A relentless campaigner for environmental justice especially in the Niger Delta, Dr. Godwin Uyi Ojo’s experience in environmental activism spans about two decades. He is the executive director, Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria. Ojo in this chat with COPY EDITOR Peter Ekanem laments the deleterious effects of global warming and gas flaring on Nigerians especially those in the hinterlands, explaining why the organization is set on renewable sources of energy for the populace. Excerpts:
What is ERA/FoEN’s policy direction this year?
We have seen that it is getting more difficult to survive in Nigeria; we have seen that the economic realities is very difficult especially for rural dwellers, people who are not hooked up to the government salary and pay-off. As a result we looked critically at issues causing this impoverishment in Nigeria, we traced it to environmental degradation, the destruction of livelihood and the impact of oil activities in the Niger Delta is a case in point. Desertification has ruined the whole of the North, the Middle Belt, to the extent that their livelihood is also destroyed. In the East, you have gully erosion, in the West, deforestation has ravaged the people. So how will they survive? The Environmental Rights Action through my watch has set up a campaign to set up a National Basic Income Scheme (NABIS) for all unemployed Nigerians so that they can have stipends to fall back on monthly basis. This need not be huge sum of money, something like N10,000 or N15,000 will go a long way. The question you may want to ask is how will the money come? But Nigeria has enough money; the issue of NABIS is a security issue. It’s easy because some state governors have started implementing this, although on a skeletal basis. In Ekiti and Ondo states, the elderly are now on monthly stipends and that is a very good basis to start up with. I hear also of other governors in other states that are already paying some section of the society that are vulnerable. It can be done.
What is your Light Up Nigeria initiative about?
The ERA has championed a campaign on renewable energy. We know that the destruction of the earth does harm to it through the increasing or rising temperature, global temperature is warming up and as a result, it’s leading to climate change in extreme weather conditions, too much of rain or sun, that is the lot of the world. In other areas where there is no flood, flood has already started and the pattern of rain has changed. This is all traceable to carbon emission released into the atmosphere and the carbon emission comes from the way we use our energy that is dependent on fossil fuel. So we started the campaign on energy transition to ensure that we transit from fossil fuel to renewable sources of energy and in doing this, we are looking at energy sources that are decentralized, energy dependent on people to produce. It is small scale. This is what we have been campaigning for in the past five years or so. We are very delighted to say that the federal government has adopted this civil society view championed by ERA that Operation Light Up the rural people will depend on renewable sources of energy; that communities run and manage these. It is on a small scale and it therefore means this monopoly of energy that we are seeing in private hands will switch to the hands of the people, at least in the rural areas.
On climate change, we are experiencing rainfall in January, what significance does this hold for farmers?
If the situation of extreme weather condition continues, it might likely result in unpredictable pattern of the climate or the weather, such that the farmer is not able to predict when the rain will begin. And if they are not able to predict correctly as they normally do, then they would not be able to sow their crops and plant, which is a huge problem that might affect food production in a very negative way. If it happens, that means Nigeria will record food deficit and it might lead to food crisis if you don’t know when to plant. Seventy per cent of farmers in Nigeria depend on rainfall for agriculture; irrigation is very minimal, so you can see the enormity of the problem. If the rain starts now, the farmer can go and plant but the sunshine is still coming. These are examples of the impacts of climate change and how it may distort our environment which will in turn distort the pattern of production and that is what we are against.
Could we say that human beings are the major cause of the deterioration of the environment or it’s natural?
There is a consensus from the intergovernmental panel on climate change, they have achieved 95 per cent consensus and say climate change issues is attributable to human factors especially due to our lifestyles, the pattern of energy production and consumption, the light, the electricity, the mega dams, and the petroleum dependency. These are the sources of green house emission that is saturating the atmosphere and preventing the sunshine from radiating back to the space.
How does your organization, being focused on environmental rights, go about its findings and gets the government to act upon its reports?
We interact and collaborate a lot with civil society groups, as well as with the government. At the last National Energy Policy Reform, ERA participated in the two sessions that took place. In other words, energy policy reforms are going on in Nigeria and we are pushing for renewable energy policy. We have been talking about renewable energy for a while and we think our campaign is now successful because government has adopted our position, which is that renewable energy sources is the right way to go and it will help to light up the rural areas because it will take years for this kind of infrastructures to be extended to villages in Nigeria. So we are now looking at how energy can be produced on a small scale and in the localities.
On the National Tobacco Control Bill (NTCB), what are you doing to ensure it is signed into law by the President?
I think we have done our work in the sense that the upper and the lower chambers of the legislative Assembly assented to the bill. They passed it and it is awaiting the president’s signature. The issue should be clearly devoid of politics, the issue is really about industry law bill. Tobacco industries are lobbying seriously that the bill should not be passed, they cannot do that at the expense of our people whose livelihood and health are affected. But at least, smoking publicly is banned.
It has been observed that the tobacco companies have a way of getting to the people especially through scholarships?
If they continue to do that, we are prepared to go to court and it is a violation of all forms of corporate campaigns, anything that will promote the young ones to smoke is negative.