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Specialists say that no large center in the Northeast needs the waters of the São Francisco to supply its population. This is only the pretext. What is certain is that 70% of the water to be diverted will go for irrigation, industry, and shrimp farming. In any event, let’s say that the project will supply twelve million people in the urban environment. This would be the noble motivation. What the men behind the diversion don’t talk about is that in Northeastern Brazil there are 2.2 million families spread throughout the barren lands—the so-called diffuse population—which means approximately 12 million people. This is the population that lives with constant insecurity with regard to water, both from the quantitative and qualitative points of view, as well as in terms of regularity of access to water.

 

Diversion vs. the Human Right to Water

Roberto Malvezzi (Gogo)*

 

1 – The Question

            The diversion of the São Francisco is the type of cadaver that, no matter how many times it’s buried, it is resuscitated an equal number of times, even if it has the face of a mummy. The last person to raise it from the tomb was the Lula government. This time, with an imperial decision to do so, running like a bullet train over whomever might be on the tracks. Once started, it isn’t certain if the work will be completed.  If completed, it isn’t known how long it will last. What is certain is that it will use up a great deal of public funds and sow discord in the relations between the northeastern states. The government doesn’t seem to be aware of the damage it’s causing.

            On TV the project looks like the redemption of the Northeast. One PT spot even said that the transfer will “end Northeastern drought.” This would be laughable if it wasn’t hilarious; tragic if it wasn’t a disaster. How one party, built on the blood and sweat of so many poor and dreaming Brazilians could come to this, only history can attempt to explain. Freud and Marx certainly can’t explain it.

            Well, one of the promises made for diversion is the human supply of sedentary populations in the semi-arid zone. The text of the project itself is contradictory, at times speaking of 12 million persons, at others 8 million, and so on. This would be for supply of the large urban centers of the Septentrional Northeast, including Fortaleza. Specialists say that no large center in the Northeast needs the waters of the São Francisco to supply its population. This is only the pretext. What is certain is that 70% of the water to be diverted will go for irrigation, industry, and shrimp farming. In any event, let’s say that the project will supply twelve million people in the urban environment. This would be the noble motivation.

 

2 – What the defenders of Diversion don’t say

            What the men behind the diversion don’t talk about is that in Northeastern Brazil there are 2.2 million families spread throughout the barren lands—the so-called diffuse population—which means approximately 12 million people. This is the population that lives with constant insecurity with regard to water, both from the quantitative and qualitative points of view, as well as in terms of regularity of access to water. I have said this before, but this is the migrant population, the population which figures in the music of Luis Gonzaga, the paintings of Portinari, the novels of Graciliano Ramos, the poems of João Cabral de Mello Neto. This population lives in this state because it doesn’t have the minimum infrastructure needed to capture water in rainy seasons and store it for normally rainless seasons. Thus it is exposed to any variation in nature. In short, this population has its human right to water permanently, systematically, massively violated.

            Ignoring this population is the historical and systematic attitude of all development projects ever proposed for the Northeast. Insecurity with regard to water cannot be explained without the “drought industry.” Although widely cited in the social literature of the Northeast, it doesn’t always provide an exact picture of what this means. First, it means the enrichment of a restricted elite with the goods meant to ameliorate the problems of the poorest sector in times of drought. But the drought only exists because the population doesn’t have adequate infrastructure to deal with variations in a climate such as a semi-arid one. Therefore, the drought industry signifies the perpetuation of the people’s misery, principally their need for water and food, in order to sustain the power of an oligarchy that lives at the expense of popular misery. Therefore, we are not only facing expertise on self-enrichment based on the suffering of others, but also a power-project that sustains itself on thirst and hunger.

 

3 – Why, then, don’t the men behind the diversion talk about this diffuse population?

