Depending on the era, there is a recurring theme. Climate change is the theme, which occupies an important place in international relations. But what international relations? Relations between polluting countries, which emit more CO2. Summits have followed one another at a high rate for several decades. The COVID pandemic slowed down, because people couldn't get together, but we could do it by videoconference.
First of all, a small precision, what is called the Conference on Climate Change appeared in 1992 in Brazil, because even if the theme was Environment and Development, a climate convention was adopted whose objective was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to minimize human impact on climate change. In fact, a conference cycle begins on this date: the conferences of the parties or COP. More than a cycle, it is a machine that is launched where non-governmental actors, NGOs, companies, cities, citizens will meet each year in a city. Theoretically, the goal is to fight against climate change.
26 COPs are organised. The first took place in Berlin in 1995. The African continent hosted the COP, organized in Morocco, this country hosted the COP22 in 2016, just after a famous COP, that of Paris in 2015. The latter made an impression, except for the former President Donald Trump, who had taken a decision to withdraw from the United States, which is the first polluting country or among the three major polluters in the world.
Other African countries have organized such as Kenya in 2006, COP12, South Africa in 2011, COP 17. According to experts, it is in the African continent that the consequences of climate change are most noticeable.
At the last COP, held in Galsgow, participants signed the Glasgow Climate Pact, which introduces what are called Regional Climate Weeks as a platform, allowing governments and stakeholders in this process to provide credible and sustainable response to climate change.
Thus a first African Climate Week took place in Libreville (Gabon) from August 29 to September 2, 2022. At the opening, Gabonese President Ali Bongo Ondimba said in a tweet that “climate change is ravaging our planet everywhere. Africa is particularly affected. But solutions exist. Gabon is determined to implement them!”.
These are adults who talk, ponder or get agitated about climate change while young people are excluded. As in the West, in Africa young people show their concern for this theme. A hundred young people gathered within the pan-African Alliance for Climate Justice, organized a march to challenge leaders on the ravages of climate change in Africa. Coming from several African countries (South Africa, Tanzania, Chad), they presented a memorandum to Lee White, the Gabonese Minister of Water and Forests, who is leading the work of the African Climate Week.
What may appear as a regional climate week took place in Djibouti (Republic of Djibouti) from October 23 to 25, 2022. In fact, it was a regional conference: Climate Change and Research (2CR): The path towards an adaptation and lasting resilience. At the inauguration of this conference, the President of Djibouti, Ismaël Omar Guelleh affirmed that “global warming is undoubtedly the most important threat facing humanity. It is today a major fact that we can no longer ignore and whose magnitude has accelerated in recent years”.
The Gabonese President was more pragmatic than his Djiboutian colleague. He does not stay on a fact that we observe everywhere in the world, but he is more proactive in saying that there are solutions, even if he does not detail these solutions.
The conference had another objective: the creation of a Regional Research Observatory for the Environment and Climate, which would be an essential scientific tool at the service of the region in terms of monitoring the climate, its impacts and the prevention of Conflicts. Its creation was a conclusion of the Summit on Environmental Risks and Opportunities in East Africa in 2015, held in Djibouti. This conference links two important issues: climate change and conflict. Indeed, the scarcity of natural resources such as water is one of the sources of conflict.
But the interesting question to ask is whether the governments of these two countries have adopted different policies in sectors such as construction, urban redevelopment, waste water management, banning the production of plastics, presence of foreign military bases whose environmental and social impact is neglected…
In addition, the two Presidents take up a recurring speech placing the African continent as the main victim of this change. Need we remind you that climate change is not a new phenomenon in certain areas of the black continent such as the Sahara, the Sahel and the Horn of Africa. Admittedly, it is a fact that we observe daily, that we cannot neglect its disastrous effects, but why does a concern for polluters also become a concern for non-polluting countries? Or should we consider these weeks as being in tune with the times or in tune with the major themes of our time. The fashion is to follow what others are doing both in form and content where the same actors are involved. In short, meetings that do not lead to concrete solutions. Meetings where the speakers discuss, speak without listening to each other and without having a conviction to achieve concrete results. The interests of certain sectors weigh even more than measures, taken by satisfying the gallery.
Like COPs, Regional Climate Weeks are human and financially draining for solutions that are ineffective and rarely put into practice. Of which act!
By Bahdon Abdillahi Mohamed
