There are those who stand by and those who, on the other hand, work hard under the table. The "secret" plan to get "private" hands on water management in Sardinia is currently without fingerprints. Jurists define it as a "combined arrangement", for astronomy scholars a sort of "astral convergence", in reality it is a set of pieces which, although apparently autonomous, point to a single objective: to privatize Sardinian water. A "taciturn" plan made up of noisy silences, delays, omissions, malfunctions, debts and even budgetary losses, evident and beyond. A devastating picture, two years after the end of the concession for the integrated water service in Sardinia.
The silence of the blitz
The news on the privatization of the water resource, to be completed by 2025, reported yesterday exclusively by the Unione Sarda , was supposed to remain armored in the offices of the building, without disturbing the maneuverers of an operation punctuated by "secret" official documents and a "pass ” silent and accomplice. The diktat of the European Union, which requires the Sardinian Region to entrust the management of the water service to private individuals, published yesterday by our newspaper, is the latest act of a plan that comes from afar, built down to the smallest detail by those who for years have pursued, from inside and outside the island, the "private" mission for the governance of water in Sardinia. The reckoning materialized with a "European" act that no one, neither officially nor politically, has dreamed of questioning, keeping it nailed in the drawers of files to keep track of. In fact, on 27 March last Europe communicated to the Region, through the Italian Ambassador in Europe, the decision to reject without appeal the request for extension of the concession for the management of the water service. To date, there hasn't been a single leap about that "either aut" from Brussels, much less an act that challenges or opposes that decision, almost as if that denial was hoped for and welcome.
Wake up late
The age-old plague that clumsily tries to dissolve all responsibility lurks once again in the usual litany: Europe said so. In reality, the game is quite different, above all in light of the fact that the European competition offices have not ruled on the merits, but on the timing of the request made by the Sardinian Region. Manuel Martinez Lopez was clear: you woke up late, when the aid plan had already ended. Impossible, for the European conciliabolo, to correct an act that had in fact already been "exhausted" for two years. One fact is certain: the Region's request to extend the expiry of the agreement by three years, from 2025 to 2028, restoring the old date, has never called the privatization plan into question. On the contrary, with the request for an extension, out of time, and the consequent response from the European buildings, the plan for the transfer to private individuals was effectively endorsed, through an international tender for the water service in Sardinia.
Pnrr, the double face
The request made by the Sardinian Region through the Italian Embassy in Brussels was not only soundly rejected, but allowed Europe to ratify a position without appeal. The Brussels bureaucrats write in the letter addressed to Sardinia: «Italy's Pnrr contains numerous commitments on public procurement and competition. In particular, the Pnrr provides that Italy speeds up the tenders for the award of contracts, and increases the tenders for the award of local public service contracts. However, the intention of the Italian authorities to postpone the tender for the award of the integrated water service in Sardinia contradicts these commitments". In other words, with the mere request for postponement you are undermining the relationship of "subjection" signed in the act of approval of the Pnrr. On that occasion, in fact, Italy not only accepted those financial resources, but undertook to "increase the tenders for the award of local public service contracts". Also in this case for the strong countries of the European Union that "kind" financial concession badly concealed a significant counterpart: on the one hand they granted Italy 209 billion of the Pnrr, a non-repayable part and a more substantial one to be repaid, but on the other they have imposed on the Bel Paese the obligation to privatize essential services, starting with water. And, in this context, it is no secret that French, Spanish and German companies are ready to take over public services far and wide, from water to wind energy, especially the Island of Sardinia.
Draghi's pact
In essence, with the approval of the Pnrr, Draghi and company have undertaken to privatize water, endorsing the already devastating choice of the Sardinian Region which, although it could, has done nothing to prevent the advent of private individuals in the government of the Sardinian water. At stake is a complex regional water system that has aqueduct management for 345 municipalities, 346 purifiers in operation, 12,117 kilometers of water networks between supply and distribution, 6,391 km of sewage networks, 749 accumulation tanks. An impressive public heritage, more often than not managed with patronage logic rather than with the necessary efficiency, confused and horizonless planning, works financed for hundreds of millions of euros for decades that have remained blocked due to ineptitude and negligence.
Water governance, the hole
Not to mention the issues relating to the governance of water resources, a single figure would suffice. In Abbanoa's newly approved balance sheet (at a loss of 11 million), there is a disturbing figure: as of 31 December 2022, the bad debt provision had reached a mountain of 446 million euros. In practice, money that the water company claims to be about to lose permanently, due to non-payments or due to prescribed sums. A chapter, that of the management of the Region's in-house company, which alone is one of the most delicate elements given that, in the last 20 years, privatization has been implemented de facto, by transferring important and decisive management assets directly to private individuals, to starting with the mega contract for purification awarded for 90% to the Spanish Acciona, a multinational that has been moving inside the regional buildings for some time like a landlady.
Billion dollar contract
If serious and concrete action is not taken, both strategically and legally, to block in any way the international tender to privatize the management of water resources in Sardinia, there will be a dizzying upward race in the cost of water and overall service, considering that the private individuals who will eventually manage the water resource will not open a branch of the “ Fatebenefratelli ” association on the island. In short, it will not be a race to see who will make citizens pay less, but probably the exact opposite. At the basis of the contract there will be two macro evaluations to compete: the technical offer and the economic one. In the first, the most discretionary in the evaluation, service levels, quality standards, organizational and management models, maintenance and infrastructure plans will have to be proposed. In the second, on the other hand, a purely economic offer is envisaged, both for investments and for the water tariff. Using the minimum parameters for a contract of this magnitude, a "basic cost" of the service of 270/300 euros per capita per year can be assumed. Using the lowest calculation basis, the deal reaches frightening figures: 405 million euros a year, which multiplied by the 18-year concession would become almost eight billion euros. Finally, only multinationals with an annual turnover of at least half a billion can compete for the tender. Sardinia and Sardinians are served.
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