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An #EndBadGovernanceInNigeria protestor in Abuja expresses his view on President Bola Tinabu. Credit: Promise Eze/IPS

By Promise Eze
ABUJA, Aug 6 2024 (IPS)

Thousands of Nigerians have taken to the streets to protest against bad governance, corruption, soaring inflation, and the rising cost of living, in what has been termed “10 Days of Rage” and believed to mirror Kenyan protests organized by the youth.

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country and a major exporter of crude oil, citizens claim that the benefits of the country’s resources do not trickle down to the masses but to a group of corrupt politicians.

The demonstrations, slated for the first ten days of August, gained momentum on social media, with the hashtag #EndBadGovernanceInNigeria accompanied by the slogan “10 Days of Rage.”

This follows the protests in Kenya, where young people engaged in six weeks of demonstrations over an unpopular bill that sought to raise taxes. Under pressure, President William Ruto retracted the bill and announced a cabinet shake-up.

There is no organized leadership for the Nigerian protests, but some of the demands include a total overhaul of the Nigerian system, including the reversal of economic policies implemented by President Bola Tinubu from his first day in office. A group is also clamoring for the unconditional release of Nnamdi Kanu, a leader of a proscribed secessionist group who was arrested in Kenya, extradited to Nigeria, and detained since June 2021. In the northern state of Kano there were demands the president step down.

Tinubu eliminated the contentious fuel subsidy and requested the central bank to stabilize the naira and control inflation, which experts say may improve the economy but has ultimately impoverished millions of Nigerians.

To appease Nigerians before protests began, the government hastily approved an increase in the minimum monthly wage from 30,000 naira (approximately USD 18.55) to 70,000 naira (USD 43.29) following pressure from labour unions. Observers note that this raise is negligible in the face of soaring inflation, which has exceeded 34%—its highest level in nearly 30 years—resulting in one of the nation’s most severe cost-of-living crises. Politicians promised to slash their salaries by 50% to help solve Nigeria’s hunger crisis.

Tinubu also held several closed-door meetings with leaders from across the country to appeal to Nigerians and quell the protests. Job advertisements in government institutions also made headlines.

Agabi Yusuf, a civil rights activist in Sokoto, Northwest Nigeria, argues that all of the “fire brigade”approaches to appeal to Nigerians to stop the demonstrations will not work because “Nigerians are hungry, and this time they have been pushed to the wall.”

“You don’t expect them to keep their mouths shut,” he told IPS.

Brutal Force

Yusuf is worried about the government’s brutal response to the protests. Human rights group Amnesty International reported that on the first day of the protests, at least 13 people were killed in clashes between protesters and police forces in various cities. Local media provided differing death tolls, with one newspaper claiming that up to 17 people were killed.

A 24-hour curfew was imposed in many parts of the country, including the northern state of Kano, which is the second-largest state and one of the country’s major voting blocs, following the looting of government and public properties there.

People defied the curfew, waving the Russian flag and chanting in the local Hausa language, calling on the president to step down and for the military to take over power. The police responded by killing no fewer than 10 people.

The Sokoto-based Yusuf, who was detained by Nigeria’s secret police on July 25 for attempting to organize youth to protest peacefully, said the threats and brutality from the government can only help but make things spiral out of control.

Yusuf told IPS that the security agency claimed he was part of those allegedly plotting to topple the government of Tinubu through the protests.

“The officers were just yelling at me. They locked me up in a very smelly room for about eight hours. In fact, they threatened that if anything went wrong during the protest, I would be held responsible,” Yusuf, a leader with the Northern Advocate for Good Governance, said.

Yusuf is not the only one who has been threatened and detained. According to Amnesty International, nearly 700 protesters, including journalists, have been arrested across the country while nine officers have been injured during the protests. The authorities are wary that the protests may mirror the deadly EndSARS demonstrations against police brutality in 2020, which resulted in deaths and injuries after security forces opened fire on unarmed protesters.

Oludare Ogunlana, Professor of National Security at Collin College in Texas, shares Yusuf’s views. He told IPS that suppressing people from protesting will result in very deadly repercussions.

“As we are appealing to the protesters to be orderly, we expect the security agencies to be cautious. If you use deadly weapons on people, then it will escalate and become uncontrollable. The people are simply telling the authorities to address their concerns, but the government has been indifferent.”

Nuredeen Hassan, a political analyst in Nigeria, argued that though the protests may have been inspired by what happened in Kenya, there were already signs that Nigerians may soon storm the streets. He noted that “people are really angry about the state of the country.”

“While Tinubu has only been president for about a year, his party has held onto power for nine years and only a few of the promises made over the years have been fulfilled. The country is getting worse and this has infuriated Nigerians,” he told IPS.

In the administrative capital Abuja, where residents are angered about the rising cases of kidnapping for ransom, police chased protesters and threw canisters of tear gas at them, injuring many. Security agencies shot live rounds at journalists and protesters, and indiscriminately arrested dozens.

Yakubu Muhammed, a reporter with Premium Times, a daily paper in the country, told IPS that while he was trying to film police officers arresting people, he was hit with the butt of a gun and dragged into a van. “Despite explaining that I am a pressman, they arrested me and seized my phone. In the van, I met four people. I was released some moments later,” he said.

Critics accused the security agencies of failing to protect protesters but rather choosing to give cover to allegedly government-paid thugs who, all over the country, are raising placards saying, ‘Say No To Protest’.

In Nigeria’s economic capital Lagos, thugs threatened and chased protesters while the police watched.

The Race For 2027

President Tinubu addressed the country on the fourth day of the protests. He pleaded for an end to the demonstrations but insisted that he would not reverse any of his economic policies.

His speech did not go well with the opposition who slammed him for not addressing the demands of the protesters. A former Vice President of Nigeria, Atiku Abubakar, said that Tinubu’s “speech neglects the pressing economic hardships that have besieged Nigerian families since the very beginning of his tenure.”

Ibrahim Baba Shatambaya, a lecturer in the Department of Political Science, Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, Nigeria,  is concerned that the President made no reference or condemned the killing of protesters in the country by security forces, despite his promise to hold onto the tenets of democracy and human rights.

“The protest is just one event which is an outcome of the poor performance of the government. If the government does not do the needful in actually reversing the trends of economic hardships in this country, the tendency is that the ruling political party may not likely have a field day come the subsequent round of elections in 2027,” Shatambaya said.

Ethnic Tensions

Peter Obi, a former governor of Anambra State in southeast Nigeria, was criticized by Tinubu’s media aide, Bayo Onanuga, for allegedly leading his supporters to organize the protests to remove the president from power. He referred to Obi’s supporters as members of the proscribed pro-secessionist group  Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) led by the detained Kanu. IPOB is agitating for an independent Biafra Republic which would be made up of Nigeria’s southeastern states-the home base of the Igbo tribe.  Onanuga claimed Obi, a presidential candidate in the last elections, is unhappy that he lost to Tinubu in a very tight race.

Obi has denied this claim and has taken legal action against Onanuga for defamation. Observers like the political analyst Hassan say this is just a reflection of the level of ‘Igbophobia’ meted out against the Igbos by some actors in the government and, if care is not taken, could lead to an ethnic crisis.

Organized Igbo-led groups in Nigeria’s southeast denounced and pulled out of the protests before they began, fearing there would be a bloody backlash against them if the protest spirals out of control. They fear that, just like in 1966, when thousands of Igbos were blamed and massacred for allegedly leading a revolutionary coup that saw the deaths of many influential leaders and eventually led to a nearly three-year civil war, they could be targeted for actively calling for Tinubu’s resignation.

Meanwhile, in the Yoruba ethnic-dominated Southwest, Tinubu’s home base, there are growing calls for Igbos to leave the region, which has been condemned by the national government.

Elsewhere in the north, where the protests have become extremely violent with many cities shut down, and workplaces, hospitals, and schools closed, rumors are spreading that the northerners, the majority of whom are from the Hausa and Fulani ethnic groups, are actively protesting against the government because they want Tinubu, a Yoruba man, to step down for one of their kinsmen.

“Some Yorubas are defending Tinubu like they are not seeing this hardship only because he is their kinsman. The Hausas and Fulanis that called protests un-Islamic are now at the forefront of violent protests. They want to make Tinubu a one-term president like the former President Goodluck Jonathan so that another northerner can take over power,” alleged Michael John, who lives in Abuja.

Meanwhile, Ogunlala told IPS that while ethnic propaganda may have been instigated by politicians for their self-interest, Nigerians should be concerned about the factors that have made the country difficult to live in.

“Whether you are from the north or the south, suffering and hardship unites all of us. I don’t think these protests should be viewed through ethnic lenses but rather should be about how the government should listen to the demands of the aggrieved citizens,” he said.

Owolabi Toyibat in Lagos, who is against the violent outcomes of the protests and believes the demonstrations may last for more than 10 days, fears that the protests with their different leaderships may spark riots, especially when the government continues to ignore the demands of the protesters.

“Looting of public and private properties will soon become the norm. While I believe that protesting is our right, there can never be a peaceful protest in Nigeria, and only very few protests have brought tangible changes in this country. Look at the protests in Kenya and how they ended in so much violence and loss of lives. Such will be the case in Nigeria,” she told IPS.

Abdullateef Abdullahi in Sokoto thinks differently.

“I believe protest is very essential until our demands are met, as it serves as the only primary means to draw our leaders’ attention to the national issues we face and to pressurize them for tangible reform of our nation,” he said, adding that “only the urgency of this protest can bring our leaders back to their senses and listen to our plight. We are being treated like slaves while they live in luxury. Does this not call for protests?”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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ECOWAS. Heads of State and Government of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in Abuja, Nigeria, July 7, 2024.

By Kingsley Ighobor
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 6 2024 (IPS)

The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was founded in 1975 to promote economic integration in the region. Forty-nine years later, the regional bloc boasts significant successes in integration, peace and security and good governance, but also faces some challenges.

ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Ambassador Abdel-Fatau Musah, participated in a high-level event at the UN headquarters in New York in June 2024, focusing on regional unity, peace and security in West Africa.

In an interview with Kingsley Ighobor following the event, Ambassador Musah, speaking on behalf of ECOWAS, highlighted the organization’s achievements and challenges, as well as ongoing efforts to strengthen integration. These are excerpts from the interview.

Ambassador Abdel-Fatau Musah, ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security

ECOWAS was founded on 28 May 1975. What are its achievements so far?

The achievements of ECOWAS over the last 49 years can be encapsulated in one key point: we have transitioned from creating an organization to building a community.

ECOWAS was created at the very height of the Cold War. The only possible area for people to come together and find common ground was economic integration, not political or ideological.

The protocol on the free movement of persons, goods and services (1976) permits citizens the right of abode in any member state and has been an ECOWAS calling card over the years. It is a major achievement that people in West Africa do not have to think about a visa when they cross borders within the region.

There was a lot of turmoil in Africa post-Cold War; without ECOWAS the whole region could have been engulfed in fratricidal wars. If you remember, a war started in Liberia towards the end of 1989 and continued throughout the 1990s, spreading to Sierra Leone and affecting Guinea and Côte d’Ivoire.

There is a lot the region can be proud of—the fact that ECOWAS is now a trademark, a pioneer in regional integration on the continent.

A: ECOWAS intervened through its multilateral armed forces, the Economic Community of West African States Ceasefire Monitoring Group (ECOMOG), which stabilized the situation and eventually provided a soft landing for the United Nations peacekeepers who came in subsequently.

On economic integration?

On economic integration, we can talk about many achievements. It is not just about the free movement of persons; it is also about creating a common market for the region. It is about helping countries develop infrastructure—energy, internet connectivity, and building road networks across the region.

This is ongoing. However, learning from the sad events of the 1990s characterized by civil wars and implosion of States, ECOWAS had no choice but to pivot to security matters and good governance.

Today, the values of democracy and human rights are very much embedded in West African culture, and ECOWAS is part and parcel of that process. West Africa is the only region in Africa that does not have an open, high-intensity conflict, despite the activities of Violent Extremist Groups.

There is a lot the region can be proud of—the fact that ECOWAS is now a trademark, a pioneer in regional integration on the continent. It provided a lot of the basis for the African Union’s frameworks.

ECOWAS morphed from an economic bloc into both an economic and political union. Is this correct?

Yes, it is.

Some ECOWAS members have indicated their intention to pull out of the group. Are there efforts to ensure they remain?

ECOWAS is a community. We have solidarity. We may have challenges or differences, but pulling out is not the answer. The countries intending to pull out talk about their Pan-African ambitions and other things, but the basis of Pan-Africanism is integration. Given that disintegration will not promote Pan-Africanism, we are doing everything we can to have them remain in the fold.

However, it is important to note that a country cannot just decide one day to withdraw from ECOWAS. There are procedures to follow, in accordance with Article 91 of the ECOWAS Treaty.

Several diplomatic engagements are going on behind the scenes to reunite the ECOWAS bloc.

What gives you hope these efforts will succeed?

What gives us hope is that ECOWAS held its extraordinary summit in February 2024 and lifted the severe sanctions against Niger, and we further encouraged them to return to the Community. We hope they understand that the advantages of being together far outweigh the disadvantages.

Talking about advantages, what further incentives do you provide these countries to encourage them to maintain their membership?

I spoke earlier about ECOWAS’ free movement of people, goods and services. About 10 million citizens of these countries are spread across the region. As we speak, 4.5 million Burkinabe citizens live in Côte d’Ivoire alone. If they withdraw from ECOWAS, the status of their citizens will change dramatically. They will have to regularize their stay, and those who cannot regularize will need to return to their countries.

We talk about trade liberalization. Intra-African trade is just about 15 percent. Within the ECOWAS region, exports from these three countries to other parts of West Africa do not go beyond 17 percent. What ECOWAS gets from them is meat products, vegetables and so on. Whereas they get energy and many manufactured goods from the other countries with virtually no tariffs attached.

The values of democracy and human rights are very much embedded in West African culture, and ECOWAS is part and parcel of that process.

Do not forget the three countries are landlocked. They will need outlets to the sea, which is being provided today under very favourable conditions within the framework of regional integration. If they pull out, they will have to find alternative outlets or pay higher freight charges and tariffs. It will take a lot of time and resources to do that.

We are also about community solidarity, which is something people take for granted. In fact, the three countries together consume more than 52 percent of the ECOWAS strategic food reserves, which is about 15,000 tonnes of food. Landlocked countries or those ravaged by cyclical droughts need such support.

Finally, the most effective way of combating violent extremism is by sharing intelligence and cross-border military cooperation. If they separate from us, how do they effectively fight violent extremists? We need them back in the family and I hope they rescind their decision.

Could their withdrawal have reputational consequences for ECOWAS?

A withdrawal will neither be good for them nor for ECOWAS because in international diplomacy today, strength lies in numbers. If we remain 15 member states, our influence in international diplomacy is greater. If they leave, ECOWAS will be weakened. This is something we must consider.

