Brazil adopts law to privatize water treatment

View of the Brazilian Congress building (Chamber of Deputies and Senate). Wikimedia commons

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The Brazilian Senate this week approved a law paving the way for the massive privatization of water treatment services. A decision that causes a great controversy while access to drinking water remains a major problem for millions of Brazilians.

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With our correspondent in Brazil, François Cardona

The law passed in the Senate on Wednesday by a very large majority will allow the privatization of public companies responsible for sanitation of water and its distribution in the country. Today, the municipalities in charge of these sectors can only solicit public companies, without competitive tendering.

But everything will change. It is a huge market for which the government plans astronomical private investments of around 120 billion euros, with tens of thousands of jobs created. It was a promise from Jair Bolsonaro, faithful to the very liberal policy pursued by his Minister for the Economy.

Growing inequalities in access to sanitation services

But it's a hot topic too, which is causing a stir. In Brazil, half of the population - 100 million inhabitants - does not have access to the sewage treatment network. Critics of this law fear that the price of bills for the population will rise and that the best served areas may not be those that need it most, especially in the most remote and poorest regions of the country.

Wastewater treatment, access to running water ... In these areas, the lack of investment is glaring in Brazil: 35 million people do not have access to drinking water. But these investments planned by the government risk leading to increased inequality in terms of access to sanitation services. Now faced with competition between private companies, certain regions, such as the favelas, in the urban outskirts, will not be the priority of the most profitable projects. However, the needs are enormous: almost half of Brazil's sewers are discharged into the environment, without having been treated.

A " crime against the sovereignty of the Brazilian people "

Approved by the Senate, the text must now be promulgated by President Jair Bolsonaro. The opposition did not succeed in overturning the Parliament, but on social networks very many critics have been fired since the vote. Former President Dilma Rousseff was indignant Thursday evening, believing that this privatization was a "  crime against the sovereignty of the Brazilian people  ".

The government, for its part, replies that its text provides that all Brazilians must benefit from drinking water and sewerage by 2033. Sanitation was one of the last major sectors that Brazil had not yet privatized.

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