By Fatima Saka
As the whole world is intense with global warming,
the Executive Commissioner, Cameroon Human
Right Commission and President, AIWO, Central
Africa Network, Mrs. Hawe Hamman Bouba, has
called on the African continent, most especially the
Africa Union to fight for the pledged made at the
COPs and bring it to Africa.
Mrs. Bouba made this call at the NatureNews
second anniversary lecture and HEAD Awards in
Abuja.
According to her, climate change is very new,
people are still coming to terms with climate
change, its impact itself is not something that
communities, indigenous people and women get to
know about because they are feeling the impact of
climate change.
“The people we need are here. We had the Minister
of Environment. We had the Minister of Finance,
Budget and National Planning, we also had people
from the private sectors, important companies, like
coca-cola who are doing innovative issues on
mitigating. I think that for me I was satisfied with
the ceremony. I’m satisfied with the work that
nature news is doing with limited resources.
.
“Everyone is feeling the impacts of climate change,
whether you’re a minister or the President of the
Republic, you are feeling the impact of climate
change, if you have to stay or the air condition
because you cannot go out into the hot sun. You
have to have the impact of climate change, if you’re
from the Niger Delta where the pollution is so high
and the fish’s livelihoods, source. You are feeling it
more again,” she said.
The commissioner expressed that, if you are a
nomadic person who has to leave the North, go to
the South to look for pasture. You are the most
impacted! If you have to leave Nigeria to go to
Ghana, back to Cameroon and go to Central Africa
with your cattle to look for pasture and water. You
are highly impacted.
“The women, girls, youth and the communities are
more impacted, bearing the brunt of climate
change. I speak for them. That is why I am here. To
speak for indigenous people”.
In bridging the gaps of pledges made at the COPs
and Trust between Africa continent, Mrs. Bouba
said Africans had to stand up, though Africa is not
the polluter and the emitter adding that Africa is
very impacted, Africa has droughts, floods and that
the impact is very high in Africa.
“The problem is that Africa doesn’t have the means
to adapt, while international communities, the
global world adapt, the developed world have
resources to even mitigate.
“Africa doesn’t have enough resources even to
permit our community to adapt. So African needs
the resources and I think Africa put their resources
together because if we continue waiting for the
pledges every year from the COPs we will be waiting
for the next maybe by 2035 I think the worst
scientists in the world if we don’t do if the world
does not stand up to fight climate change by 2025
Living will be very difficult live on the earth. Africa
needs to stand up.
“The pledge has been made, the appropriate
amount of compensation for damages and loss has
been created already. Africa is waiting for the funds
but they said they will create an institution to
manage the funds.
“So you see there is already a problem. Who are the
people who will manage them? So these pledges
may linger before coming to Africa, because they
will put their big structure which is high educational
to manage the funding and what we will be having
in Africa will be something insignificant because
when they bring their own people, the Europeans
or the Americans to manage the funding in Africa
part of it or more than half of it will be going for
that institutional support and their salaries Africa
will finally end up having a lot of a lot of speeches
which are not heading off anywhere but Africa.
“And you can put conditions, they can condition
because the global world needs Africa to mitigate
climate change. I am the executive president of
Africa also a condition of permission as a member
of the working group on indigenous nations of the
African Commission on Human and People’s
Rights,” she stated.