Remember that ECOWAS is an organization of solidarity. If you are seeking positions in international organizations like the UN and others, ECOWAS comes together and backs a candidate. For the sake of solidarity, we will back those who are within the community.

So diplomatically speaking, security-wise, politically, it is bad for both sides. But on balance, it is very much not in their favour.

Source: Africa Renewal, a United Nations digital magazine that covers Africa’s economic, social and political developments—plus the challenges the continent faces and the solutions to these by Africans themselves, including with the support of the United Nations and international community.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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By Anis Chowdhury, Khalilur Rahman and Ziauddin Hyder
SYDNEY, NEW YORK, WASHINGTON DC, Aug 6 2024 (IPS)

The International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) are complicit in the gross human rights violations and death of democracy in Bangladesh. They continued to supply financial blood line to the regime, well-documented for its corruptions, human rights violations – such as forced disappearances and tortures in custody – and riggings of votes, including politicization of state institutions in its slide into autocracy. This is despite their professed commitment to transparency, accountability and good governance (IMF, World Bank, ADB).

Anis Chowdhury

A democratically elected government must not bear responsibility for any loan agreements that these organizations had with a regime remaining in power through rigged elections. The financial support from these multilateral institutions have provided legitimacy to a regime which is regarded widely as illegal, thus enabled it to survive.

Continued life-line from the IMF, World Bank and ADB
The IMF approved Bangladesh’s US$4.7 billion bailout in January 2023. The first review of the bailout plan was cleared in December and gave Bangladesh immediate access to about US$468.3 million for its economy and about US$221.5 million in support of its climate change agenda.

On 21 June, 2024 the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors approved two projects totalling US$900 million. The Bank’s yearly commitment of loans increased from US$2 billion in 2015 to US$3 billion in 2018.

The (ADB) has been a major source of external financing in Bangladesh, providing an average of US$2 billion per year since 2016. As of 31 December 2023, ADB has committed 726 public sector loans, grants, and technical assistance totalling US$31.8 billion to Bangladesh. Cumulative sovereign and non-sovereign loan and grant disbursements to Bangladesh amount to US$23.52 billion.

Legitimizing an undemocratic regime
The government led by Sheikh Hasina retained power in successive terms since 2014 through rigged elections, unprecedented in the history of the country. She used her majority in parliament to change the constitution, especially the system of a neutral care-taker government to conduct elections, as well as to politicize state institutions with the sole aim of clinging to power.

Khalilur Rahman

The elections in 2014 were preceded by a severe government crackdown on the opposition, including widespread arrests, violence, attacks on religious minorities, and extrajudicial killings by the government, with around 21 people killed on the election day.

In 2018, the ballot boxes were filled the night before the election day. Following the rigged 2018 election, Deutsche Welle (DW) reported the findings of the Bertelsmann Foundation that Bangladesh has turned into an autocracy. Time Magazine in its cover story (30 Nov. 2023) expressed grave concerns about the fate of democracy in Bangladesh under the “Hard Power” of Sheikh Hasina. The New York Times (3 Sept. 2023) reported how “democracy in Bangladesh is quietly being crushed”.

The recent election, held on 7 January 2024, was a sham, was characterized by bans of the opposition candidates and boycotts by the main opposition party, ‘dummy’ candidates, coerced voting and a low voter turn-out.

Unfortunately, the IMF, the Bank and ADB turned a blind eye and continued to support the regime with a doubtful legitimacy. This has enabled the regime to become not only increasingly authoritarian, but also extremely corrupt.

Ziauddin Hyder

Enabling corruption
Laudably in 2012, the Bank pulled out of a project to build Bangladesh’s largest bridge, citing corruption concerns. However, it seems the Bank has been looking to absolve itself.

The Bank’s recently approved loan of US$900 million to Bangladesh is apparently for strengthening fiscal and financial sector and ensuring sustainable and climate-resilient growth. This time, the Bank seems not to care that around 54.40% of funding for climate change mitigation projects was embezzled or wasted through various irregularities and corruptions, and the country’s financial sector “has long been devilled by scandalous corruption”.

Bangladesh is the 10th most corrupt country in the world. As Sheikh Hasina’s regime turned into a kleptocracy after her winning power in 2008, nearly US$50 billion was siphoned off Bangladesh in six years (2009-2015). Money laundering by Bangladeshi elites is a “common knowledge”. The names of 89 Bangladeshis have appeared in the Paradise Papers and 6 Bangladeshis have been named in Pandora Papers of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).

There is a clear link between autocracy and corruption. The US has imposed sanctions on a former Army Chief for his “significant involvement in corruption”. A former Police Chief is also investigated for wide-scale corruption. Both played a significant role in undermining the democratic election process in Bangladesh and institutionalizing political repression.

A 2021 investigative documentary on Bangladesh, All the Prime Minister’s Men by Al Jazeera, exposed wide-scale corruption by powerful political and military figures connected to Sheikh Hasina herself.

Odious loans not a democratically elected government’s responsibility
Bangladesh is at a historic cross-road as it has just witnessed the demise of an autocratic and corrupt regime. In a re-born Bangladesh, the new democratically elected government should review all loan agreements of the corrupt and illegitimate regime, including those with China. If found dubious and the proportion lost in corruption, should be declared as “odious”.

As United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) emphasizes, the international law obligation to repay debt has never been accepted as absolute. The obligation to repay loans is limited only to the category or portion that are not deemed odious.

Anis Chowdhury, Emeritus Professor, Western Sydney University (Australia) & former Director of UN-ESCAP’s Macroeconomic Policy & Development Division.

Khalilur Rahman, former Secretary of the UN Secretary-General’s High-level Panel on Technology Bank for LDCs; former head of UN-OHRLLS’s Policy Development, Coordination and Monitoring Service for LDCs’; former head of UNCTAD’s Technology and Logistics Division, Management Division, Trade Analysis Branch and its New York Office.

Ziauddin Hyder, former Cluster Lead, World Bank

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Gatherer Cristina Poblete, from the town of Pichilemu, carries one of the sacks of freshly harvested seaweed. This coastal town in the O'Higgins region of central Chile is known worldwide for its large waves. Credit: Courtesy of Cristina Poblete

By Orlando Milesi
PAREDONES, Chile, Aug 5 2024 (IPS)

The number of organisations that bring together fisherwomen who seek to be recognised as workers, make their harsh reality visible and escape the vulnerability in which they live is growing in Chile.

These women have always been present in the fishing sector, but have been ignored, classified as assistants, and relegated socially and economically.

There are 103,017 registered artisanal fisherpeople in Chile, and 26,438 of them are women who work as seaweed gatherers on the shore, known as algueras in Spanish, and related tasks.

According to statistics from the government’s National Fisheries Service  (Sernapesca), in 2023 there were 1,850 artisanal fisherpeople’s organisations in Chile, of which 81 were made up of women alone.

The fisheries sector in this long and narrow South American country of 19.5 million people exported 3.4 million tonnes of fish and seafood in 2021, bringing in USD 8.5 billion.

Chile is one of the 12 largest fishing countries in the world, being its industrial fishery the most economically relevant.

Meanwhile, artisanal fishing is carried out in 450 coves or inlets where groups of fisherpeople operate from the far north to the southernmost point of the country, stretching 4,000 kilometres in a straight line.

Seaweed harvesting, which is mainly carried out by women, lasts from December to April. In the remaining seven months, the algueras barely survive on their savings and must reinvent themselves in order to earn an income.

The invisible seawomen

Marcela Loyola, 55, is the vice-president of Agrupación de Mujeres de Mar (Seawomen Group) in the coastal town of Bucalemu, which belongs to the municipality of Paredones. It is 257 kilometres south of Santiago and part of the O’Higgins region, bordering the southern part of the capital’s metropolitan area.

The Agrupación brings together 22 algueras, as well as fish filleters, weavers who sew and place the hooks spaced out in the fishing nets, and shellfish shuckers, who extract their edible meat.

“The main problem is that we fisherwomen are invisible throughout the country. We have always been in the shadow of our husbands. There is a lack of recognition of women also from the authorities, in society and policies,” she told IPS in the Bucalemu cove.

“There are many trade unions, but their projects only reach men, never anything that serves women. And we don’t have health, welfare, nothing”, claims Loyola.

Together with Sernapesca, her group launched an activity to legalise workers in artisanal fishery.

“We held an application day and a lot of people came because they didn’t have a licence.  In Bucalemu alone, 60 people signed up. Some had fishing credentials, but no permit to collect cochayuyo (edible brown seaweed) or in other related activities,” she explained.

Bucalemu also hosted a National Meeting of Women of the Land and Sea on 31 May, attended by more than 100 delegates from different parts of Chile.

Gissela Olguín, 40, coordinator of the national Network of Seawomen in the O’Higgins region, told IPS that the meeting sought to defend seafood sovereignty.

“We are working to learn from seawomen about food sovereignty. From the right to land, water and seeds, we analysed how people of the sea are threatened today because the inequality of the rural model is now being repeated on the coast,” she said.

Marcela Loyola, vice-president of Agrupación de Mujeres de Mar in the coastal town of Bucalemu, at a local tourist lookout point. Credit: Orlando Milesi / IPS

Women-only management area

Delfina Mansilla, 60, heads the Women’s Union of Algueras in the municipality of Pichilemu, also in O’Higgins, 206 kilometres south of Santiago. It brings together 25 members and is in charge of the La Puntilla management area, the only one given to women in central Chile.

The leader told IPS by telephone from her town that the management area has cochayuyo (Durvillaea antárctica) and huiro (Macrocystis integrifolia) seaweed, along with the bivalve molluscs called locos (Concholepas concholepas) as its main products.

The cochayuyo is extracted by going into the sea with a diving suit and using a knife to cut the stalk attached to the rocks so that the seaweed can grow back.  In the case of huiro, an iron barrette, called chuzo by the algueras and fishermen, must be used.

“Our main issue is that the men are bothered by our management area and come diving in. Some people don’t respect women and also go into an area that was given to us and that we have taken care of for years,” she said.

These women sell the locos to restaurants in Pichilemu, while the cochayuyo is traded “in green (the estimated extraction, not yet extracted)”, to middlemen in Bucalemu.

According to Olguín, there has been significant growth in women’s organising nationwide thanks to the Gender Equity Law, number 20820, passed in 2020.

“The labour of women have been invisible in the fishing sector, and even more so within the fisheries organisation because, although unions have women, they are in the minority,” she said.

The law, she explained, opened up the possibility for women to train and organise themselves.

In spite of this progress, male chauvinist mentality persists in the fishery.

“They believe women can’t be on the boats or they have smaller spaces for them in the cove. It is a behaviour of men who still think that women only help in the fishing industry, but don’t work in it,” she said.

María Godoy ties and prepares in her home in the coastal town of Bucalemu, in the Chilean municipality of Paredones, the packets of cochayuyo seaweed collected by her husband and daughter. Credit: Courtesy of Gisela Olguín

Critical situation of the algueras

The leader describes the situation of women seaweed gatherers as bad.

“The women who work at sea live and sleep in little shacks with minimal conditions. They don’t have water or electricity and everyone has to make do as best they can.  The same goes for sanitation, they have to make makeshift toilets,” she said.

It is hard work because the timetable is set by the sea, she adds. The first low tides can be at 7:00 am or sometimes at noon in summer, with the sun over their heads.

“Conditions are always a bit extreme. Throwing seaweed out when cutting the cochayuyo is a job requiring much physical strength,” she explained.

Since the working season is short, the women prefer to stay in the shacks, improvised dwellings made of sticks and cloth that are erected on the sand or ground resembling tents.

“Here, women stop going to the sea only when their bodies prevent them from doing so. I know women over 70 who are still working on the shore because that’s how they subsist,” she added.

Another determining factor is the price of seaweed, which is set by buyers and ranges from 200 to 500 pesos per kilo (between 20 and 50 US cents).

The fisherwomen work long hours to extract more product. “It is a very vulnerable sector, with no social security or cultural recognition,” Olguín concluded Olguín.

Hortensia, Sonia, Cristina and Elizabeth, four seaweed workers from the Chilean municipality of Pichilemu, in front of the municipal building where they will meet the deputy mayor, Sergio Mella. The workers are seeking a concession and municipal premises to exhibit and sell their handicrafts, soaps and various products made from seaweed. The sale allows them to subsist during the southern winter, when seaweed extraction is banned. Credit: Orlando Milesi / IPS

The threat to seaweed

Alejandra González, a doctor in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Chile, told IPS that some species of brown and red macroalgae found along Chile’s coasts are raw material for the food, pharmacological and medical industries.

This commercial value and high demand leads to direct extraction, “causing a reduction in natural populations and fragmentation, with a slow recovery rate of only those that survive harvesting”, she explains.

“This scenario makes populations less able to cope with environmental change, leaving them vulnerable to events such as Enos (El Niño), heat waves, increased tidal surges, changes in seawater pH, many of them associated with climate change,” she said.

Among the greatest threats to macroalgae are habitat destruction due to coastal port constructions, pollution caused by urbanization, and invasive species associated with ship movements and migrations.

Other threats are overexploitation related to human population growth, climate change caused by increased carbon dioxide (CO2) and its side effects, such as higher temperatures, storm surges and chemical changes.

According to González, the greatest threat to seaweed is the combination of all these variables.

Chile has developed various strategies for the conservation and management of natural seaweed meadows, but these measures are inadequate, argues the specialist.

“In Chile’s north, the exploitation of brown macroalgae from natural meadows is greater, because drying is free on the beaches themselves, but it is also affected by El Niño current events. While in the south it is necessary to invest in sheds or drying systems, it is more efficient to cultivate them because there are tamer bays,” she said.

González also believes that measures to recover natural seaweed meadows are not efficient “either because of legal loopholes, difficulties in on-site monitoring and/or other additional environmental variables such as those associated with climate change.”

In September 2024, world leaders will gather at UN headquarters in New York for the Summit of the Future, which aims to “forge a new global consensus on what our future should look like.” Credit: OpenAI’s ChatGPT Image Generator Via United Nations

By Simone Galimberti
KATHMANDU, Nepal, Aug 5 2024 (IPS)

Preparations are ongoing for the upcoming Summit of the Future, probably the most consequential initiative of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres so far.

The gathering, to be seen as a serious attempt at fixing some of the most intricate and enduring issues of our times, could help cement the Secretary General’s legacy as an idealistic architect of a stronger and more cohesive multilateral system.

To be held September 22-23, the summit will indeed provide a platform for the international community to discuss ways to strengthen and enhance global governance.

https://www.un.org/en/summit-of-the-future

Building on the proposals of Our Common Agenda, the comprehensive blueprint that Guterres presented in 2021, the gathering will see member states trying to broker an agreement on how to enhance some of the key pillars of multilateralism, fitter for the purpose.

