Irish Water Grab

Unprecedented Mobilization’: Hundred Thousand Rise Against Irish Water Tax Posted on January 14, 2015 Written by pakalertpress.com

FA Note: Around the world water is being col­lec­tivized through “pri­va­ti­za­tion”. The goal is to get water out of the hands of indi­vid­u­als. Con­trol the water – con­trol the peo­ple. Via cen­tral­ized water peo­ple will be forced to live where and how those in con­trol desire. Cen­tral­iza­tion of water means you will live where you are directed to live, as you are directed to live. The Irish have some sense of this.

Protest orga­niz­ers Right 2 Water esti­mate that over 150,000 peo­ple came out to protest the water charge scheme. In a state­ment released Sat­ur­day after­noon, they wrote: “Despite tor­ren­tial rain, our expec­ta­tions have been mas­sively exceeded, with well over 150,000 peo­ple com­ing out in every neigh­bour­hood, town and vil­lage to send a clear mes­sage to the Gov­ern­ment: water is a human right, and we demand the abo­li­tion of domes­tic water charges.”

Ear­lier: Across Ire­land, crowds of peo­ple took to the streets on Sat­ur­day in a mass mobi­liza­tion against a gov­ern­ment aus­ter­ity scheme to charge res­i­dents for domes­tic water usage.

With over 70 demon­stra­tions planned across the nation, orga­niz­ers esti­mated as many as 100,000 Irish cit­i­zens are expected to take part in  the actions.

The demon­stra­tions fol­low on the heels of 100,000-strong march in the nation’s cap­i­tal to protest a recently enacted gov­ern­ment plan to install water meters on homes and charge res­i­dents for pri­vate water usage. Angry res­i­dents have also begun block­ing the water meter installations.

“From Ballyshan­non in Done­gal to Tralee in Kerry, we are wit­ness­ing an unprece­dented pop­u­lar mobil­i­sa­tion which started in Dublin on Octo­ber 11th, and will only end when domes­tic water user charges are abol­ished,” said the group Right2Water in a press state­ment ahead of the Sat­ur­day actions. The group says that the his­toric show­ing reflects the “level of pub­lic anger sur­round­ing the water charges.”

The Journal is main­tain­ing a live blog of the day’s events while images of the dozens of protests are being shared on Twit­ter under the hash­tag #Right2Water.

#Right2Water Tweets

As part of their bailout deal made with the Inter­na­tional Mon­e­tary Fund (IMF), the Irish gov­ern­ment has attempted to enact reforms to pri­va­tize the nation’s water sys­tem. Under the Water Ser­vices Act 2013, the gov­ern­ment set up a new semi-state com­pany, Irish Water, which is grad­u­ally tak­ing over all water pro­vi­sion ser­vices from the Republic’s 34 local authorities.

In the face of grow­ing water cri­sis, fueled largely by cli­mate change-driven drought effects, efforts to pri­va­tize water resources are spring­ing up world­wide. Mitch Jones, Direc­tor of the Com­mon Resources Pro­gram at Food & Water Watch, says that the con­cept of “water mar­kets” is fraught. “A mar­ket can’t rep­re­sent the com­mon will of the peo­ple, because only those with the money to buy are allowed a voice,” Jones writes. “And it can’t express the value of water because the value of a life-giving sub­stance like water is dif­fer­ent than its cost. Water is vital for all of us. And, access to water can­not be for sale.”

Accord­ing to the Irish Inde­pen­dent, a meet­ing between Irish Water offi­cials and coun­cil­lors from Cork, Kerry and Clare had to be aban­doned on Fri­day after pro­test­ers gained access to a con­fer­ence room.

In an expres­sion of sol­i­dar­ity, res­i­dents of Detroit, Michigan—which has faced mass water shut­offs in the face of a sim­i­lar water pri­va­ti­za­tion effort—are march­ing on Sat­ur­day on Wood­ward Avenue in Detroit.

“Detroi­ters stand in sol­i­dar­ity with the peo­ple of Ire­land against water charges and the pri­va­ti­za­tion of our pub­lic water sys­tems,” wrote orga­niz­ers with the group Detroit Water Brigade. “We are not strangers our­selves to the esca­lat­ing attacks on the poor­est mem­bers of soci­ety col­lec­tively known as ‘austerity.’”

Fol­low­ing the day of action, the Right2Water cam­paign will a national People’s Assem­bly on Inter­na­tional Human Rights Day, Decem­ber 10, to “vis­i­bly and vocally cel­e­brate and rein­force our human Right2Water.” A con­tin­gent from the Detroit Water Brigade is also expected to attend.

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