Access to water resources including safe drinking water is a fundamental human right. There is no denying that there is a need for efficient water resource management in the country. And yes, Malaysians would prefer to receive clean drinking water as opposed to receiving dirty and contaminated water at home.

But water resources should not be subject to private ownership and full cost recovery. This strategy would involve removing subsidies and cross subsidies and would burden the poor and would remove the social safety protection of the rakyat which is the responsibility of the government.

Fomca believes that water must be identified primarily as a public good and a human right and not simply as a commodity to be traded in the open market. The state has an important obligation in ensuring that the country's water resources remain in the hands of the public sector.

In a privatised environment, peoples' access to water will be a function of affordability, and no longer as a need or right to sustain life and livelihood. Specifically, the business decision to allocate scarce water resources between competing users will be predicated on affordability and profitability.

Thus, to exercise control over the distribution and access to water amounts to controlling people's access to water, their livelihoods and their right to life.

Water is a critical resource for the reproduction of the individual, the family and sustainable livelihood. There is no substitute for water. However from a business and investment perspective water as a scarce resource commands a high price and thus is a source of huge profits, such as oil and gold.

In this environment, privatisation of water resources will favor the rich and not the poor. Furthermore, in a privatised environment market forces and profit motive subordinates human and society's fundamental needs and rights.

Foreign control

Water resources of this country can potentially come under the control of private individuals or foreign corporations. The General Agreement on Trade and Services, currently negotiated at the World Trade Organisation makes possible the foreign acquisition of our water resources, since water is no longer provided for by the government as part of government services. The European Union has requested that the Malaysian government open up its water resources as part of its GATS obligation.

Potentially, this could mean that the decisions affecting investments, pricing and distribution of water can come from some corporate board room outside of the country such as in France or Germany. Essentially, privatisation makes possible the loss in the political and economic control of domestic natural resources.

Privatisation is being put forward as the solution to resolve the problem of scarcity and to promote efficient use of water resources. This is an absurd claim. The need to create profits and conserve water resources at the same time is a conflicting proposition. Profitability is a function of an increase in demand for water. This would require water corporations to process and churn out more water for consumption. Profitability will promote a greater shareholder value for water companies, as well.

On the other hand, water conservation would entail less consumption and thus less profit. Simply put, privatisation would undermine conservation practices and worsen existing scarcity of water resources. In this conception water resources will not be protected nor conserved as a common good of humanity.

Human right

The access to water as a human right is stipulated in the various United Nations covenants, agreements and international law. It can be categorised into two categories. Water is both an implicit and explicit right. The European Council of Environmental Law chairperson Alexandre Kiss suggested that the right to water is one of the first substantive environmental rights recognised internationally.

Water as a human right is explicitly enshrined in the Convention of the Rights of the Child (1989 ) and implicitly, as a precondition in the "component elements of an adequate standard of living" in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) . Article 25 of the Declaration indicates "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well being of himself and of his family, including food, clothinghousing (UN General Assembly, 1948).

Clearly, Article 25 cannot be satisfied without access to water as an implicit right and a component element. This is because adequate quantity of water of sufficient quality is required to maintain human health and well being in order to satisfy Article 25.

The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESR) 1966 supports the notion that the right to water as an implicit right. Central to the ECOSOC rights is that governments have a legal obligation to ensure that their citizens enjoy the right to water.

In November 2002, the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in its General Comment No 15 indicated that the right to water was a human right. International human rights laws require that governments take immediate steps, to realise the right to water. Thus, governments have a responsibility to respect, fulfill and protect this right.

Alternative ideas

Moreover, international human rights also require that governments are held accountable for their conduct in relation to their human right obligations. Water as an essential public good takes priority over water as an economic commodity.

1.The government has to consult the people before it decides to privatise water resources. It should involve a through evaluation of the failure of existing policies before the next course of action is identified.

2. The government needs to explain to the rakyat why it is abdicating its constitutional responsibility and development goal that it has embraced all these years vis--vis water.

3. Sustainable and alternatives ideas for overcoming existing problems has to be debated before privatisation ideas are pushed forward as the best way of organising the provisioning of water resources.

4. All documents relating to water privatisation has to be made public as a way to ensure peoples' participation and transparency. Furthermore all existing water privatisation contracts must be made public and placed before parliament and the Dewan Undagan Negri's for debate, discussion and scrutiny.

CHARLES SANTIAGO is a consultant to the Federation Of Malaysian Consumers Association (Fomca) on trade and economic issues.