By Chuks Oyema-Aziken
Director, Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF), Rev. Nnimmo Bassey, has again advised that the exploitation of nature’s gifts must be conducted in manners that do not disrupt or breach the cycles of nature.
He gave the advise at the 2nd Nigeria Socioecological Alternatives Convergence held at Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua Centre, Abuja, on Monday
Bassey said the fabric of the social and environmental conditions of Nigeria are literally stretched to the limit.
“The threats emanate from local and global strands of the polycrisis wracking the globe. Exploitation, displacements, conflicts, climate chaos, socioeconomic inequities combine to threaten the tenuous fabrics holding our nation and peoples together.
“Desertification, deforestation, extreme water and air pollution, deadly floods, coastal and gul”ly erosion, insecure farms and diverse ecological devastations all merit a declaration of national environmental security state of emergency,” he said.
He noted that the widespread environmental challenges also provide clear platforms for collective work to salvage the situation in ways that political coalitions may not.
“Waiting before acting is a luxury the people cannot afford. The clarion call for action is urgent and critically existential. This reality inspired the Nigeria Socioecological Alternatives Convergence (NSAC).
“Regrettably at this second outing the conditions remain dire. We remain undaunted because we understand that the struggle for the change we need cannot be a sprint because it has to be a comprehensive overhaul of a system entrenched by indifference and lack of accountability.
“The socioecological alternatives we propagate must overturn the current predatory system of destructive extraction and shredded ecological safety nets. Our charter has to construct a Nigeria that is decolonial and post extractivist.
“The environment supports our life and exploitation of nature’s gifts must be conducted in manners that do not disrupt or breach the cycles of nature. As part of nature, humans have responsibilities and obligations regarding how we interact with our environment and other beings we share the planet with.
“Human activities contribute to the squeezing we are experiencing from desertification in northern Nigeria and the erosion washing away our communities on the coastline. Sixty-eight (68) years of extraction of fossil fuels has rendered the Niger Delta a disaster zone.
“Climate impacts and environmental genocide leave festering sores on the territory. Uncontrolled solid mineral extraction is poking holes across the land, and these combined with long abandoned but non-decommissioned mines are scars that we cannot ignore.
In his key note address, Climate Change Specialist, Prof. Emmanuel Oladipo, said if a nation’s environmental foundations are depleted, its economy may well decline, its social fabric may deteriorate, and its political structure may even become destabilized.
“Development will be meaningful if it does not increase a country’s vulnerability to environmental, climate change and complex socio-ecological impacts. Development seeing purely from economic growth view that is an increase in quantity cannot be sustainable indefinitely on a finite planet.
He said that Climate change is a major threat to the environment and sustainable development, now reaching a critical phase in our development stride.
“Having increasing potential to affect every part of the globe – recent devastating floods not only in Nigeria. Science has made enormous inroads in understanding the natural and human-induced forcings of climate change processes and their interactions, but a lot of uncertainties remain.
In his contribution, Jaye Gaskia, public affairs and political commentator and analyst, as well as a development specialist made a call for radical transformation in the extractive sector to make it beneficial for the citizens.
