The ECI
collected more then 1.85 million signatures after a long campaign that started
in May 2012 and submitted these to the national authorities in September 2013.
As the first ECI we submitted the signatures to the national authorities for
validation.
“It is a
great satisfaction to the supporters of the ECI that we can now, on human
rights day, announce that we have the certified minimum number of signatures
required” says Jan Willem Goudriaan of the citizens committee. “The
ball now moves in the Court of the European Commission to listen to the voice
of people and propose legislation to implement the human right to water and
sanitation in European law”.
While not all
results are back yet, based on the certificates received from the national
authorities the ECI has collected more than 1 million valid signatures and
passed the minimum threshold in more than 7 countries (Spain, Italy,
Luxembourg, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Slovakia, Slovenia, Greece,
Lithuania and Finland) countries. When all the certificates are back we will
submit our demands officially to the European Commission. So far we have over
1.5 million valid signatures.
The demands of
the ECI “right2water” are:
For the EU to recognise the UN right
to water and sanitation into EU law
Not to liberalise water services in
the EU
To contribute to achieving access to water and sanitation for
all across the world
According to
the World Health Organization, 780 million people lack access to drinking
water, including in Europe. The European Environmental Agency stated in 2012
that more than 50% of the rural population in 10 EU countries have no access to
improved water or sanitation. This has a direct impact on their health.
We have used the ECI campaign as a tool to commit to the
human right to water and sanitation. It is a tool to change the mind-set in the
European Commission from a market-based approach with the focus on competition
to a rights-based approach with the focus on public services. It aims to
achieve universal (global) access to water and sanitation and to safeguard the
limited public water resources for future generations.
Today, on
human rights day, we think we have made a big step to bring the realisation of
the right to water and sanitation closer to all the people whose rights are not
fulfilled yet and a big step in defence of those who see their rights
threatened by corporate interests. We also made a major advancement towards
more participation of citizens in EU decision-making. The European Commission
will give its answer on how and what it will do in three months.
For more information contact Pablo Sanchez , psanchez@epsu.org 0032 (0) 474 62 66 33
