In commemoration of Earth Day, the
PACJA Executive Director Mithika Mwenda said it would prove difficult in the
long run for states to spend so much on mitigation of the Covid-19 pandemic but
forget climate change, which has claimed many lives in Africa.
He referred to news that at least 48
people had been killed in the Democratic Republic of Congo, after it rained
only once.
In Kenya, landslides claimed at
least 12 lives overnight after flash floods. Many parts of the country have
suffered flooding, and thousands displaced.
As the world marked the 50th anniversary
of Earth Day, Mithika said it would be key for governments to help their
people, including the indigenous communities that interact with nature more
closely, to conserve them by ensuring the green climate fund reaches the
grassroots.
He said there were adequate
legislations to ensure climate actions, but countries were lacking in implementation.
The climate justice activist also indicated
that the Covid-19 and climate crisis were two dangerous evils running at
different paces but killing masses all the same.
“Coronavirus is running a short 100
metre race, while climate change is on a marathon. At the end of the day both
will have killed huge numbers and messed our economies,” he said.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres linked the global coronavirus recovery to the climate change crisis in a sharply worded message marking the 50th anniversary of Earth Day.
In a video address, Guterres urged nations to take advantage of the deep economic disruptions caused by the pandemic "to do things right for the future" by viewing it as a chance to move away from fossil fuels.
Calling the health crisis "an unprecedented wake-up call," the U.N. chief warned "there is another deep emergency -- the planet's unfolding environmental crisis."
Citing a decline in biodiversity, Guterres said climate disruption "is approaching a point of no return."
"We must act decisively to protect our planet from both the coronavirus and the existential threat of climate disruption," he said.
Guterres
called for an end to fossil fuel subsidies and urged governments to instead
funnel recovery money to "sustainable sectors and projects that help the
environment and the climate."
Mithika regretted that the UNFCCC’s
COP25 did not achieve much on climate action in Africa, and urged that the
African Group of Negotiators prepares well and employs better tacks to ensure
UN climate summit COP26, which has been pushed to 2021, achieves more on
tangible issues.
The COP26 was scheduled to take
place in Glasgow, Scotland in November.
“Climate change is foreseeable and
we can do something to avert much. If we did the right thing in good time,
there would be enough space for us to focus on emergencies like Covid-19,” said
Mithika.
The situation, Mithika said, was
scary for developing countries as a lot of donor countries were busy grappling
with the Covid-19 pandemic in their own countries.
“Right now everyone is inward
looking and we can only beg. Why can’t everyone do their part on climate
action? We must think green, on a wider scale that would also include employing
agriculture in a magnitude that can ensure food security for any African and
poor nation,” he said, adding that conservation of every living thing’s habitat
would offer peace of mind to all.
By Kofi Adu Domfeh
