By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NEW YORK (IDN) \u2013 Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has at least two African partners stepping up on the global stage and telling world leaders to \u201cwake up\u201d and recognize the dangers to women and girls of climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a speech broadcast as part of the Desmond Tutu International Peace Lecture, Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate tied climate change to poverty, hunger, disease, conflict and violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSee the danger we are in,\u201d Nakate urged the leaders at the Tutu peace lecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The lecture is given every year to coincide with the South African Nobel Peace Prize winner\u2019s birthday. Tutu turned 89 on October 7. The pre-recorded speeches, not given in person this year because of the pandemic, called for \u201cclimate justice globally.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nakate\u2019s speech focused on the African continent, which contributes the least to climate change but stands to suffer its effects the most.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cClimate change is a nightmare that affects every sector of our lives,\u201d she said. \u201cHow can we eradicate poverty without looking at this crisis? How can we achieve zero hunger if climate change is leaving millions of people with nothing to eat? We are going to see disaster after disaster, challenge after challenge, suffering after suffering \u2026 if nothing is done about this.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cLeave your comfort zones and see the danger we are in and do something about it. This is a matter of life and death,\u201d she called out the world leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There were also messages from South African climate activist Ayakha Melithafa and former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, who praised the younger generation\u2019s work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
South African Melithafa is from a small farming town in the Eastern Cape which is also crippled by drought. She joined \u201cProject 90 by 2030\u201d, a social and environmental justice organization and now works as a recruitment official and spokesperson for the African Climate Alliance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe do need more people of colour in the fight against climate change,\u201d Melithafa told Daily Maverick, a South African news publication. \u201cI want people to know that not only privileged people are aware of climate change. The privileged people might be protesting because the quality of the water is getting worse, but people of colour have been drinking that water all along, and they feel lucky just to have water,\u201d the young teen said. [IDN-InDepthNews \u2013 14 October 2020]<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Photo: Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate (left) CC BY-SA 4.0 and South African climate activist Ayakha Melithafa (right) at DAVOS World Economic Forum in 2020. CC BY 3.0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) \u2013 Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg has at least two African partners stepping up on the global stage and telling world leaders to \u201cwake up\u201d and recognize the dangers to women and girls of climate change. In a speech broadcast as part of the Desmond Tutu […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6475,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,27,53,16,32,3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6473","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-africa","8":"category-environment-resources-energ","9":"category-goal13","10":"category-news","11":"category-regions","12":"category-sdgs-2"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6473"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6474,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6473\/revisions\/6474"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}