The list of propositions is in-depth and exhaustive, covering several policy areas, namely Sustainable Development and Financing for Development; International Peace and Security; Science, Technology and Innovation and Digital Cooperation; Youth and Future Generations; Transforming Global Governance.

Each of these domains contains proposals, from restructuring the way multilateral financing system operates, including ensuring resources for the realization of the SDGs to enabling a stronger global governance centered on stronger mechanisms to prevent conflicts.

In an age of growing division, misinformation, and polarization, a new challenge paper recommends informing and engaging global citizens through innovative structural changes to the multilateral system. Credit: OpenAI’s ChatGPT Image Generator

They are now under intense negotiations and the final decisions will be contained in the Pact for the Future that is to be approved during the Summit. Yet while the aims and overarching goals of the Summit are nothing but praiseworthy, we should wonder if the proposals being discussed are truly transformational.

Moreover, linked to the above, is the international community engaged and invested enough in the discussions? What about the overall level of involvement and participation of the general public?

For sure, global civil society, from the South and the North, have been proposing a wide ranging of ideas that, if implemented, would represent a radical change.

While there is no doubt that Guterres is really trying to achieve something ambitious, at the same time none of the proposals up to discussion at the Summit for the Future represent truly game changers.

Rather they should be seen for what they are: important steps, potentially even incremental steppingstones towards much more radical and indispensable changes that the international community still unfortunately resists.

For example, the New Agenda For Peace, that is part of the package, should be considered as an entry point to start a conversation on how to tame future conflicts by promoting “whole-of-society prevention” strategies, doing a better job at protecting civilians during conflicts.

But also in this case, the Pact resembles more a list of principles, like the commitment, one of many, of “advancing with urgency discussions on lethal autonomous weapons systems” rather than truly actionable proposals.

It also focuses on strengthening mechanisms to manage disputes and improve trust, something that never can be discounted. Yet, it is harder imagining how to advance consensus on this contentious area in a time where geopolitical tensions and rivalries are rising.

But there is one priority domain for which Guterres deserves praise: putting youths first and at the center of his plans. What is noticeable is an attempt at re-thinking and re-booting the whole decision-making system by involving and engaging youths.

But, at the same time, also in this case, it is difficult to envisage any real changes beyond the semi-tokenistic proposals of Guterres like reinforcing the UN agencies ‘current modalities of working with youths. The Declaration on Future Generations, a sort of charter of rights for youths, is, unquestionably and symbolically significant but is still far from being a truly bold and transformative and lack enforcement.

Instead, what the global civil society that, to the credit of Guterres, has been fully involved and engaged in the negotiations of the Summit of the Future, is proposing is not only inspiring but also what the world is desperately in need of.

Indeed the People’s Pact for the Future, brought together by a wide ranging coalition of civil society organizations, The Coalition for the UN We need, is rich of daring ideas. It is exciting to read about establishing not only a UN Parliamentary Assembly but also other audacious solutions like creating mechanisms to involve citizens in the decisions making related to the UN, including a UN World Citizens’ Initiative.

In comparison, the propositions being discussed by the member states in the Pact for the Future are substantially too timid and, in no way, are transformative nor radical as they should be. But to me the most problematic aspect is not the inevitable lack of ambition of Guterres’s project.

After all, it was unavoidable that many details in implementing his vision, would have been constrained and limited by the complexities of international relations. What instead is disappointing is the fact that that any global meeting of such importance for the future of humanity, should have also been radical in involving the citizens of the world.

The truth is, instead, grim: despite the good intentions and a real effort at involving the civil society, there is a widespread unawareness about the whole initiative among the people. In plain terms, amidst the public, there is total lack of knowledge and information about the Summit and its agenda.

The vast majority of youths who should be leading the discussions, have not been involved as they should have been. Most of them do still ignore the Summit of the Future and the negotiations around it. I do not doubt that, all over the world, the UN Country Offices might have tried to engage and consult some of them in some discussions.

But the magnitude of the initiative and the topics to be discussed, no matter how, at the end of the day, are dealt with weakened and flaw propositions, should have deserved much a stronger participation of youths.

The United Nations, in partnerships with civil society organizations in the South and North of the world, should have planned and carried out a much more robust exercise in terms of consulting and engaging young people.

Imagine how transformative would have been to organize consultations at school levels where students could have discussed their priorities and come up with their own solutions. With the proper political will and preparation, such exercises could have represented a new benchmark in terms of innovative ways of consulting and engaging with youths.

The hope is that the efforts being put to organize the Summit of the Future and the energies being spent to negotiate the Pact for the Future, will at least open a new chapter not only at nudging nations to deal with complex issues but at doing so through a completely novel bottom-up approach.

Indeed, the Summit of the Future might be remembered not for what will have achieved. Instead, the whole process that had started with Our Common Agenda, could be remembered for heralding an era where tough issues are tackled differently and more inclusively.

Engaging and involving those who, at the moment, are excluded from the decision making, the people and among them, especially the youths, should become the moral imperative to overcome the biggest challenges faced by humanity.

This is what the immense and far-ranging agenda being pushed by Guterres should be probably remembered for.

Simone Galimberti writes about the SDGs, youth-centered policy-making and a stronger and better United Nations.

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Water partner Aparna Khuntia tests on-premises drinking quality water from a tap for a slum household in Bhubaneswar. Credit: Manipadma Jena/IPS

By Manipadma Jena
BHUBANESWAR, India, Aug 2 2024 (IPS)

“Daily squabbles at the lone water point in Bhubaneswar’s slums, where hundreds of households depended on this single non-potable water source, have now receded into the past,” says Aparna Khuntia, a member of a large cohort of water volunteers who have played an important enabling role in ensuring households in the eastern India city now have their own on-premises potable running tap water available all 24 hours.

No mean feat this, considering that the capital city of India’s eastern state, Odisha, is flooding with much of the outbound rural to urban migrants. Of Odisha’s 8.86 million rural households, one in three has an out-migrant according to government data. Of this, 70% move within the State, a majority landing up in Odisha’s fast developing capital city.

For new migrants into a city, they may set up a shelter using discarded flex advertisement banners with a few bamboo poles but access to water, let alone potable water, remains a huge challenge.

“Even government-recognized slums like our colony in 2019 got just two hours of water supply in a day. Large families who could not store enough faced untold difficulties. Many had to pay for a water tanker every other day. Illegal water connections were rampant, resulting in huge revenue losses for the government,” 36-year-old Khuntia told IPS.

By 2030, 2 billion people will still live without safe drinking water

“The midpoint of our journey to 2030 has passed. The world is on track to achieve only 17 per cent of the targets under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG),” reveals the recent 2024 United Nations SDG report card.

Goal 6 focusing on ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all, found between 2015 and 2022, the proportion of the global population using safely managed drinking water increased from 69 to 73 per cent according to report. Although more people now access safe drinking water, in 2022, 2.2 billion still went without this basic human right. Achieving universal coverage by 2030 will require a sixfold increase in current rates of progress for safely managed drinking water, it warns.

In 2022, the UN said, roughly half the world’s population experienced severe water scarcity for at least part of the year. One quarter faced “extremely high” levels of water stress.

Such situations were experienced this extreme summer 2024 in India’s largest economic hubs Bangaluru and Delhi.

Climate change worsens these issues. Rating agency Moody’s in June warned water shortage may hit India’s future economic growth.

Even so, according to the report 93.3% of India’s population are now using at least basic drinking water services which UN rates as “moderately improving.”

Women Benefit the Most From Women Water Managers

To further progress on SDG-6, in 2020 when Odisha launched the ‘Drink from Tap Mission’ to dispense certified quality drinking water 24X7 from piped supply installed at each urban household, it created a pool of the women water volunteers. Designated Jal Sathi or water partner, they were stringently selected from among local Self-Help Groups (SHGs), trained and raring to make a difference.

And a difference they did bring about. The government’s implementing Housing and Urban Development department “increased their water tariff collection by around 90 percent,” said Khuntia. Representing community partnership in urban water management, they are key stake-holders in a novel initiative.

A key government official G Mathi Vathanan, who once headed the State-owned non-profit company Water Corporation of Odisha (WATCO) that rolls out the water mission for the State government, even went on to write a book on the women volunteers giving them much of the credit for the initiative’s success.

“The women from SHGs are the ones who helped make reality the goal of bringing water to the doorstep of each household. The mission’s success was due to (their ability to) building people’s trust in the government,” he said.

The service these women volunteers provided to households turned the tide against diarrhea, jaundice, and poor gut health that plagued the poor, especially children.

The UN’s Sustainable Development Report 2024 ranks India on SDG progress at 109 out of 166 indicating a “score moderately improving” but “insufficient to attain goal.”

India’s federal government is mulling replicating Odisha’s Pure Water Scheme’s success in other States.

These women managers helped other householder women by bringing drinking and cooking water to their doorstep, eliminating the disproportionate burden of water on women in India.

Change-Makers’ Contribution: A Working Day in a Water Partner’s Life

Each woman volunteer works with 1,200 designated households, both in her own tenements and higher-end households. This familiarity with her gives her an edge with her clients—of trust, of openness in interactions helping her to achieve what government staff are unable to.

Every month she visits her households, reads the installed water meter, generates the bill and often gets paid too. But for those who are unable to pay, the water-partner will visit again and again urging, cajoling payments.

“We urge them not to waste such a precious commodity like water, and for those who lagged in taking new connection we convinced them to do so,” said Khuntia. With water meters installed and payments mandatory, households tend not to waste water. In slums, bills often were no more than 50 to 65 rupees (less than one dollar), affordable even for the poorest.

“So, this tap drinking water mission was a win-win for both government and consumers,” Khuntia, a mother of two told IPS. It also ensures Sustainable Cities and Communities under SDG-11. Revenue accruing to the government ensures water infrastructure maintenance.

On water-users’ request, Khuntia said they tested the tap water with kits they carried. They also reported water-related issues and information of pipe leaks that compromised water purity, to the government’s maintenance staff who attended immediately.
“Earlier, people would rarely call the staff if they noticed water pipe damages; sometimes it was deliberate, for water theft. But because we visit families often and they are comfortable with us, we get this information very quickly,” she added.

The SDG targets 6–1 of the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals call for universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all. The drink from tap mission is a move to achieve this.

According to WATCO, by March 2023, 4.5 million urban residents in 29 Urban Local Bodies out of 115 ULBs in Odisha State have access to or be in line to drink from tap utilities.

Under the scheme, not only water equity is ensured, but sustainability is also ensured by fixing water meters for every household water pipeline. Since households pay for their water, they tend not to waste it.

However, after four years of service, these women volunteers have been demanding better pecuniary recognition for their services. What they get now is 5% of their total bill collection as an incentive, 100 rupees if she enrolls a new customer for a water connection, and a bicycle. Aparna Khuntia told IPS she gives 4 hours a day to this work while her monthly income approximates 5000–7000 rupees (60–84 USD). Much of it is spent supplementing her husband’s 15000 rupees (180 USD) income from plying a three-wheeler auto rickshaw for household expenses, including their one-room rent. What is left over is spent during festivals or when we visit relatives in the village.

“With a government change in the June election this year, Odisha’s new government is reorganizing the entire women’s self-help group set-up. The Jaal Sathis will possibly get a new designation but the programme which has been highly successful, will continue,” WATCO’s chief operating officer, Sarat Chandra Mishra, told IPS.
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Activists protest during the 25th International AIDS Conference (AIDS2024) in Munich over a affordable pricing for a drug currently sold by pharmaceutical firm Gilead. Credit: Ed Holt/IPS

By Ed Holt
MUNICH, Aug 2 2024 (IPS)

Campaigners and experts have demanded a breakthrough HIV intervention hailed as “the closest thing to an HIV vaccine” must be made available as soon and as cheaply as possible to all who need it as its manufacturer faces protests over its pricing.

Activists led a massive protest during the 25th International AIDS Conference (AIDS2024) in Munich last week as a study was presented showing lenacapavir—a drug currently sold by pharmaceutical firm Gilead for more than USD 40,000 per year as an HIV treatment—could be sold for USD 40 per year as a form of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to help prevent HIV infection.

Community groups working in prevention, as well as experts and senior figures at international organizations fighting HIV, called on the company to ensure it will be priced so it is affordable for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), which account for 95 percent of HIV infections.

“It is no exaggeration to call lenacapavir a game changer. It could be life-changing for some populations. We need to see it produced generically and supplied to all low- and middle-income countries to the people who need it,” said Dr. Helen Bygrave, chronic disease advisor at Medecins sans Frontiere’s (MSF) Access Campaign.

During the event, data from a trial of lenacapavir, a twice-yearly injectable, were presented. The results of the trial were announced by pharmaceutical firm Gilead last month and showed the drug offered 100% protection to more than 5,000 women in South Africa and Uganda.

Many experts and community leaders helping deliver HIV interventions who spoke to IPS described the drug as a real “game changer,” offering not just spectacular efficacy but relative ease and discretion in delivery—the latter key in combating stigma connected with HIV prevention intervention in some societies—compared to other interventions, such as oral PrEP.

But they warned there were likely to be challenges to access, with cost expected to be the main barrier.

Lenacapavir is currently approved only as a form of HIV treatment at a price of USD 42,000 per person per year.

While as a PrEP intervention it would be expected to be sold at a much lower price, an abstract presented at the conference showed that it could cost just USD 40 a year for every patient.

In a statement put out following the protests, Gilead said it was developing “a strategy to enable broad, sustainable access globally” but that it was too early to give details on pricing.

Critics claimed Gilead was not being transparent in its statement—the company talked of being committed to access pricing for high-incidence, resource-limited countries rather than specifically low- and middle-income countries—and there are fears that the price at which it is eventually made available as PrEP will be so high as to put it out of reach of the countries that are struggling most with the HIV epidemic.

“Cabotegravir, a two-month injectable form of PrEP, is currently being procured by MSF for low-income countries for USD 210 per person per year. We would not expect [the price for lenacapavir] to be higher than that, and we would hope it would be more ‘in the ballpark’ of  USD 100 per person per year,” said Bygrave.

She added that “questions have been asked of Gilead about its pricing for lenacapavir, and the company has been pretty vague in its answers.”

“Civil society needs to put continued pressure on Gilead about this issue because, without that pressure, I do not trust Gilead to do the right thing,” Bygrave, who took part in protests at the conference against Gilead’s pricing, said.

Some speakers at the conference set out a series of demands for the firm.

Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS, called on Gilead to license generic manufacturers to produce it more affordably through mechanisms such as the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP), a UN-backed programme negotiating generics agreements between originators and generic pharmaceutical companies.

Others, such as keynote speaker Helen Clark, Chair of the Global Commission on Drug Policy, said such interventions must be seen as “common global goods, and ways must be found to make them accessible to all.”

