(02/13/2004) Since the Philippine government privatized the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) in 1997, consumers in Metro Manila, including Quezon City, have been burdened by rising water rates and poor water services. Two private concessionaires – Maynilad Water Services Inc. of Benpres and French water giant Suez; and Manila Water Company Inc. of the Ayala Corporation and American company Bechtel – have taken over the supply of drinking water. The privatization of Metro Manila water is known the world over as a failure. Ironically, pushed by the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, privatization schemes are also cooked up outside the capital, including Laguna, Iloilo and Bacolod.

The Water for all Network, which was launched recently, has planned a number of activities to denounce the privatization of water. As they believe water resources are part of the national patimony, they also oppose big dam projects like the San Roque Dam in the Cordillera region.

(12/31/2003) The Filipino masses are not likely to forget 2003 for a long time. They will most probably remember this year as one of the worst in recent history.

Aside from a crisis-ridden economy which the government tried to veil with lies (with hardly any success), the different basic sectors of the people had to put up with their own litanies of misery.

The workers, in this centennial year of Labor Day observance in the Philippines, had to endure high unemployment. The peasantry found themselves poorer than in previous years. Likewise the urban poor suffered from an acute lack of jobs, social services--and hope.

IMC-QC presents a series of yearend reports from Bulatlat.com.