Water that is tea-colored or coffee-colored, foul-smelling and undrinkable; water available only at midnight or early morning, some days with no water at all, only air comes out of the tap for several minutes but the meter keeps running; expensive and continually rising water service fees—these are the deplorable conditions and ordeal of residents who have been under PrimeWater’s water supply service for several years.

Privatization of water service

PrimeWater Infrastructure Corporation (PrimeWater) is a company owned by the largest bourgeois comprador family in the entire Philippines, the Villar family. Across the country, PrimeWater controls up to 130 water districts from cities and municipalities through joint venture agreements (JVA). An estimated 16 million people depend on it.

The JVA places local water districts (LWD) under a public-private partnership (PPP) with PrimeWater. This system turned water service from being a public utility to a private enterprise.

In the JVA, the company binds LWDs to 25-year contracts. PrimeWater takes charge of the operation, repair, development, and construction of infrastructure, maintenance of the water supply and septic management system, and collection of service fees. PrimeWater also sets the rate increases and service charges as part of its supposed fund for service development. LWDs are merely tasked with monitoring.

Contrary to the promises in the JVA, LWDs have for several years complained about PrimeWater’s blatant non-compliance of contracts, resulting in failed service to the areas they supply with water throughout the Philippines. The Commission on Audit has also repeatedly pointed out PrimeWater’s non-compliance with its contract, failure to provide sufficient funds or investment for service improvement, and the decline in LWD income while PrimeWater earns more in terms of profit sharing and other anomalies.

Terminating PrimeWater

From mounting complaints about PrimeWater’s rotten service, the filing of petitions, launching press conferences, noise barrages, to filing formal complaints, residents and organizations advocating for the right to water service have undertaken various forms of collective action. This compelled LWDs and local government agencies to investigate, act, and terminate the contract with PrimeWater.

The LWD of San Jose Del Monte issued a resolution ending the JVA with PrimeWater on April 3, the province of Quezon on April 30, and the Metro San Fernando Water District in La Union on May 8.

Meanwhile, Camarines Norte Water District filed a Notice of Intention to Pre-terminate the JVA with PrimeWater on January 20, as did the City of San Fernando Water District in Pampanga on May 1. Leyte Metropolitan Water District in Tacloban City also expressed its intention to revoke the JVA on May 5.

The call of Bacolod residents and those living in Tierra Nova Subdivision, Barangay Bagumbong, Caloocan, to end the PrimeWater JVA in their area is also mounting and gaining strength.

In Congress, party-list representatives under Makabayan filed House Resolution 2279 on May 6, urging Congress to investigate PrimeWater’s JVAs with more than 130 LWDs nationwide. Rep.Arlene Brosas of Gabriela Women’s Party called for the immediate enactment of House Bill 10150 or the Anti-Privatization of Public Water Systems Act.

PrimeWater consumers and Bayan Muna also filed a complaint in Malacañang on May 8 to urge Ferdinand Marcos Jr to terminate all JVAs with PrimeWater due to its repeated failures and legal anomalies.