AGEYO'S ANGLE: No amount of talk will turn down the climate heat
The 7th Devolution Conference is nearing its close. This will for all practical purposes be the last such gathering of county leaders before the country heads to the next general election.
It is therefore noteworthy, nay, commendable that they chose
to focus on what is arguably one of the biggest threats to human existence as
we know it today, that is climate change.
I say this is commendable because, for the first time since I started covering such
issues some 20 years ago, an environmental issue is making such waves that it
can actually form the key theme of a gathering of top decision-makers in
government.
You see, when I was starting out, I remember how environmental stories such as pollution of rivers,
cutting down of forests, accumulation of garbage were seen as appendages of
news bulletins or buried deep inside the obscure pages of newspapers.
So much so that one politician on being appointed assistant minister of
health quite derogatively asked whether he was expected to go and plant trees –
he declined the job.
Indeed, even the outrage over the brutality unleashed on the
now deceased environmental icon, Prof Wangari
Maathai as she sought
to protect Karura
forest in the late 1990s, was more about the indignity and inhumanity of police
action, than the substantial issues of forest conservation that she stood for.
In fact, the story was packaged even internationally as part
of the political intolerance that characterised the 40-year year rule of KANU. In this respect, the late Maathai was way ahead of her time.
You must have seen the frenzy at the just-concluded climate
summit in Glasgow to
freeze any further destruction of forests by 2030 – not because we love
forests, but because we finally recognise the crucial role, they play in
keeping our planet cool and liveable.
And so, this week, climate change is not topping the agenda
in Makueni because it
has a nice sounding name or because some visionary leader somewhere in his
wisdom chose to put it front and centre. No, climate change has literally forced
its way onto the agenda of everyone all across the world.
The impacts are there for all to see and the costs are being
born by real human beings. We can no longer pretend we don’t know it
exists. Yet the lack of real commitment
to tackle this problem, is just as glaring.
Over the last two days, it emerged that of all the 47
counties in Kenya, only
six have set aside a specific fund to deal with the impacts of climate change.
Further, more than 10 counties are yet to pass any legislation on tackling
climate change.
So for all the right-sounding talk in Makueni, nothing will change until the
governors begin to put their money where their mouths are.
This conversation must now move from climate change to what
experts call climate action – both in terms of dealing with the causes of
climate change as well as the suffering it causes to ordinary Kenyans.
The county governments must now set aside part of their
development budget and ring-fence it for climate action. And a budget means
money, not figures on a piece of paper. They could start with simple actions
such as drilling boreholes and powering them using solar energy.
This would not only be good for the planet, but it would
also deal with the acute water shortage caused by drought that has since
increased in frequency and intensity owing to climate change.
Secondly, every county in this country has dumpsites. Now,
these are often a rich source of methane which is one of the gases that cause
climate change, yet it can also be harnessed to provide cooking gas for crucial
facilities such as slaughterhouses and even homes.
Counties must see biogas as a real alternative to firewood
and charcoal which are still used by more than 80 per cent of Kenyans for their daily cooking. Of
course, more charcoal and firewood means that more trees will have to die and
more forests will have to disappear.
Now, I have spoken about climate
change for some weeks now, not because it is my favourite subject or because it
is an exciting topic. But because it is important and has the potential of
rendering everything else irrelevant.
So I
end with a quote that the county bosses would do well to remember as they
conclude their summit. It is a tweet from Barack Obama,
way back in September
of 2014 which rings true today as it did then.
He said: “We
are the first generation
to feel the effect of climate change and the last generation who can do
something about it.” Enough said. And that is my
angle for the week.
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