative to secure the right to water in a UN treaty. Anil Naidoo from the Blue Planet Project in Canada represents the Friends of the Right to Water and is in Ecuador to join the PHM. Naidoo wants to engage the PHM in the campaign to demand such a Treaty. “The Right to Health and the Right to Water are indivisible. It makes a lot of sense for the Friends of the Right to Water and the People’s Health Movement to work together on this fundamental health and human rights campaign.”
Water is sacred and essential for life. Damage to our water sources means sickness and death for our communities. Whether it is contaminated by gold mining, oil drilling, pesticides, deforestation or other industrial activity, water contamination is a fundamental violation of our rights. This UN Treaty would hold both states and non-state parties accountable for such violations.
Our common right to water is also violated by the corporations that are stealing our water and selling it back to us. When the water of Cochabamba, Bolivia was taken over by Bechtel Corporation, prices rose dramatically. When Coca Cola built a bottling plant in Plachimada, India, robbing groundwater to make their cola, local farmers suffered severe health impacts. With stories like these increasing across the globe, a binding Treaty to protect water from exploitation is essential.
Indigenous communities and other land-based peoples are some of the most strongly affected by the infringement on water rights. “We know that our problem is similar to everyone’s,” says Angel Valencia of the Yaqui Nation of Sonora Mexico. “When our water is stolen and polluted, this is a violation of our rights.” A Water Treaty would support the struggle of the Yaqui people and other indigenous peoples worldwide in the preservation of culture, dignity, and health.
A UN Treaty will not give us clean water. But binding international law with built-in enforcement mechanisms can be a powerful tool to support grassroots struggles against the commodification, privatization and contamination of water. By including the demand for a Water Treaty in the Cuenca Declaration, and by creating a working group on the right to water, PHM can use its platform on health to ensure water for all.
This year is the start of the International Decade for Action “Water for Life”, and communities around the world desperately need access to safe, sufficient, affordable water. PHM has already drafted a declaration supporting the movement for a right to water (see www.righttowater.net). At PHA2, with representation from peoples worldwide, we are granted a unique opportunity to secure this fundamental collective right.
In fact, the People´s Health Movement is uniquely situated to move this kind of Treaty forward, because many people within the movement are involved in policy at different levels. Every year, the PHM steering committee attends the World Health Assembly in Geneva and each country representative lobbies his or her Minister of Health on the PHM platform. In this way, an common global agenda is pushed forward. At the same time, groups like the Indian Treaty Council, who represent Indigenous Peoples of the Americas at the United Nations, push for these policies there, and direct action oriented groups like the Treatment Action Campaign, the disability rights movement, and the anti-war movement, bring these agendas to the streets.
At this point in the dispatch, I might add again that there is so much going on, on so many levels, that the bits and pieces I am offering are a small view into the events. Another major theme of the last few days has been militarization and war, with an Iraqi doctor, Dr. Salam Ismael giving a grueling testimony of events there, along with testimonies from the war in the Congo, the fumigations of Plan Colombia, the health crisis in Chiapas, and so forth. Fortunately I missed the session and the depression it caused in hundreds of attendees. Speaking with Brahm Amadi about it this morning, we reenforced our notion -- and Brahm and People´s Grocery are a great example of this -- that while we must face the realities of our time, it is our job as activists to offer hope, to imagine alternatives, to struggle with dignity for a better future.
The poet Diane DiPrima has said "There is only one war -- the war against the imagination." All other wars partake of this central strategy of denying vision, denying creativity, denying hope. My personal hope for a gathering such as this one is that, alongside the gruesome news from all quarters of the world, our collective energies will emerge into yet more visions for a positive future and yet more creative strategies for change.
Posted by jeff at July 20, 2005 07:59 AM