“The pharmaceutical industry has been the beneficiary of much public research investment. With respect to HIV/AIDS, it has benefited from the mobilization of scientists and engaged communities who have advocated for investment in R&D and treatments. Prima facie, the notion that the companies can then make great profits from and not share the intellectual property created is wrong,” she said.

Others went even further, accusing some pharmaceutical firms of being parties to the creation of a de facto global two-tier system for medicine supply.

“Companies must share their medicines. We cannot accept an apartheid in access to medicine in which the lives of those living in the Global South are not regarded as having the same value as the lives in the North,” Archbishop Dr Thabo Makgoba, Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Cape Town and HIV advocate, said at a UNAIDS press event during the conference.

Some of those who work with key populations stressed the need to push through all necessary approvals and set lenacapavir’s price at an accessible level as quickly as possible to save lives.

“It’s great to have innovation and get important new tools in the fight against HIV. But the question is: how long will it take to get them to the people who need them? Until then, they are just a great announcement—like a beautiful picture hanging up there that you can see but cannot actually touch. We need to give communities the funding and the tools they need to do their vital work,” Anton Basenko, Chair of the Board of the International Network of People who Use Drugs (INPUD), told IPS.

The calls came as campaigners stressed the exceptional potential of lenacapavir. It is not only its astonishing efficacy, but also its relative ease and discretion of delivery, which experts are excited about.

Stigma around HIV prevention, such as oral PrEP, which involves taking daily tablets, has been identified as a major barrier to the uptake of HIV interventions in some regions.

Some HIV healthcare specialists at the conference told IPS they had seen cases of women leaving clinics with bottles of tablets and, as soon as they heard them rattling in the bottle, threw them into the bin outside the clinic because the noise would tell others they were taking the tablets and leave them open to potential discrimination, or even gender-based violence.

“The lack of oral PrEP uptake and adherence among women and girls is due to a number of factors, such as stigma and worries about being seen with a huge bottle of pills. What about if you are in a relationship and your partner sees the bottle and starts asking whether you are cheating on them or something?

“A woman could go and get a lenacapavir injection a couple of times a year and no one would have to even know and she wouldn’t have to think about taking pills every day and just get on with her life. This drug could change lives completely. I would definitely take it if it was available,” Sinetlantla Gogela, an HIV prevention advocate from Cape Town, South Africa, told IPS.

The concerns around access to lenacapavir at an affordable price for low and middle income countries come against a background of record debt levels among poor countries, which experts say could have a severe negative impact on the HIV epidemic.

A recent report from the campaign group Debt Relief International showed that more than 100 countries are struggling to service their debts, resulting in them cutting back on investment in health, education, social protection and climate change measures.

Speakers at the conference repeatedly warned these debts had to be addressed to ensure HIV programmes, whether they include lenacapavir or not, continue. Many called for immediate debt relief in countries.

“African debt needs to be restructured to let countries get hold of the medicines they need,” said Byanyima.

“Drop the debt; it is choking global south countries, denying us what we need for health. Please let us breathe,” said Makgoba.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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The UN's focus on green energy, plastic, biodiversity, and early warnings aims to safeguard the Maldives from climate change. Credit: UNDP Maldives / Ashwa Faheem

By Bradley Busetto and Bjorn Andersson
MALE, Maldives, Aug 2 2024 (IPS)

The ocean is our lifeline, covering 70 percent of the earth’s surface, it is the source of half of the oxygen we breathe, and it absorbs 26 percent of the carbon dioxide we produce. It is home to millions of marine species, contains 97 percent of all of the water on our planet and offers humankind immense resources. 

Maldives – 500,000 people living in ocean-side communities across an archipelago of 26 atolls and 1,192 islands – demonstrates both the challenges of living within an ocean world and its vast potential. Therefore, we must ensure that the ocean is not only our treasured history but part of our healthy and prosperous future as well.

The UN in Maldives together with Ocean Generation (an organization working to restore a healthy relationship between people and the ocean), is supporting the Maldives in meeting the increasing dangers of the climate crisis and preserving and protecting our threatened ocean.

At the recently concluded 4th Small Island Developing States (SIDS4) Conference in Antigua, Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu directly addressed these challenges, calling for international public and private sector finance to invest in Maldives – to provide urgently needed climate financing for new green energy sources and to fund climate protection for communities and islands threatened by rising sea levels.

Recognizing the precarious state of our oceans due to human consumption patterns and global heating, the President has recently ordered a pause to coastal development activities over concerns of high-water temperatures and coral bleaching in nearby waters.

Heeding the President’s call, the UN and Ocean Generation are looking forward to working with Maldives towards solutions for the challenges faced by one of the most climate-vulnerable states in the world.

Here are four key areas with the potential to make the biggest difference.

1) Green energy

A critical issue for Maldives is to reduce the use of expensive diesel fuel for energy production and transport between the many and distant atolls and island communities. Less diesel fuel use is a win-win: fewer carbon emissions and less foreign exchange spent on costly imported fuel.

International investment is urgently needed to scale-up commercial, private-sector supported solar and other renewable energy sources for the capital city Malé and other urban areas, for smaller island communities, and for resorts.

Meeting the Government’s goal of 33 per cent green energy supply by 2028 is a key priority where UN and World Bank initiatives can contribute.

2) Reducing plastic pollution

Safely disposing of waste and reducing the amount of waste that is generated are crucial goals for improving the lives of coastal communities. Reducing the import of single use, throwaway plastics into Maldives that ultimately end in our ocean and wash up on the shores of Maldives atolls, will be essential.

Global plastic production is currently around 420 million metric tonnes per year.  Half of this is destined for single-use. We cannot rely on recycling to address our plastic waste problem.  Only 13 percent of global plastic is recycled and of that 13 percent, only 1 percent is re-used through the system again meaning that even the plastic that does get recycled will eventually end up in landfill, being burned or in the environment.

Maldives Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Technology’s efforts to increase fees on plastic bags is essential to the national goal of phasing out plastic usage. Working with the Government, the UN and Ocean Generation strive to raise awareness among stakeholders of the cost of inaction and the shift towards environmentally-friendly alternatives to single-use plastics.

The rich biodiversity of the Maldives is vital for the resilience of its island communities, supporting thriving fisheries, diverse vegetation, and various economic opportunities. Credit: UNDP Maldives / Ashwa Faheem

3) Biodiversity conservation

The broad biodiversity of Maldives coastal and marine life is the key to resilience of the interconnected communities of the islands, through fisheries and vegetation and economic livelihoods. Maldives can act as a global laboratory both for oceanic health and for the immediate and dynamic effects of climate change. Ongoing UN initiatives focused on conservation and sustainably managing coral reefs in fishing communities are already laying the ground for local lessons to shape national policy change.

4) Fighting climate change

The ocean is our biggest ally when it comes to climate change, especially with regards to absorbing heat. Average global temperatures today sit at 15 degrees C, (59 F) and without the ocean absorbing heat, that average is estimated to be 50 degrees C (122 F).  Maldives has already demonstrated its commitment to climate resilience, by becoming the first country in Asia and the first Small Island Developing State to embrace the UN Secretary-General’s Early Warnings for All (EW4All) initiative.

Globally, it is the first country to endorse a national EW4All road map, at the presidential level, to ensure multi-hazard early warnings for all by 2027. Continuing to conserve, protect and restore marine resources, as a clear nature-based solution to climate change, is of utmost priority.

Maldives’ climate initiatives offer valuable lessons for all island nations, and their successful implementation could serve as a model for global change. By scaling up efforts to reduce fossil fuel dependence and combat throwaway consumerism, we can protect our oceans and planet, creating a sustainable future for all.

This article was adapted from an Op-Ed written by the UN Resident Coordinator in the Maldives Bradley Busetto and the founder of Ocean Generation Jo Ruxton, MBE. The links follow: maldives.un.org oceangeneration.org.

Source: UN Development Coordination Office (UNDCO).

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Erico Platt looks at the disarmament exhibition that she staged, "Three Quarters of a Century After Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The Hibakusha—Brave Survivors Working for a Nuclear-Free World." Credit: UNODA/Diane Barnes

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 1 2024 (IPS)

The upcoming 79th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which took place on August 6 and 9, 1945, remains a grim reminder of the destructive consequences of nuclear weapons.

The US bombings killed an estimated 90,000 to 210,000, with roughly half of the deaths occurring on the first day in Hiroshima.

But despite an intense global campaign for nuclear disarmament, the world has witnessed an increase in the number of nuclear powers from five—the US, UK, France, China and Russia—to nine, including India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel.

Is the continued worldwide anti-nuclear campaign an exercise in futility? And will the rising trend continue—with countries such as Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and South Korea—as potential nuclear powers of the future?

South Africa is the only country that has voluntarily given up nuclear weapons after developing them. In the 1980s, South Africa produced six nuclear weapons, but dismantled them between 1989 and 1993. A number of factors may have influenced South Africa’s decision, including national security, international relations, and a desire to avoid becoming a pariah state.

But there is an equally valid argument that there have been no nuclear wars—only threats—largely because of the success of the world-wide anti-nuclear campaign, the role of the United Nations and the collective action by most of the 193 member states in adopting several anti-nuclear treaties.

According to the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA), the United Nations has sought to eliminate weapons  of mass destruction (WMDs) ever since the establishment of the world body. The first resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1946 established a commission to deal with problems related to the discovery of atomic energy, among others.

The commission was to make proposals for, inter alia, the control of atomic energy to the extent necessary to ensure its use only for peaceful purposes.

Several multilateral treaties have since been established with the aim of preventing nuclear proliferation and testing, while promoting progress in nuclear disarmament.

These include the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and Under Water, also known as the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which was signed in 1996 but has yet to enter into force, and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director, Western States Legal Foundation in Oakland, California, which monitors and analyzes US nuclear weapons programs and policies, told IPS: “As we approach the 79th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the world is facing a greater danger of nuclear war than at any time since 1945.”

“The terrifying doctrine of “nuclear deterrence,” which should long ago have been delegitimized and relegated to the dustbin of history and replaced with multilateral, non-militarized common security, has metastasized into a pathological ideology brandished by nuclear-armed states and their allies to justify the perpetual possession and threatened use—including first use—of nuclear weapons,” she pointed out.

“It is more important than ever that we heed the warnings of the aging hibakusha (A-bomb survivors): What happened to us must never be allowed to happen to anyone again; nuclear weapons and human beings cannot co-exist; no more Hiroshimas, no more Nagasakis!”

This demands an irreversible process of nuclear disarmament. But to the contrary, all nuclear armed states are qualitatively and, in some cases, quantitatively upgrading their nuclear arsenals and a new multipolar arms race is underway, she noted.

“To achieve the elimination of nuclear weapons and a global society that is more fair, peaceful, and ecologically sustainable, we will need to move from the irrational fear-based ideology of deterrence to the rational fear of an eventual nuclear weapon use, whether by accident, miscalculation, or design.”

“We will also need to stimulate a rational hope that security can be redefined in humanitarian and ecologically sustainable terms that will lead to the elimination of nuclear weapons and dramatic demilitarization, freeing up tremendous resources desperately needed to address universal human needs and protect the environment.”

In this time of multiple global crises, “our work for the elimination of nuclear weapons must take place in a much broader framework, taking into account the interface between nuclear and conventional weapons and militarism in general, the humanitarian and long-term environmental consequences of nuclear war, and the fundamental incompatibility of nuclear weapons with democracy, the rule of law, and human wellbeing,” declared Cabasso.

Dr. M.V. Ramana, Professor and Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security School of Public Policy and Global Affairs and Graduate Program Director, MPPGA at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, told IPS, “The glass is half-full or half-empty depending on how one looks at it.”

“The fact that we have avoided nuclear war since 1945 is also partly due to the persistence of the anti-nuclear movement. Historians like Lawrence Wittner have pointed to the many instances when governments have chosen nuclear restraint instead of unrestrained expansion.”

While South Africa is the only country that dismantled its entire nuclear weapons program, many countries—Sweden, for example—have chosen not to develop nuclear weapons even though they had the technical capacity to do so. They did so in part because of strong public opposition to nuclear weapons, which in turn is due to social movements supporting nuclear disarmament, he pointed out.

Thus, organizing for nuclear disarmament is not futile. Especially as we move into another era of conflicts between major powers, such movements will be critical to our survival, declared Ramana.

According to the UN, a group of elderly hibakusha, called Nihon Hidankyo, have dedicated their lives to achieving a non-proliferation treaty, which they hope will ultimately lead to a total ban on nuclear weapons.

“On an overcrowded train on the Hakushima line, I fainted for a while, holding in my arms my eldest daughter of one year and six months. I regained my senses at her cries and found no one else was on the train,” a 34-year-old woman testifies in the booklet. She was located just two kilometres from the Hiroshima epicenter.

Fleeing to her relatives in Hesaka, at age 24, another woman remembers that “people, with the skin dangling down, were stumbling along. They fell down with a thud and died one after another,” adding, “still now I often have nightmares about this, and people say, ‘it’s neurosis’.”

One man who entered Hiroshima after the bomb recalled in the exhibition “that dreadful scene—I cannot forget even after many decades.”

At a disarmament exhibition in UN Headquarters in New York, a visitor reads text about a young boy bringing his little brother to a cremation site in Nagasaki, Japan. Credit: UNODA/Erico Platt

A woman who was 25 years old at the time said, “When I went outside, it was dark as night. Then it got brighter and brighter, and I could see burnt people crying and running about in utter confusion. It was hell…I found my neighbor trapped under a fallen concrete wall… Only half of his face was showing. He was burned alive”.

The steadfast conviction of the Hidankyo remains: “Nuclear weapons are absolute evil that cannot coexist with humans. There is no choice but to abolish them.”

Addressing the UN Security Council last March, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that with geopolitical tensions escalating the risk of nuclear warfare to its highest point in decades, reducing and abolishing nuclear weapons is the only viable path to saving humanity.

“There is one path—and one path only—that will vanquish this senseless and suicidal shadow once and for all.  We need disarmament now,” he said, urging nuclear-weapon States to re-engage to prevent any use of a nuclear weapon, re-affirm moratoria on nuclear testing and “urgently agree that none of them will be the first to use nuclear weapons.”

He called for reductions in the number of nuclear weapons led by the holders of the largest arsenals—the United States and the Russian Federation—to “find a way back to the negotiating table” to fully implement the New Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, or START Treaty, and agree on its successor.

“When each country pursues its own security without regard for others, we create global insecurity that threatens us all,” he observed.  Almost eight decades after the incineration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons still represent a clear danger to global peace and security, growing in power, range and stealth.”

“States possessing them are absent from the negotiating table, and some statements have raised the prospect of unleashing nuclear hell—threats that we must all denounce with clarity and force,” he said.  Moreover, emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and cyber and outer space domains have created new risks.”

From Pope Francis, who calls the possession of nuclear arms “immoral”, to the hibakusha, the brave survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to Hollywood, where Oppenheimer brought the harsh reality of nuclear doomsday to vivid life for millions around the world, people are calling for an end to the nuclear madness.  “Humanity cannot survive a sequel to Oppenheimer,” he warned.

