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by University of Ghana(Legon)Student Resentative Sat Nov 10 '01

address: Agricultural Research Station, University of Ghana, Legon-Accra, Ghana-W. Africa

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Student Leaders at the University of Ghana have join coaltion against Water Privatisation In Ghana. This was made know to the general student body at a 'Water Serminar' which was organised at Akuafo Hall on the 30th October 2001, by the Ghana government agents who are pushing forward for water privatisation in Ghana. it was clear at the serminar that students who were present at the said serminar unanimously kicked against the governments policies in the presents of the Mojority Chief Whip in Parliament and their topnotch technocrates. The voice of the powerless defeated the Bosses and esxposed their tricks!

STATEMENT BY UNIVERSITY OF GHANA, LEGON S.R.C. ON PRIVATE SECTOR PARTICIPATION IN URBAN WATER SUPPLY.

The SCR has been keenly following the public debate on water privatisation. After thorough scrutiny of the issues we have resolved the following; 1. That government’s claim that only outright sale constitutes privatisation is incorrect. The public water system is an integrated one which includes a range of activities from water sourcing, production and distribution. It is perfectly possible to separate these undertakings such that they will be operated and controlled by different entities. The Government-World Bank proposal for water sector restructuring involves the separation of urban water supply systems and the transfers of their management, control and therefor effective ownership to profit oriented multi-national companies

2. That directors public institutions should be made accountable to the public. The restructuring of urban water supply systems to fulfil the profit motive, is Infact a profound re-orientation of how public funded institutions and services no longer have the primary purpose of providing a public need and serving the public interest. We believe that this is a dangerous attack on the space for democratic accountability and governance in our public lives. We recognise that it is precisely such failure of accountability and governance that is at the source of the crisis and inefficiencies in public institutions such as GWCL and public services such as the water sector. We reject the ridiculous view that the solution to weak public accountability is to do away with any possibility of public accountability altogether and replace it with private self-interest as the guarantor of efficiency.

3. That neo-liberal agenda led and driven by corporate must stop. Two decades of rampant structural adjustment polices and neo-liberalism has only delivered greater social inequalities and potential social disintegration as many millions of able-bodied Ghanaians are denied any opportunity to lead productive lives. The fact that something as basic to life as water will not be spared from the greed of the already powerful and thereby denied to the already weak is evidence of the extremism of an agenda that will stop at nothing to concentrate more and more resources and wealth in the hands of a few as their private gain even if this is at the cost of the pain of the many.

4. As students we are constantly threatened with the dire consequences of privatised social provision that will curtail the social opportunities that we still enjoy as a result of the struggles against institutionalised inequality and injustice. This very academic semester was threatened by the attempt at unilateral fees increases, in this case with the justification of the rising water and electricity prices. More recently the same insistence on “their pound of flesh’ has inspired to threaten a naked assault on the constitutionally guaranteed right to free tuition which has probably been the most powerful stimulus for any advancement our society has attained over the past few decades.

5. We the Legon SRC leadership are therefor proud to take our stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Christian Council of Ghana, Ghana Labour Forum (TUC, GNAT, GRNA, CSA, JUSSAG, etc), the National Coalition Against Privatisation Of Water and other civil society groupings to stop the inimical policy of urban water privatisation. we hereby signal our commitment to contribute to and participate in the widest possible civil society mobilisation to ensure democratic victory

Signed:……………………………

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BENJAMIN AMPOMA-BOATEN FRANK ACHEAMPONG (SRC PRESIDENT) (SECRETARY)
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