He is correct, and yet, will most people understand his point?

The kind of balkanised web he spoke about, as typified by Brazil's home-soil servers argument orIran's emerging intranet, is partially being driven by revelations of NSA and GCHQ mass surveillance. The distrust that it has brewed, from a political level right down to the threat of self-censorship among ordinary citizens, threatens an open web and is, said Berners-Lee,  a greater threat than censorship. Knowing the NSA  may be breaking commercial encryption services could result in the emergence of more networks like China's Great Firewall, to "protect" citizens. This is why we need a bit of anti-establishment push back, alluded to by Berners-Lee. 

I guess he's defending Edward Snowden style pushback.