When Nagasaki marked the 78th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of the city last year, the mayor Shiro Suzuki, urged world powers to abolish nuclear weapons, saying nuclear deterrence also increases risks of nuclear war, according to an Associated Press (AP) report.

He called on the Group of Seven (G7) industrial powers to adopt a separate document on nuclear disarmament that called for using nuclear weapons as deterrence.

“Now is the time to show courage and make the decision to break free from dependence on nuclear deterrence,” Suzuki said in his peace declaration. “As long as states are dependent on nuclear deterrence, we cannot realize a world without nuclear weapons.”

Russia’s nuclear threat has encouraged other nuclear states to accelerate their dependence on nuclear weapons or enhance capabilities, further increasing the risk of nuclear war, and that Russia is not the only one representing the risk of nuclear deterrence, Suzuki said.

Suzuki, whose parents were hibakusha, or survivors of the Nagasaki attack, said knowing the reality of the atomic bombings is the starting point for achieving a world without nuclear weapons. He said the survivors’ testimonies are a true deterrent against nuclear weapons use, the AP report said.

This article is brought to you by IPS Noram, in collaboration with INPS Japan and Soka Gakkai International, in consultative status with UN ECOSOC.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau
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• FEATURED TRANSLATION – ITALIAN

Erico Platt looks at the disarmament exhibition that she staged, "Three Quarters of a Century After Hiroshima and Nagasaki: The Hibakusha—Brave Survivors Working for a Nuclear-Free World." Credit: UNODA/Diane Barnes

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Aug 1 2024 (IPS)

The upcoming 79th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which took place on August 6 and 9, 1945, remains a grim reminder of the destructive consequences of nuclear weapons.

The US bombings killed an estimated 90,000 to 210,000, with roughly half of the deaths occurring on the first day in Hiroshima.

But despite an intense global campaign for nuclear disarmament, the world has witnessed an increase in the number of nuclear powers from five—the US, UK, France, China and Russia—to nine, including India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel.

Is the continued worldwide anti-nuclear campaign an exercise in futility? And will the rising trend continue—with countries such as Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and South Korea—as potential nuclear powers of the future?

South Africa is the only country that has voluntarily given up nuclear weapons after developing them. In the 1980s, South Africa produced six nuclear weapons, but dismantled them between 1989 and 1993. A number of factors may have influenced South Africa’s decision, including national security, international relations, and a desire to avoid becoming a pariah state.

But there is an equally valid argument that there have been no nuclear wars—only threats—largely because of the success of the world-wide anti-nuclear campaign, the role of the United Nations and the collective action by most of the 193 member states in adopting several anti-nuclear treaties.

According to the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA), the United Nations has sought to eliminate weapons  of mass destruction (WMDs) ever since the establishment of the world body. The first resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1946 established a commission to deal with problems related to the discovery of atomic energy, among others.

The commission was to make proposals for, inter alia, the control of atomic energy to the extent necessary to ensure its use only for peaceful purposes.

Several multilateral treaties have since been established with the aim of preventing nuclear proliferation and testing, while promoting progress in nuclear disarmament.

These include the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and Under Water, also known as the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which was signed in 1996 but has yet to enter into force, and the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).

Jackie Cabasso, Executive Director, Western States Legal Foundation in Oakland, California, which monitors and analyzes US nuclear weapons programs and policies, told IPS: “As we approach the 79th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the world is facing a greater danger of nuclear war than at any time since 1945.”

“The terrifying doctrine of “nuclear deterrence,” which should long ago have been delegitimized and relegated to the dustbin of history and replaced with multilateral, non-militarized common security, has metastasized into a pathological ideology brandished by nuclear-armed states and their allies to justify the perpetual possession and threatened use—including first use—of nuclear weapons,” she pointed out.

“It is more important than ever that we heed the warnings of the aging hibakusha (A-bomb survivors): What happened to us must never be allowed to happen to anyone again; nuclear weapons and human beings cannot co-exist; no more Hiroshimas, no more Nagasakis!”

This demands an irreversible process of nuclear disarmament. But to the contrary, all nuclear armed states are qualitatively and, in some cases, quantitatively upgrading their nuclear arsenals and a new multipolar arms race is underway, she noted.

“To achieve the elimination of nuclear weapons and a global society that is more fair, peaceful, and ecologically sustainable, we will need to move from the irrational fear-based ideology of deterrence to the rational fear of an eventual nuclear weapon use, whether by accident, miscalculation, or design.”

“We will also need to stimulate a rational hope that security can be redefined in humanitarian and ecologically sustainable terms that will lead to the elimination of nuclear weapons and dramatic demilitarization, freeing up tremendous resources desperately needed to address universal human needs and protect the environment.”

In this time of multiple global crises, “our work for the elimination of nuclear weapons must take place in a much broader framework, taking into account the interface between nuclear and conventional weapons and militarism in general, the humanitarian and long-term environmental consequences of nuclear war, and the fundamental incompatibility of nuclear weapons with democracy, the rule of law, and human wellbeing,” declared Cabasso.

Dr. M.V. Ramana, Professor and Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security School of Public Policy and Global Affairs and Graduate Program Director, MPPGA at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, told IPS, “The glass is half-full or half-empty depending on how one looks at it.”

“The fact that we have avoided nuclear war since 1945 is also partly due to the persistence of the anti-nuclear movement. Historians like Lawrence Wittner have pointed to the many instances when governments have chosen nuclear restraint instead of unrestrained expansion.”

While South Africa is the only country that dismantled its entire nuclear weapons program, many countries—Sweden, for example—have chosen not to develop nuclear weapons even though they had the technical capacity to do so. They did so in part because of strong public opposition to nuclear weapons, which in turn is due to social movements supporting nuclear disarmament, he pointed out.

Thus, organizing for nuclear disarmament is not futile. Especially as we move into another era of conflicts between major powers, such movements will be critical to our survival, declared Ramana.

According to the UN, a group of elderly hibakusha, called Nihon Hidankyo, have dedicated their lives to achieving a non-proliferation treaty, which they hope will ultimately lead to a total ban on nuclear weapons.

“On an overcrowded train on the Hakushima line, I fainted for a while, holding in my arms my eldest daughter of one year and six months. I regained my senses at her cries and found no one else was on the train,” a 34-year-old woman testifies in the booklet. She was located just two kilometres from the Hiroshima epicenter.

Fleeing to her relatives in Hesaka, at age 24, another woman remembers that “people, with the skin dangling down, were stumbling along. They fell down with a thud and died one after another,” adding, “still now I often have nightmares about this, and people say, ‘it’s neurosis’.”

One man who entered Hiroshima after the bomb recalled in the exhibition “that dreadful scene—I cannot forget even after many decades.”

At a disarmament exhibition in UN Headquarters in New York, a visitor reads text about a young boy bringing his little brother to a cremation site in Nagasaki, Japan. Credit: UNODA/Erico Platt

A woman who was 25 years old at the time said, “When I went outside, it was dark as night. Then it got brighter and brighter, and I could see burnt people crying and running about in utter confusion. It was hell…I found my neighbor trapped under a fallen concrete wall… Only half of his face was showing. He was burned alive”.

The steadfast conviction of the Hidankyo remains: “Nuclear weapons are absolute evil that cannot coexist with humans. There is no choice but to abolish them.”

Addressing the UN Security Council last March, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that with geopolitical tensions escalating the risk of nuclear warfare to its highest point in decades, reducing and abolishing nuclear weapons is the only viable path to saving humanity.

“There is one path—and one path only—that will vanquish this senseless and suicidal shadow once and for all.  We need disarmament now,” he said, urging nuclear-weapon States to re-engage to prevent any use of a nuclear weapon, re-affirm moratoria on nuclear testing and “urgently agree that none of them will be the first to use nuclear weapons.”

He called for reductions in the number of nuclear weapons led by the holders of the largest arsenals—the United States and the Russian Federation—to “find a way back to the negotiating table” to fully implement the New Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, or START Treaty, and agree on its successor.

“When each country pursues its own security without regard for others, we create global insecurity that threatens us all,” he observed.  Almost eight decades after the incineration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons still represent a clear danger to global peace and security, growing in power, range and stealth.”

“States possessing them are absent from the negotiating table, and some statements have raised the prospect of unleashing nuclear hell—threats that we must all denounce with clarity and force,” he said.  Moreover, emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and cyber and outer space domains have created new risks.”

From Pope Francis, who calls the possession of nuclear arms “immoral”, to the hibakusha, the brave survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to Hollywood, where Oppenheimer brought the harsh reality of nuclear doomsday to vivid life for millions around the world, people are calling for an end to the nuclear madness.  “Humanity cannot survive a sequel to Oppenheimer,” he warned.

When Nagasaki marked the 78th anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of the city last year, the mayor Shiro Suzuki, urged world powers to abolish nuclear weapons, saying nuclear deterrence also increases risks of nuclear war, according to an Associated Press (AP) report.

He called on the Group of Seven (G7) industrial powers to adopt a separate document on nuclear disarmament that called for using nuclear weapons as deterrence.

“Now is the time to show courage and make the decision to break free from dependence on nuclear deterrence,” Suzuki said in his peace declaration. “As long as states are dependent on nuclear deterrence, we cannot realize a world without nuclear weapons.”

Russia’s nuclear threat has encouraged other nuclear states to accelerate their dependence on nuclear weapons or enhance capabilities, further increasing the risk of nuclear war, and that Russia is not the only one representing the risk of nuclear deterrence, Suzuki said.

Suzuki, whose parents were hibakusha, or survivors of the Nagasaki attack, said knowing the reality of the atomic bombings is the starting point for achieving a world without nuclear weapons. He said the survivors’ testimonies are a true deterrent against nuclear weapons use, the AP report said.

This article is brought to you by IPS Noram, in collaboration with INPS Japan and Soka Gakkai International, in consultative status with UN ECOSOC.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau
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• Will the New Triumvirate—Russia, China & North Korea—Force the South To Go Nuclear?
• A Nuclear-Armed European Union? A Proposal Under Fire
• When the Man Who Built the Bombs Met the Man Who Dropped the Bombs…
• FEATURED TRANSLATION – ITALIAN

Credit: Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP via Getty Images

By Andrew Firmin
LONDON, Aug 1 2024 (IPS)

It’s risky to try to protect the environment in authoritarian Cambodia. Ten young activists from the Mother Nature environmental group have recently been given long jail sentences. Two were sentenced to eight years on charges of plotting and insulting the king. Another seven were sentenced to six years for plotting, while one, a Spanish national banned from entering Cambodia, was sentenced in absentia.

Four of the activists were then violently dragged away from a peaceful sit-in they’d joined outside the court building. The five who’ve so far been jailed have been split up and sent to separate prisons, some far away from their families.

This is the latest in a long line of attacks on Mother Nature activists. The group is being punished for its work to try to protect natural resources, prevent water pollution and stop illegal logging and sand mining.

The more you repress us, the more resolute our fight to protect #Cambodia 's nature will be.
The more you to try to break our spirit, the stronger we will be.
Ratha, Kunthea, Daravuth, Akeo and Leanghy: We love you & respect your immense sacrifices. #FreetheMotherNature5 pic.twitter.com/2CoMwyHpjw

— Mother Nature Cambodia (@CambodiaMother) July 3, 2024

An autocratic regime

Cambodia’s de facto one-party regime tolerates little criticism. Its former prime minister, Hun Sen, ruled the country from 1985 until 2023, when he handed over to his son. This came shortly after a non-competitive election where the only credible opposition party was banned. It was the same story with the election in 2018. This suppression of democracy required a crackdown on dissenting voices, targeting civil society as well as the political opposition.

The authorities have weaponised the legal system. They use highly politicised courts to detain civil society activists and opposition politicians for long spells before subjecting them to grossly unfair trials. Campaigners for environmental rights, labour rights and social justice are frequently charged with vaguely defined offences under the Criminal Coder such as plotting and incitement. Last year, nine trade unionists were convicted of incitement after going on strike to demand better pay and conditions for casino workers.

In 2015 the government introduced the restrictive Law on Associations and Non-Governmental Organisations (LANGO), which requires civil society organisations to submit financial records and annual reports, giving the state broad powers to refuse registration or deregister organisations. In 2023, Hun Sen threatened to dissolve organisations if they failed to submit documents.

The state also closely controls the media. People close to the ruling family run the four main media groups and so they mostly follow the government line. Independent media outlets are severely restricted. Last year the authorities shut down one of the last remaining independent platforms, Voice of Democracy. Self-censorship means topics such as corruption and environmental concerns remain largely uncovered.

This extensive political control is closely entwined with economic power. The ruling family and its inner circle are connected to an array of economic projects. Landgrabs by state officials are common. These means land and Indigenous people’s rights activists are among those targeted.

In 2023, courts sentenced 10 land activists to a year in jail in response to their activism against land grabbing for a sugar plantation. That same year, three people from the Coalition of Cambodian Farmer Community, a farmers’ rights group, were charged with incitement and plotting. The LANGO has also been used to prevent unregistered community groups taking part in anti-logging patrols.

The activity that saw the Mother Nature activists charged with plotting involved documenting the flow of waste into a river close to the royal palace in the capital, Phnom Pen. It’s far from the first time the group’s environmental action has earned the state’s ire. The government feels threatened by the fact that Mother Nature’s activism resonates with many young people.

Three of the group’s activists were convicted on incitement charges in 2022 after organising a protest march to the prime minister’s residence to protest against the filling in of a lake for construction. In 2023, Mother Nature delivered a petition urging the government to stop granting land to private companies in Kirirom National Park; there’s evidence of licences going to people connected to ruling party politicians. In response, the Ministry of Environment said Mother Nature was an illegal organisation and that its actions were ‘against the interests of Cambodian civil society’.

Media also get in trouble if they report on the sensitive issue of land exploitation. In 2023, the authorities revoked the licences of three media companies for publishing reports on a senior official’s involvement in land fraud. In 2022, two teams of reporters covering a deforestation operation were violently arrested.

Regional challenges

Repression of environmental activism isn’t limited to Cambodia. In neighbouring Vietnam, the one-party communist state is also cracking down on climate and environmental activists. In part this is because, as in Cambodia, climate and environmental activism is increasingly shining a light on the environmentally destructive economic practices of authoritarian leaders.

Cambodia’s creeping use of the charge of insulting the king to stifle legitimate dissent also echoes a tactic frequently used in Thailand, where the authorities have jailed young democracy campaigners for violating an archaic lèse majesté law that criminalises criticism of the king. Other repressive states are following its lead – including Cambodia, where the law on insulting the king was introduced when the crackdown was well underway in 2018.

Cambodia provides ample evidence of how the denial of democracy and the repression that comes with it enable environmentally destructive policies that further affect people’s lives and rights. The solution to protect the environment and prevent runaway climate change is less repression, more democracy and a more enabled civil society.