            Precisely because the situation of this population will not be changed by the Diversion, simply because it is outside the scope of the project. As we already have said, we will never really see the transferred water. Thus, what we mean to say is that drought, carro-pipa, the migrations, hunger, thirst, all of this will continue as before in the Colonels’ sertão. When asked, the men behind the diversion say: “we are going to provide cisterns and drill deep wells for this population.” The truth is that this is a verbal concession to justify the diversion, without any practical consequence. Who really has to deal with living with the semi-arid conditions, and the supply of water for human consumption for these populations, is civil society. From here on, perhaps for many years to come, all federal resources invested in the Northeast will go to the diversion, should it go ahead. It won’t only eat up public funds, but will also block the massive investment required in what would be necessary. The key problem is that, if the Lula government doesn’t have a plan for Brazil, much less does it have one for the semi-arid region. Then it furnishes its ineffectiveness with a mega-work such as this.

 

4 – The priority is the thirsty human being and the watering of animals

            The priority of “human consumption and watering of animals” is written into our Hydric Resources law no. 9433 of 1997. This is a law based on the economic value of water, not its biological, environmental, and social value. However, although restricting human priority for situations of scarcity, it does give priority to humans and animals. Legally, therefore, the priority of any governmental action in the semi-arid region with regard to water, should be to prioritize those who don’t have even a cup of clean water to drink. However, contrary to the gist of the law, and to common sense as well, the government is giving priority to a work that will carry water to irrigate fruit and grow shrimp. Without a doubt, this is proof of the government’s attitude toward human rights in its policies.

            This legal priority is absolutely obvious, as without water no being can remain alive. It is a natural right. But the water merchants, both at the national and international levels, differentiate between natural right and positive right, recognizing water only as a human need, not a human right. Astonishingly, they differentiated between need and right. For the classic right, need was a natural right, without requiring positive recognition.

 

5 – The fight is a global one

            Today, recognizing water as a human right is a globalized battle. However, its recognition suffers resistance from governments, transnational water enterprises, and multilateral organisms. They prefer water to be only a need. Their wisdom is impressive! But it is a way to “draw the chestnut out of the fire with a cat’s paw”. Not recognizing water as a human right frees governments from international monitoring, from being judicially actionable at the national level, and water enterprises are free to charge whatever price they want and cut off water supply to whoever can’t pay for it. In short, everything just the way the devil likes it, including the globalized devils. Thus, it isn’t surprising that the Brazilian government is also attempting to block recognizing water as a human right. This debate is shown in the changes in water legislation proposed by the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil. The word from the central government is: “water as a human right written in law, no.”

            It must be noted that the Diversion, grounded in the philosophy that sustains it, fits into today’s globalized mercantile logic regarding water. What can be called a hydrobusiness. Thus, we repeat that the Diversion is “the last drought industry work and the first hydrobusiness work.” Now even CHESF talks about creating “water auctions,” i.e., it’s no longer looking to use water for irrigation or shrimp farming, but to sell it like any other merchandise, as if in Brazil someone were the owner of our water.

            In this sense, we are no longer confronting simply the Colonels of the sertão, but powerful interests of the entire world and the globalized Brazilian elite. When the men behind the Diversion go unquestioned, they say clearly that the Diversion will enable fruit production and shrimp farming at more competitive prices, since production will be much closer to ports –say, Pecem in Ceará—facilitating access to markets throughout the world. At this moment, human priority is simply ignored. When challenged, they raise the flag of the twelve million people in the urban centers. However, even economically, this water will be so expensive that, if not subsidized, it wouldn’t be economically competitive at all. Today, on the banks of the São Francisco, several Codevasi settlements are unsuccessful precisely because they can’t manage to pay the price for water and maintenance of irrigation infrastructure. In short, the pretext is the people, the objective is the market.

            However, marrying practice and theory, diversion and water as a human right, we are in the early stages, as always. Even this time around we won’t have a serious development project for the Brazilian in the semi-arid region. As for those who live in a state of hydric insecurity in our region, they are still going to be very thirsty. Those who defend water as a human right are still nothing more than a drop of fresh water in a salt water ocean.

 

* Roberto Malvezzi is a member of the National Coordinating (Committee) of the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT).