The Executive Director of Kebetkache Women Development and Resource Centre, Emem Okon has advocated that those seeking elective positions in the 2023 general election should look at issues like climate change and gender to attract the votes of electorate.
Okon made the call at a two-day capacity training on Gender and Climate Change at Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.
Okon explained that any political party or candidate that does not address the needs of the local communities on the issue of climate change, quality health, portable drinking water, and food sufficiency don’t deserve the votes of the people. “We will engage government officials on climate change,” She said.
She maintained that the training was organised to engage stakeholders and Councilors to be proactive in adaptation and mitigation to address the many problems associated with climate change, especially in the Niger Delta where oil and gas is predominantly rampant through the activities of the multinationals, noting that it is imperative to link communities to the State and National level to have access to Green financing on climate change to address the challenges around climate change saying the communities are badly in trouble due to flooding, acid rain, low agricultural produce, poor harvest, soot appearance, alterations in weather, low fish production and health implications of the people, among others.
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The human rights activist said that women were more vulnerable as climate change is killing a reasonable number of people according to World Health Organisation, saying that there is no positive response yet since the campaign on climate change about mitigation and adaptation and that there was no framework at the local government levels.
On the National Action Plan on climate change, the Executive Director advocated for proper refuse management and a modern disposal system to create job and economic prosperity among the youth, while calling on the communities to take advantage of waste to wealth to reduce poverty.
Other areas of intervention are food security, health integration and mainstream gender into the budget at all levels of government. “Sensitisation is the way out through new innovation and orientation,” She said.
Earlier, Patience Ekong, Idong Smart and Nelly Umoren enumerated the symptoms of climate change and steps that communities can take to overcome the menace. Still, tasked community stakeholders to contribute their quota by planting trees to combat the emission of greenhouse gases due to activities of oil companies.
Recall that deforestation, desert encroachment, rise in sea level, flooding, acid rain, black soot, and poor harvest of agricultural produce are challenges facing the oil-producing communities in the Niger Delta due to the degradation of the environment.