Cambodia’s international partners should emphasise this in their dealings with the state. They should press the authorities to release the jailed Mother Nature activists, who deserve to spend the coming years helping make their country a better place, not rotting in prison.

Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

 

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An elderly woman in China counted her money with worried feeling. Credit: World Bank / Curt Carnemark

By Kiatkanid Pongpanich
BANGKOK, Thailand, Aug 1 2024 (IPS)

Economic performance in Asia and the Pacific has proved to be quite resilient to the shocks of the past few years – the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and the cost-of-living crisis. In 2023, the region’s economy drove over 60 per cent of the global economic growth.

Positive economic conditions in the region are evident since the start of 2024. Economic growth picked up in major economies amid strong private consumption driven by steady employment and moderating inflation.

While not broad-based, exports also rebounded in several countries such as China, Pakistan, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Viet Nam after contraction in previous quarters. Yet, it is premature to say whether this trend will continue to gain further momentum.

For both 2024 and 2025, ESCAP projects the developing Asia-Pacific economies to grow on average at 4.4 per cent. Though quite decent, this is slower than the earlier projection of 4.8 per cent highlighted in 2023 and the average 5.4 per cent growth experienced in the pre-pandemic years of 2017-2019.

Domestic demand, especially household consumption, is likely to continue to drive economic growth as inflation is expected to decline from an average of 5.2 per cent in 2023 to 4.8 per cent in 2024 and 3.8 per cent in 2025. Despite this resilient performance, vigilance is needed as several near-term risks and challenges lie ahead.

First, China’s economic performance present both upside and downside risks. On the upside, the economic stimulus announced in May 2024 has the potential to lift public investment. Part of this stimulus includes measures to support the country’s property market which could help stabilize the downturn including falling house prices and boost confidence, although the pace and strength of recovery are uncertain.

While exports have been providing near-term support since the start of 2024, the expected slower-than-expected global growth, financial conditions that will remain tighter-for-longer and increased trade tensions present some downside risks.

As China accounts for over 40 per cent of the region’s economic output, its economic performance will have notable impacts on export performance of other regional peers and beyond.

Second, financial stability risks are on the rise in some Asia-Pacific countries as high debt servicing costs have weakened the debt repayment ability of not only governments but also firms and households.

For example, the proportion of default loans have increased between 0.5 to 2.5 percentage points since end-2022 in economies such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and Viet Nam where the non-performing loan ratio stands around 5 to 10 per cent.

Third, while policy rate cuts have begun in Canada and the European Union, similar monetary easing in the United States may come later than expected due to strong employment conditions and above-target inflation. This influences the monetary policy stance of Asia-Pacific central banks.

Even when inflation falls back within official targets, some central banks may still be reluctant to cut policy rates to guard against capital outflows and subsequent currency depreciations.

Fourth, the recent increases in global food and energy prices since the beginning of 2024 raise renewed concerns regarding inflation. Global oil prices have already increased by an average of 8 per cent so far in 2024 compared to 2023. Domestic policies will also play a role.

For example, the Malaysian government has announced a shift from blanket diesel subsidies towards a more targeted one, which could result in higher inflation.

Finally, continued geopolitical tensions in Ukraine and the Middle-East could disrupt supply chains through diversion of trading routes and further push up freight costs. For example, the Shanghai Containerized Freight Index, which measures the shipping costs from Asia to Europe, in May 2024 was about 180 per cent higher than the pre-Middle-East conflict level in October 2023.

Uncertainty regarding near-term economic outlook has direct implications for people’s socioeconomic wellbeing. Slower economic growth would lead to subdued job creation and wage growth. People’s purchasing power in Asia and the Pacific has already eroded, as the rise in wage earnings is struggling to keep up with inflation.

In many Asia-Pacific economies, over 60 per cent of those employed are informal workers who work in precarious jobs and have no social safety net to fall back on in case economic conditions worsen.

Furthermore, difficult economic conditions could constrain tax revenue collection, thus undermining government’s efforts to step-up investments in support of Sustainable Development Goals.

While we acknowledge the economic resilience of economies in Asia and the Pacific and the positive economic conditions evident so far since the start of 2024, policymakers must also be cognizant and prepared for the uncertainties that may unfold.

Kiatkanid Pongpanich is Senior Research Assistant, ESCAP

IPS UN Bureau

 

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An elderly woman in China counted her money with worried feeling. Credit: World Bank / Curt Carnemark

By Kiatkanid Pongpanich
BANGKOK, Thailand, Aug 1 2024 (IPS)

Economic performance in Asia and the Pacific has proved to be quite resilient to the shocks of the past few years – the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and the cost-of-living crisis. In 2023, the region’s economy drove over 60 per cent of the global economic growth.

Positive economic conditions in the region are evident since the start of 2024. Economic growth picked up in major economies amid strong private consumption driven by steady employment and moderating inflation.

While not broad-based, exports also rebounded in several countries such as China, Pakistan, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Viet Nam after contraction in previous quarters. Yet, it is premature to say whether this trend will continue to gain further momentum.

For both 2024 and 2025, ESCAP projects the developing Asia-Pacific economies to grow on average at 4.4 per cent. Though quite decent, this is slower than the earlier projection of 4.8 per cent highlighted in 2023 and the average 5.4 per cent growth experienced in the pre-pandemic years of 2017-2019.

Domestic demand, especially household consumption, is likely to continue to drive economic growth as inflation is expected to decline from an average of 5.2 per cent in 2023 to 4.8 per cent in 2024 and 3.8 per cent in 2025. Despite this resilient performance, vigilance is needed as several near-term risks and challenges lie ahead.

First, China’s economic performance present both upside and downside risks. On the upside, the economic stimulus announced in May 2024 has the potential to lift public investment. Part of this stimulus includes measures to support the country’s property market which could help stabilize the downturn including falling house prices and boost confidence, although the pace and strength of recovery are uncertain.

While exports have been providing near-term support since the start of 2024, the expected slower-than-expected global growth, financial conditions that will remain tighter-for-longer and increased trade tensions present some downside risks.

As China accounts for over 40 per cent of the region’s economic output, its economic performance will have notable impacts on export performance of other regional peers and beyond.

Second, financial stability risks are on the rise in some Asia-Pacific countries as high debt servicing costs have weakened the debt repayment ability of not only governments but also firms and households.

For example, the proportion of default loans have increased between 0.5 to 2.5 percentage points since end-2022 in economies such as Bangladesh, Pakistan and Viet Nam where the non-performing loan ratio stands around 5 to 10 per cent.

Third, while policy rate cuts have begun in Canada and the European Union, similar monetary easing in the United States may come later than expected due to strong employment conditions and above-target inflation. This influences the monetary policy stance of Asia-Pacific central banks.

Even when inflation falls back within official targets, some central banks may still be reluctant to cut policy rates to guard against capital outflows and subsequent currency depreciations.

Fourth, the recent increases in global food and energy prices since the beginning of 2024 raise renewed concerns regarding inflation. Global oil prices have already increased by an average of 8 per cent so far in 2024 compared to 2023. Domestic policies will also play a role.

For example, the Malaysian government has announced a shift from blanket diesel subsidies towards a more targeted one, which could result in higher inflation.

Finally, continued geopolitical tensions in Ukraine and the Middle-East could disrupt supply chains through diversion of trading routes and further push up freight costs. For example, the Shanghai Containerized Freight Index, which measures the shipping costs from Asia to Europe, in May 2024 was about 180 per cent higher than the pre-Middle-East conflict level in October 2023.

Uncertainty regarding near-term economic outlook has direct implications for people’s socioeconomic wellbeing. Slower economic growth would lead to subdued job creation and wage growth. People’s purchasing power in Asia and the Pacific has already eroded, as the rise in wage earnings is struggling to keep up with inflation.

In many Asia-Pacific economies, over 60 per cent of those employed are informal workers who work in precarious jobs and have no social safety net to fall back on in case economic conditions worsen.

Furthermore, difficult economic conditions could constrain tax revenue collection, thus undermining government’s efforts to step-up investments in support of Sustainable Development Goals.

While we acknowledge the economic resilience of economies in Asia and the Pacific and the positive economic conditions evident so far since the start of 2024, policymakers must also be cognizant and prepared for the uncertainties that may unfold.

Kiatkanid Pongpanich is Senior Research Assistant, ESCAP

IPS UN Bureau

 

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If Africa is to achieve the milestones under the UN 2030 Agenda for sustainable development or the Africa Union Agenda 2063, countries urgently need to recommit themselves to carrying out the Maputo Protocol. Credit: Shutterstock.

By Betty Kabari
NAIROBI, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

International African Women’s Day on July 31 recognizes the contribution of African women toward political, social, and economic freedom on the continent. But gender equality is still not a reality for most African women.

Many countries still have regressive laws, and even the more progressive laws in other countries are often poorly carried out. There is a lack of supportive frameworks to promote and safeguard women and girls’ equality, such as research into rights violations and public education on gender equality and women and girls’ rights.

The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, or the Maputo Protocol as it is known, provides a framework for fulfilling and upholding the rights of women and girls.

The lack of adequate progress is a reminder that governments have not met their obligation to address meaningfully the ways that laws, policies, and practices propagate patriarchal systems that discriminate against women and girls and entrench gender inequality in every aspect of life

It identifies various areas in which women and girls are denied equality and calls on governments to take legislative, institutional, and other measures to combat all forms of discrimination.

Forty-four out of 55 African countries have ratified the Maputo Protocol and some have made progress in enacting legislation in the two decades that it has been in force.

But the lack of adequate progress is a reminder that governments have not met their obligation to address meaningfully the ways that laws, policies, and practices propagate patriarchal systems that discriminate against women and girls and entrench gender inequality in every aspect of life.

Article 4 of the Maputo Protocol recognizes women’s and girls’ rights to life, integrity, and security of their person, some of the most fundamental, foundational rights. Yet violations of these rights are frequent and manifest in a number of ways including femicide – gender related killings of women and girls; what is called obstetric violence – ill treatment of women and girls when seeking reproductive health services; and lack of access to safe, legal abortion care.

In 2022, the United Nations identified Africa as the continent with the highest incidence of femicide. More than 20,000 women and girls on the continent were killed by intimate partners or family members that year, averaging more than 54 deaths daily – the highest in absolute numbers of any continent.

However, only the government of South Africa has consistently collected data on femicide or made any efforts to develop laws, policies, or programs that address femicide, such as in its National Strategic Plan on Gender Based Violence and Femicide. Other governments, such as Kenya, fail both to collect the relevant data and to effectively investigate and prosecute femicide.

African countries have also been slow to respond to mistreatment of women and girls during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum care, including verbal and physical abuse, neglect, and non-consensual and medically unnecessary procedures.

Insufficient data  hampers conclusions on the exact scope of the problem but global studies have found that, depending on the country,  between 15 and 91 percent of women experience mistreatment during childbirth. There is also a dearth, globally, of data on abuses that occur when women and girls seek other maternal health services, including abortion services.

In Malawi, a 2019 report from the Office of the Ombudsman documented various forms of abuse and mistreatment during labor and delivery, including forced Cesarean sections and hysterectomies.

The causes included negligence by overworked and underpaid healthcare workers and a lack of medication and emergency obstetric care. Five years later, Malawi is lagging in carrying out the report’s recommendations.

Article 14 of the Maputo Protocol recognizes women and girls’ right of access to abortion care in cases when the pregnancy is a result of sexual violence or when the pregnancy endangers the physical or mental health of the woman, or the life of the woman or the fetus. But fewer than half of the countries that have ratified the Maputo Protocol have incorporated this right into their domestic law, and even fewer have implemented it.

In the absence of legally protected abortion care, 75 percent of all abortions on the African continent are unsafe. This results in maternal mortality as well as complications that require over 1.6 million African women and girls to seek post-abortion care each year.

In Zambia, which is considered to have some of the most liberal abortion laws on the continent, unsafe abortion remains prevalent and accounts for 30 percent of the country’s maternal mortality.

The law limits the availability of facilities and healthcare providers who can legally provide abortion services, contrary to guidance from the World Health Organization.

In addition, the government has not taken sufficient measures to address stigma against abortion or raise awareness of the country’s laws on abortion, leading to many women, girls, and even healthcare providers believing incorrectly that abortion is illegal.

If Africa is to achieve the milestones under the UN 2030 Agenda for sustainable development or the Africa Union Agenda 2063, the continent’s strategic framework to achieve inclusive and sustainable socio-economic development over a 50-year period, countries urgently need to recommit themselves to carrying out the Maputo Protocol. That means including taking immediate action to address femicide, obstetric violence and inaccessibility of safe, legal abortion care.

Betty Kabari is a women’s right researcher at Human Rights Watch.

Cover of the Cultural Olympiad programme

By SWAN
PARIS, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

As cheers from beach-volleyball fans fill the air at the Eiffel Tower Stadium on a steamy, sunny day, pedestrians just down the road are enjoying another kind of show: an outdoor exhibition of huge photographs gleaming on the metal railings of UNESCO headquarters.

Titled Cultures at the Games, the exhibition is among hundreds of artistic and cultural events taking place across France during the 2024 Olympic Games (hosted by the French capital July 26 to Aug. 11), and they’re being staged alongside the numerous athletic contests.

The events even have an umbrella name – the Cultural Olympiad – and include photography, painting, sculpture, fashion, and a host of attractions linking art and sport. Most are scheduled to run beyond the closing ceremony of the Games.

UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) is a “partner” in the Cultural Olympiad, arranging not only the usual meetings where bureaucrats give lofty speeches, but also showcasing a series of works to highlight diversity and inclusion.

Cultures at the Games, for instance, comprises some 140 photographs portraying memorable aspects of the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics since 1924 and is presented in association with the Olympic Museum of Lausanne.

Images show how national delegations have transmitted their culture during these extravaganzas, and the pictures depict athletes such as Jamaica’s Usain Bolt, whose “lightning bolt” pose has become part of the Games’ folklore even as he has helped to make the green, gold and black colours of his country’s flag more recognizable.

Inside UNESCO’s Y-shaped building, meanwhile, a collection of panels focuses on how sport can “Change the Game”, a theme running across all of the organization’s “Olympiad” events. (At the “World Ministerial Meeting” that UNESCO hosted on July 24, just ahead of the Olympics, officials discussed gender equality, inclusion of people with disabilities, and protection of athletes, for example.)

A notable section of the indoor exhibition features historic photographs that pay tribute to athletes who sparked change through their achievements or activism. Here, one can view an iconic picture of American athlete Jesse Owens, the “spanner in the works that completely disrupted the Nazi propaganda machine set up during the 1936 Berlin Olympics,” according to the curators.

