On January 10 the citizens of El Alto took to the streets en masse to demand that their water system...be returned to public hands...In Cochabamba five years ago, the water contract with Bechtel and the Abengoa Corporation of Spain paved the way for rate increases of double and more for poor water users...In El Alto the chief complaint about the Suez/World Bank privatization is that it left tens of thousands of poor families with no access to water whatsoever.