The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
You might expect that the state would protect its citizens from such tactics, if not from being poisoned in the first place. We broke no laws; on the contrary, we have been upholding Kenya’s constitution, which guarantees citizens’ rights to a safe and healthy environment. But perhaps we should not be surprised by the state’s behavior. After all, in 2015, Kenya’s government voted in the UN General Assembly, along with just 13 others, against a United Nations resolution calling for the protection of human-rights defenders.
Nature provides enough for everyone’s needs, but not for everyone’s greed. As natural resources become scarcer, Africa’s lush, mineral-rich lands are becoming more lucrative for investors seeking to maximize profits. But, while governments should welcome opportunities for economic growth and job creation, they should not allow companies to damage the environment and threaten residents’ health and livelihoods.
As stories like Berta’s, Isidro’s, and mine demonstrate, we can no longer rely on state bodies, such as national law enforcement, to ensure this outcome, much less to investigate and prosecute crimes against the planet and those who fight for it. That is why the world needs an independent, internationally recognized legal body to which communities and activists can turn to address environmental crimes.
The appointment in March 2012 of the first-ever UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment was a positive step. But we need a system with teeth. Twenty years ago, the International Criminal Court was established to prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity. A similar court should do the same for crimes against the environment and its defenders.
Silencing the voices fighting to uphold environmental laws and regulations is self-defeating. People and the planet are dying. Those who are fighting to prevent those deaths deserve protection, not to become further casualties.
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Phyllis Omido, a Kenyan environmental activist and a winner of the 2015 Goldman Environmental Prize, is a 2017 Aspen New Voices Fellow.
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Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2017.
www.project-syndicate.org