Owens won four medals at the Games, but “received no immediate (official) recognition from his own country” despite being welcomed as a hero by the public, as the exhibition notes. The racism in the United States meant that President Franklyn D. Roosevelt refused to congratulate him “for fear of losing votes in the Southern states.” The photo shows him standing on the podium in Berlin, while behind him another competitor gives a “Hitler salute”.

 

Jesse Owens at the Berlin Olympics, in Athletes who changed the world at UNESCO;

 

Athletes who changed the world equally features boxer Mohammad Ali, who in 1967 refused to fight in Vietnam and was stripped of his world championship title and banned from the ring for three years.

Perhaps the most famous image, however, is that of athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the 1968 games in Mexico City. They “removed their shoes and walked forward in socks to protest against the extreme poverty faced by African Americans,” as the caption reminds viewers. “With solemn faces, Smith and Carlos bowed their heads and raised their gloved black fists, aiming to raise global awareness about racial segregation in their country.”

 

A photo of Tommie Smith, in Athletes who changed the world at UNESCO

 

The exhibition outlines the long battles faced by women athletes as well, and it highlights the work of Alice Milliat who, as president of the French Women’s Sports Federation, “campaigned for women’s inclusion in Olympic sports”. She organized the first Women’s Olympic Games in Paris in 1922, bringing together five countries and 77 athletes.

Although Milliat “died in obscurity” in 1957, her “legacy endures today, with the Paris 2024 Games highlighting gender equality in sports, largely thanks to her visionary efforts,” says the photo caption.

Similarly, the exhibition spotlights the contributions of disabled athletes such as Ryadh Sallem, who was born without arms or legs, a victim of the Thalidomide medication that was prescribed to pregnant women in the 1950s and Sixties and caused deformities in children.

Sallem won 15 French championship titles in swimming and later turned to team sports such as wheelchair basketball and rugby. At UNESCO, his photograph is prominently displayed, along with the story of his hopes for the 2024 Paralympics and his mission to “promote a positive vision of disability”.

Elsewhere in the city, artists and museums are also paying tribute to Paralympic competitors, ahead of the Paralympic Games from Aug. 28 to Sept. 8 in Paris.

On the fencing around the imposing Gare de l’Est (train station), colourful works by artist Lorenzo Mattoti show disabled athletes competing in a variety of sports, while the Panthéon is presenting the “Paralympic Stories: From Sporting Integration to Social Inclusion (1948-2024)”. This exposition relates the “history of Paralympism and the challenges of equality,” according to curators Anne Marcellini and Sylvain Ferez.

For fans of sculpture, Paris has a range of “Olympiad” works on view for free. In June, the city unveiled its official “sculpture olympique” or Olympic Statue, created by Los Angeles-based African-American artist Alison Saar, who cites inspiration from Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America.

The sculpture, located near the famed Champs Elysées avenue, depicts a seated African woman holding a flame in front of the Olympic rings, and it “embodies Olympic values of inclusivity and peace,” according to the office of Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo.

When it was inaugurated on June 23, however, it sparked a flurry of hostile remarks from some far-right commentators on social media, who apparently felt threatened by the work.

Another statue of a woman, that of Venus de Milo or the mythical goddess Aphrodite, has been “reinterpreted” in six versions by artistic director Laurent Perbos to symbolise “feminine” sporting disciplines, including boxing, archery and surfing. The statues stand in front of the National Assembly, and the irony won’t be lost on most viewers: French women secured the right to vote only in 1944.

Of course, Paris wouldn’t be Paris without another particular artform. As the much-discussed Opening Ceremony of the Olympics showed, fashion is an integral part of these Games, and those who didn’t get enough of the array of sometimes questionable costumes can head for another dose with “La Mode en movement #2” (Fashion in Motion #2).

This exhibition at the Palais Galliera / Fashion Museum looks at the history of sports clothing from the 18th century, with a special focus on beachwear. Among the 250 pieces on display, viewers will surely gain tips on what to wear for beach volleyball.

For more information, see: Olympiade Culturelle (paris2024.org)

Time is ripe to tap on this youthful Gen Z generation and ensure that they are supported financially and with the knowledge they need to lead the much-needed African agriculture revolution. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS

By Esther Ngumbi
URBANA, Illinois, US, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

Kenyan Gen Z recently led a series of historic protests that resulted in Kenya’s President rejecting the Finance Bill 2023 and dissolving his cabinet.  These protests are inspiring a wave of change, revolutions, and optimism in Kenya and the African Continent.

Importantly, these protests present Kenyans with a chance to reflect on governance and other fundamental issues including food insecurity and hunger, youth unemployment and an agricultural sector that is yet to deliver for Kenyans and the African continent.

The agricultural sector, that is a source of livelihood for over 70% of African citizens if tapped upon by Gen Zs can offer a crucial part of the solution to this dilemma.

For one, as a sector, agriculture provides multiple avenues for Gen Zs and youth to tap in- from the production all the way to marketing agricultural products to the consumers.

Further, according to the African Development Bank, and The World Bank this sector is projected to be worth around one trillion dollars by 2030, with opportunities at every stage of the agricultural value chain.

Gen Zs possess the energy and creativity needed to revolutionize African agricultural sector. They have college degrees, are tech-savvy, purpose-driven and entrepreneurial

At the same time, according to the world bank’s “Unlocking Africa’s Agricultural Potential” report, there are enormous opportunities stemming from the several areas where the sector is currently lagging.

These include the gap between regional demand and supply, the low adoption of irrigation technologies and climate-smart farming practices, limited use of inputs and new technologies including precision technologies, ranging from remote sensing platforms, use of sensors and drones, automated mechanical weeders drones, satellite powered weather stations, soil health determination and monitoring tools and artificial intelligence.

Gen Z and the youth can view these as opportunities that can be tapped on and leveraged to bring upon this agricultural revolution.

But to tap onto these opportunities presented by the agricultural sector value chain and to transform the sector into a high-technology powerhouse of innovation and a global food powerhouse, Gen Z will need to access financial capital and other investments.

Governments in African countries, including Kenya and other credible development funding agencies such as USAID, The Rockefeller foundation, and the African Development Bank, must finance entrepreneurial efforts and agriculture-focused startups launched by Gen Zs.

Indeed, Kenya’s and Africa’s Gen Zs have the potential to lead the much-needed Africa’s agricultural revolution that will see Kenya and other African countries produce abundant, safe and healthy food that will not only meet the continent’s food needs, but also be of such taste, class and distinction that the whole world will want it.

Gen Zs possess the energy and creativity needed to revolutionize African agricultural sector. They have college degrees, are tech-savvy, purpose-driven and entrepreneurial.

Time is ripe to tap on this youthful Gen Z generation and ensure that they are supported financially and with the knowledge they need to lead the much-needed African agriculture revolution. It will do more than produce food. It will create jobs, wealth and bring the much-needed makeover of the agricultural sector in Kenya and Africa.

Esther Ngumbi, PhD is Assistant Professor, Department of Entomology, African American Studies Department, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Jay Mulucha speaks at the 25th International AIDS Conference in Munich. Credit: Steve Forrest/IAS

By Ed Holt
MUNICH, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

Jay Mulucha, Executive Director of FEM Alliance Uganda, gave an impassioned plea to governments around the world to push lawmakers in his home country to reverse punitive new legislation criminalizing the LGBT+ community.

He became the first trans man to speak at the opening ceremony when he addressed the 25th International AIDS Conference in Munich last week (July 22)—the world’s largest conference on HIV and AIDS, attended by an estimated 10,000 people.

Mulucha spoke about how he and other members of the LGBT+ community in Uganda live in constant fear, and the impact of Uganda’s 2023 Anti-Homosexuality Act, which outlaws sexual relations among members of the same sex and imposes the death penalty for “serious homosexual acts.”

IPS spoke to Mulucha at the conference about how he and other activists refuse to give up their fight for acceptance and their determination to help others despite the dangers and challenges they face on a daily basis.

Jay Mulucha, Executive Director of FEM Alliance Uganda. Courtesy: Jay Mulucha

IPS: Were you surprised at the reception you got today when you spoke?

Jay Mulucha (JM): I was very surprised because this is a really big conference that brings together a lot of people. But at the same time, I am very pleased that I am here.

IPS: Today, we heard you talk about the repression that you and other members of the LGBT community face in Uganda. But of course, Uganda is not the only place where there are such laws. Do you think that your activities and what you are doing can be an inspiration for other LGBT+ people facing repression in other countries?

JM: Yes, it can. What I have achieved today by telling the world about what we are going through is going to make a change. That’s because I have made sure that we are getting opportunities (to speak out). This is the first time that a trans person has been part of the opening ceremony at [the annual IAS AIDS Conference] and it is very important that these opportunities be given to us so that they can hear our voices. You see, it’s not only in Uganda—people in other countries are suffering. Our voices are being trodden on, so if we are given the chance to speak, it gives us a greater opportunity to let the world know that things are not going well for people like us.

We work with different people in different countries to get out the message of what we are doing to counter the anti-gender movements that are rising up. This movement is really hurting us and we are doing what we can to try and stop them from spreading their hate.

IPS: Do you see any hope that the situation in Uganda for LGBT+ people will change any time soon?

JM: I joined the LGBTQI activist movement in Uganda more than ten years ago. When I joined, the situation was worse than it is today. Today, we are doing a lot of advocacy work, helping different people, and I can say that though the situation is not good, I am happy to say that there are some people who used to be homophobic and transphobic, and their minds and narratives have been changed through the advocacy work that we have done. Compared to ten years ago, at least now people know about the LGBT community. Back then, no one would even say it because people thought it was a sin to even mention the LGBT+ community. Right now, they are talking about us, the health service providers, and the government knows about LGBT—they are saying it. Even if it’s negative, at least they are saying it; they know that we exist and that we need services. So, I have a feeling that if we keep on doing our work, our advocacy, and we keep on talking about all these issues in different forums, at some point things will change. I can give an example of countries that have better laws, but those laws didn’t come about suddenly; it’s not like everyone woke up one morning and they were suddenly in place. People had to fight [for these laws] and go through a lot until things were better. I have a feeling that one day things in Uganda are going to change. We’re not going to give up; we’re going to continue the fight until we get what we want. We call upon different missions, different countries, in Europe, and the whole world to stand with us in this fight until we get what we want.

IPS: What impact are these laws going to have, or are already having, on the HIV situation in Uganda?

JM: These laws are making things worse. Different government officials are on record castigating and telling health service providers not to attend to any LGBT people, meaning that access to services is a challenge. The LGBT community is kept from accessing health services. This is because they know that once they try to access these services, they are going to be arrested, that they are not going to get these services, that they are going to be tortured, that they are going to be discriminated against, and (that they will be) told lots of homophobic things. These laws have really impacted health service provision for LGBT+ people. It’s so bad that some people are resorting to self-medication, which, of course, is bad and very dangerous.

IPS: How does someone in Uganda from the LGBT+ community who has HIV access the HIV care they need?

JM: There are drop-in centres that are being funded by international organizations. We also educate some health service providers. Some healthcare providers are welcoming; they welcome us and give us the services we need. The pop-up centres have supported the community. The community feels safe accessing services in places where they feel comfortable. Finding a doctor is done by word of mouth. There are some physicians that are welcoming [of LGBT+ people] but those doctors also have challenges; they have to give us services sometimes secretly because they don’t want to be seen supporting us.

IPS: Do you think that homophobia and transphobia are very prevalent in Uganda, or is it really the case that there is just a very visible and very vocal minority that thinks like that and is spreading anti-LGBT+ hate, and most other people are just silent on the issue?

JM: Homophobia and transphobia were very prevalent in Uganda even before LGBT+ people were as open as they are now. But with the anti-rights movement, it has just increased. There was already hate, but this movement that has come up has increased the hate, transphobia and homophobia. The anti-gender and anti-gay movements have just increased and fueled everything. The rise of those movements among the politicians and the ‘evangelicos’—like the religious leaders and the cultural leaders—has fired up everything. Nowadays, they are so vocal because they are being funded. They have these huge donors and people are bribed to support them. This is just increasing the hate.

Another thing—the reason these people are silent is because these anti-gay and anti-gender movements are being funded and they are bribing people to stand with them and for people to be silent about the whole situation. People are not standing with us because some of them have been bribed to do so. That is why the LGBT community in Uganda asked different governments in different countries to speak up about these repressive laws in Uganda and other places. But instead, some countries, especially European countries, have been silent on it, including Germany. They are welcoming parliamentarians from Uganda, like the vice speaker of parliament, who was welcomed with open arms by the German government recently. And Germany is still funding our government. Why is that happening?  They are hiding behind the US, which put sanctions on the government figures who were involved in the passing of the [anti-homosexuality] laws. Germany just put out statements on this. We don’t want statements; we want Germany to put sanctions on these people. And they should stop funding them. Instead, Germany should fund the LGBT+ organizations that are struggling. And they’re doing all this thinking that we won’t, or don’t, know about it. We call on the German government to stop this.

IPS: You spoke about waking up every day and wondering whether you were going to be safe. How do you and other activists function and do your jobs when you have to worry all the time about your safety?

JM: We are trying to do our work in hiding because we need to continue the struggle; we need to continue to stand with the LGBT community here. We find ways to operate safely. We try our best to make sure we aren’t discovered because the moment the government finds out about our work, they will close the organization, arrest us, or cancel our permission to work. So we do our work in hiding. The second thing we do is look out for each other and each other’s security and try to find new ways to keep ourselves safe. Safety is a major concern for us. The situation is not good, but we are not giving up. We tried to also make sure that we advocate and that we also help educate people in institutions, like the police for example. We speak to people and we try to make them understand who we are and why they should not be violent towards us. We are going through a lot of challenges at the moment, but we go on because we know that at some point this is going to change and everything is going to be okay with us.

IPS: What message would you like to give to people from this conference?

JM: I would like to say thank you to the conference organizers for allowing me to be a speaker here and hope people like me continue to get opportunities like this to speak, because whenever we do, it takes things to another level. Every time we get the chance to speak out, it allows our voices to be heard, and it is through our voices being heard that we get support.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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By Oritro Karim
NEW YORK, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

Global warming, widely believed to be a universal crisis, will actually impact girls and women far more than boys and men. It is already known that we live in a patriarchal world, one in which men are afforded far greater opportunities for success while women generally hold less societal power and have access to fewer resources. This especially pertains to developing countries in which agriculture related work, usually delegated to females, depends on a variety of environmental factors and subsequently, significantly hurts their livelihoods.

In addition, women are generally far more susceptible to poverty, discrimination, and social injustice, all of which are magnified by the climate crisis. It is also important to note that global warming puts reproductive health in jeopardy as rising temperatures and a lack of resources increase the chances of miscarriage, gestational diabetes, and maternal mortality.

Moreover, there is a direct correlation between environmental harm and domestic violence, sexual exploitation, and a loss of education for women. Furthermore, answers to the climate crisis are generally male-centered and do not keep these inequities in mind. It is essential for the future of the planet that we come up with universal solutions to reverse global warming, ones that yield benefits for all.

