Global North Pushing Africa Into Water Privatisation, Says Corporate Accountability Director

As activists across Africa mark the 5th Africa Week of Action Against Water Privatisation, Neil Gupta, Water Campaign Director at Corporate Accountability, has accused powerful governments and institutions in the Global North of driving policies that threaten public control of water on the continent.

Speaking during the launch of the Week of Action under the banner of the Our Water Our Right Africa Coalition (OWORAC), Gupta said defending water is “defending life itself,” warning that water must never be treated as a commodity for corporate profit.

“Unfortunately, there is an entire industry that seeks to exploit our need for water,” Gupta said. “Multibillion-dollar corporations and their wealthy shareholders — mostly based in the Global North — have made fortunes by taking over community water systems around the world.”

He described Africa as a key target for these corporations, accusing multinational firms of disguising their operations under so-called public-private partnerships.

“We can’t be fooled — this is about corporate control of water,” he said. “Privatisation shifts the goal from ensuring universal access to maximizing profit for corporations and shareholders.”

Gupta warned that water privatisation often results in unaffordable tariff hikes, job losses, and poor service delivery, undermining people’s rights and livelihoods.

He also linked the issue to the climate crisis, arguing that private control of essential resources hinders long-term planning and climate resilience.

“The short-term profit incentives of private companies are fundamentally incompatible with the long-term investments the climate crisis requires,” he said.

Gupta named French multinationals Veolia and Suez as two of the world’s biggest water privatizers, accusing them of raking in billions annually while leaving a “decades-long track record of abuse.” He said their expansion into Africa has been actively enabled by institutions such as the World Bank, IMF, and government-backed development agencies in the Global North.

Citing examples, he said the U.S. government is supporting a multimillion-dollar corporate water scheme in Lagos, Nigeria, while Kenya faces mounting pressure from the World Bank to privatize bulk water supply projects. He also pointed to France’s state ownership in Veolia and Suez, calling it a “glaring conflict of interest.”

“The French state stands to benefit financially from lining up projects for these water privatizers across Africa, as it did just a few months ago for Suez in Gabon,” he noted.

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According to Gupta, these examples show how deeply entangled Global North governments are with the water privatisation industry. He urged African movements, communities, and workers to strengthen their solidarity in resisting corporate takeovers.

“Building the power of communities and workers as a counterweight to these schemes is at the heart of what brings us together today,” he said. “We are not just defending water — we are defending dignity, justice, and life itself.”

The Africa Week of Action Against Water Privatisation, coordinated by OWORAC, brings together civil society organisations, trade unions, and grassroots movements from across the continent to campaign for publicly controlled, equitable, and climate-resilient water systems.