As stated, global warming and the climate crisis has a significant impact on the livelihoods of women. As the climate crisis causes temperatures to rise globally, jobs in agriculture diminish in frequency. Climate change is directly linked to higher rates of drought, famine, flooding, erosion, and a loss in crop yields. Women constitute the majority of agriculture jobs globally, accounting for approximately 45-80 percent of all food production in developing countries, according to the UN article, “Women, Gender Equality, and Climate Change”. This often displaces women financially as their job security is highly dependent on a stable environment and natural resources.

Additionally, the consequences of this familial financial displacement often causes girls to be pulled out of school, which essentially keeps them from gaining employment in fields beyond agriculture. The CNN article, “How the climate crisis fuels gender inequality” states that communities that are affected by environmental harm are often faced with the decision to place their young children into the workforce early in order to support their households. In developing countries, such as Nigeria, girls are discouraged from pursuing an education and therefore, the climate crisis only amplifies that sentiment.

Habiba Mohammed, the director of the Center for Girls’ Education, states, “when we give the girls education on climate change, how to mitigate it, it will go a long way in helping the girls in how to support themselves in times of difficulties, and even help them prepare for it”. It is apparent that the climate crisis strips women in developing countries of their opportunities and essentially keeps them in a state of economic vulnerability.

The climate crisis also has a far greater detriment on the physical health and wellbeing of women than men. For example, women are afforded far fewer resources than men, including access to clean water and food. The UN article states “global warming is one of the leading causes and greatest contributors to world hunger, malnutrition, exposure to disease, and declining access to water. Moreover it poses limitations to adequate housing, spurring the loss of livelihoods as a result of permanent displacement”. As essential resources diminish, the remainder is often left to those at the top of society, men. Therefore, women have much higher chances of dying from these consequences.

It is also important to note that the climate crisis has a disastrous effect on reproductive health. In the United States, BIPOC communities are more likely to be placed in lower income neighborhoods, which have higher levels of pollution and restricted access to clean living. This causes Black women to be 2.6 times more likely to die from childbirth related complications due to environmental factors caused by climate change. Furthermore, women in developing countries are highly susceptible to complications due to high temperatures. The article, “How the Climate Crisis Affects Reproductive Rights” states that rising temperatures are responsible for an increase in stillbirth, preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, malaria, fibrosis, and stress related illnesses.

Additionally, it is stated that pregnant women are far more likely to die from the spread of disease due to flooding, which is a consequence of climate change, and are less likely to receive prenatal care. Therefore, the climate crisis not only limits a woman’s access to healthcare but also disproportionately exacerbates rates of disease and death for women.

It is also crucial to acknowledge the link between the climate crisis and gender related abuse. Cases of gender discrimination, domestic violence, and sexual exploitation are already massive concerns globally but are only exacerbated by environmental devastation and natural disasters. The article, “How Climate Change and Instability Exacerbate Sexual- and Gender-Based Violence and Violence Against Women and Girls” states that climate change often causes women and children to migrate away from their families and into unfamiliar and potentially dangerous areas, greatly increasing the risk of abuse, stalking, sexual trafficking, and even “female genital mutilation”.

In addition, these women are far more likely to turn to sex work in order to support themselves, which can not only be potentially dangerous but also increases their chances of developing STDs and HIV. The article also states that in Ethiopia, due to dire conditions caused by famine, sexual violence has run rampant and there aren’t systems in place to protect them or let them acquire justice.

It is imperative that we find sustainable solutions to climate change that not only include fe male perspectives but also tackle issues of gender inequality. As Earth begins to be stripped of her resources, so do women, and therefore, we do not have any time to waste.

Sources Used:
1. https://www.un.org/womenwatch/feature/climate_change/downloads/Women_and_Climate_Change_Factsheet.pdf
2. https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2023/11/world/climate-gender-inequality-cnnphotos-as-equals-intl-cmd/
3. https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/02/09/how-climate-crisis-affects-reproductive-rights
4. https://now.org/blog/how-climate-change-and-instability-exacerbate-sexual-and-gender-based-violence-and-violence-against-women-and-girls/

Oritro Karim is a recent graduate from Rochester Institute of Technology and a working illustrator, graphic designer, painter, and writer.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Kamala Harris. Credit: White House

By Alon Ben-Meir
NEW YORK, Jul 31 2024 (IPS)

Within the Democratic field, no potential candidate for president is better-positioned, at this juncture, to defeat Trump more skillfully and pointedly than Kamala Harris. She is writing a new chapter in American history that will chart a new national course impacting future generations.

When it became clear that President Biden would likely drop out of the race, I hoped that some shining, younger, experienced, and inspiring Democratic candidate would emerge to assume Biden’s mantra and crush Trump.

Once Biden endorsed Kamala Harris, within hours, she responded to the call of a party saddled with uncertainly and sorely in need of coalescing around a leader with qualities to galvanize and unite a party; she rose to the occasion and stymied every potential rival from challenging her.

Her subsequent performance on the stump has demonstrated that she is not only up to the task but also the candidate who will give Trump a run for his money and expose him for what he really is: a man who will not ‘make America great again’ but the one who will bring shame to America and destroy its greatness.

Before I expound on why Harris is the right candidate for the right time, when everything—the Supreme Court, House, and Senate are on the ballot—it is critical to contextualize the social and political environment in which we find ourselves today.

Trump’s dire divisiveness and polarization that is tearing America apart and what the horrific domestic and international ramifications will be should Trump be elected place a formidable burden on Harris to literally save America from the pandemic that has infected the majority of the Republican party.

Yes, a Black and South Asian woman is now tasked to save America from a wannabe dictator, a fascist bent on destroying America’s democracy and its unique standing in the world only to serve his cultish, sickening ego.

No one but Harris can possibly fathom how fateful her mission is and how arduous the road she must travel to restore America’s political and social civility and its leadership in the world will be. She knows she is writing a new chapter on America’s destiny and why she cannot fail.

Harris enjoys many professional skills and attributes and can build on Biden’s legacy and remarkable achievements over the past four years. Here are nine reasons Harris can, and most likely will, crush Trump in the upcoming elections and win.

Harris is inspiring

There was a hunger among the Democratic party to desperately find someone other than Biden to coalesce around without infighting, a candidate that could restore dignity to politics. Harris has engendered tremendous enthusiasm and many qualified voters will vote for her just for that reason.

The polls have already reflected the public fervor for change, a trend that she can sustain as we edge closer to election day. Moreover, the enthusiasm she evoked has also translated to raising a record amount of money during the last week since she became the presumptive nominee.

The age advantage

Harris is relatively young (59) and energetic, with charisma, stamina, and natural flair. She has no age problem that has been haunting Biden. She can now turn the table on Trump and use the age issue against him—he is old (77), fumbles, goes off on tangents, and is generally incoherent, all of which reflects that his age caught up with him prematurely.

Harris’s advantage as a woman

Post-Hillary Clinton, many voters of all ethnicities and ages have become more comfortable with a woman as president. Moreover, at a time of extreme political tension and divisiveness, where compromises are hard to come, women tend to work out compromises and keep a respectful tone in politics, which is particularly needed, thanks to Trump, in this poisonous political atmosphere. She will be in a perfect position to deal with an angry, unhinged, and temperamental fool like Trump and play the adult in any setting with him.

Skilled prosecutor

As an experienced prosecutor in California and attorney general, Harris is best positioned to prosecute the case against Trump, probably like no other. She has prosecuted, over the years, sex offenders, grand larcenists, tax evaders, and swindlers. As she recently said, “I know his type.” Trump will sweat it out with her and not know where the next punch is coming from.

Energizing young Democrats

Many young Black women have been reinvigorated by Harris’ campaign, in part due to her race and gender, with a “Win With Black Women” Zoom fundraising event raising over $1.5 million for the Harris campaign the same day Biden endorsed her. Many young Black men who were disenchanted by Biden and considered giving Trump a chance have returned to the fold and will vote for Harris in droves.

They sought someone to inspire them, and Harris came to quench their yearning. Moreover, younger people are generally less inclined to judge an individual based on gender. In this case, Harris may have an added advantage.

Galvanize Democrats on the fence and anxious Republicans

Given the concerns of a growing number of Democrats about Biden’s age and frailty when he was still the de facto nominee of his party and many Republicans’ anxiety over Trump’s unfitness to serve another term as president, many eligible voters have been swayed to stay out and not vote at all. That has changed with the rise of Harris to the top of the ticket. She has now offered a viable alternative and fundamentally altered the election’s trajectory in her favor.

Harris can speak about abortion freely

Biden, who is a Catholic, supports women’s right to choose and stated last year that the now-overturned Roe v. Wade “got it right,” but is not the strongest Democratic orator on the issue, given his personal religious beliefs on the issue, which is critical for women of all colors and ethnicities.

Harris, on the other hand, has already been Biden’s surrogate on the issue, becoming the first vice president to visit a Planned Parenthood clinic in March, and has made women’s right to abortion one of her central themes. Approximately 65 percent of all women oppose the Supreme Court’s decision to annul Roe v. Wade and found many of the red states passing draconian laws against abortions as despicable and chauvinist. The majority of these women will flock toward Harris, giving her a significant advantage on election day.

Harris has more time and energy to campaign

Unlike President Biden, who must still deal with increasingly mounting domestic and foreign policy issues, Harris has considerably more time to campaign nearly full-time, with the resilience and energy needed to campaign in every swing state time and again. Harris is engaging, and an increasing number of undecided voters in these crucial swing states find her refreshing with solid ideas that address their concerns.

Harris is an excellent debater

As California’s attorney general, she honed her public speaking and debating skills and became an excellent debater who is engaging, charismatic, and an outstanding communicator. Harris is very good at punching back forcefully, which puts her opponent on the defensive. In any debate with Trump, all he will be able to do is bark back and keep trying to change the subject. But he is no match for Harris’ piercing counter-attack, which may force him to lose his composure and badly expose his vulnerabilities.

Combating prejudices and mitigating disadvantages

Many Republicans have spared no time criticizing her on a range of issues, claiming that she has presumably failed in addressing the immigration problem, she is too liberal, has no experience in foreign policy, comes through as ingenuine, is fully supportive of Biden’s policies, which they consider to be an utter failure, and that she will be unable to distance herself from his agenda.

Harris will need to overcome several of these disadvantages, real or perceived. She will continue to face prejudices, particularly racism and sexism, which are hard to mitigate, as old white men would want to stop her. However, Harris can overcome most of the ideological obstacles, provided she projects herself as a uniter who is out to mend the horrific social and political schism that has affected this country to the core.

Harris needs to demonstrate that she is a moderate, mainstream Democrat, defend democracy, and draw a clear contrast with the extremist Republicans. She must focus on the economy as people are hurting and need relief. She must keep Biden’s promise to put a cap on rent increases, limit income tax on those earning less than $400,000 a year, ensure that the rich pay their fair share of taxes, ban medical debt from credit reports, and forgive student loans that have saddled borrowers with endless debt as their minimum payments hardly cover the interest they pay.

Finally, Harris knows that millions of Republicans despise Trump and wish that he would disappear from the political scene and restore sanity to a party that has lost its way—a party that stood for constructive conservatism, respected the rule of law, assumed fiscal responsibility, stood for fair and free elections, strengthened America’s alliances and leadership in the world, and stood firm against Russia and China.

These Republicans are not Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables.” They are dedicated Americans to whom Harris must appeal and solicit their involvement and even offer high-profile positions to those who want to share her vision about America’s future. As an example, she could invite Senator Mitt Romney, a staunch anti-Trump Republican and one of the few voices on the right calling to combat climate change, to serve as her Climate Czar.

Harris must now articulate that new vision for America and explain why she would be the best person to lead the country at this historic, fateful time in American history. Harris must make a new contract with America founded on unity of purpose, growth, and prosperity while safeguarding our democracy with zeal.

Harris can win this election; I believe she will because America is desperately ready for change, and Harris is best positioned to lead the way.

Dr. Alon Ben-Meir is a retired professor of international relations, most recently at the Center for
Global Affairs at NYU. He taught courses on international negotiation and Middle Eastern studies.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Many Afghan women have turned to online business despite its risks, as all forms of work are forbidden for women. Credit: Learning Together.

By External Source
Jul 30 2024 (IPS)

The Taliban’s total ban on women’s employment in Afghanistan leaves few options for earning a living. Nevertheless, Afghan women are carving out niches in online business with sheer determination and perseverance.

The situation remains challenging. Securing permits is difficult, and online businesses involving foreign exchange transactions are deemed haram – a crime, under sharia law. Women must also rely on a mahram—male relative or husband—for every step of the process, facing the risk of arrest and torture if they violate these rules.

Ten women were interviewed for this article. Some have found online jobs, while others have started online enterprises.

Anoshe has been selling sanitary and cosmetic products online for over a year. She previously worked as a state official in the Republican government of Afghanistan, but after the Taliban took power in 2021 she was forced to stay home and decided to import goods from a neighboring country to sell them online to support herself and her family.

Despite lacking a permit, she placed some of her money as collaterall in order to gain trust with the seller. “I waited two months for my orders from Iran, fearing it was a scam,” she said.

The goods eventually arrived, allowing her to start her business, though challenges persist. Anoshe hopes the Taliban will recognize the benefits for the whole country of allowing women to conduct business in this way, rather than creating obstacles.

 

The internet is almost the only way for Afghan women to earn a living or communicate, but it is highly controlled and thus very risky. Credit: Learning Together.

 

Masouda, another online seller, has faced frustrations and fraud. She was robbed twice due to the lack of an official permit but succeeded on her third attempt. “If I could find a job with a salary of 5,000 Afghanis, I’d never work online—it’s a headache,” she says.

“In the beginning, I could not even cover my own expenses”, she complains. “I paid my internet bill from my own pocket and spent hours talking to customers patiently pitching my products”.  Masouda’s brother handles deliveries to hide her identity from the Taliban.

Mohammad Mohsen and his colleagues attempted to start a non-profit to support women in online business, but their efforts failed when the Taliban noticed a woman’s name among the leadership of the organization, and refused their permit.

“To obtain a permit, women can no longer work alone. A male family member must join to ensure their efforts are not in vain,” says Mohsen.

For many Afghan women, finding a livelihood is their primary preoccupation, especially as family members have migrated, worsening their situation.

Twenty-three-year-old Neelam, whose sister and father were her only source of financial support and they both left the country after the Taliban’s arrival, now works from home. After jumping through many hoops, she found an online job. Despite the risks of arrest and torture, she embraces the opportunity.

“We work like thieves in this market,” says Neelam. “If the Taliban learn anything about us, they will arrest and torture us. That’s why we use pseudonyms for everything we do.”

Excerpt:

The author is an Afghanistan-based female journalist, trained with Finnish support before the Taliban take-over. Her identity is withheld for security reasons