I had a déjà vu moment last week seeing some breathless young lady accost French President Emmanuel Macron entreating him to stop the development of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP).
The EACOP is the 1400 km pipeline that will evacuate Ugandan oil from western Uganda to the Tanzanian port city of Tanga.
The earnest young lady explained that the pipeline (As if Macron
does not know) that the pipeline would encourage the use of fossil fuels which
are major driver behind climate change, whose effects are manifest in droughts,
floods and even the increased frequency of sand storms the middle east is
suffering currently.
It took me back nearly 20 years when all sorts of activists jumped
out of the woodwork to protest the development of the 250 MW Bujagali dam. Led
by the local agents of an NGO called the International Rivers Network.
The anti-Bujagali lobby argued at the time that damming the river
would displace hundreds and destroy the scenic beauty of the area.
"So that time they could not hide behind climate change, especially since hydroelectricpower is one of the most ecofriendly energy sources, they argued for scenic beauty...
One local
activist was quoted as saying at the time, "The real issue in Uganda is
not electricity but poverty. Currently the majority of Ugandans have no money
for electricity, for they are below the poverty line. Production of more
electricity will not reduce use of fuelwood and charcoal until deliberate
programs are evolved to reduce poverty and the cost of power."
Since Bujagali
came on line in 2012 – the world has not collapsed around our ears, but in fact,
more than a million households have been hooked up to the grid. Those are a
thousand families who left to find their own devices without electricity, would
have used kerosene lamps or diesel generators for their lighting at night or used
more charcoal in their kitchens and would have been less productive.
Access to
power is just below 50 percent today but this is a far cry to the just over
five percent of the population who had access to power before Bujagali came
online.
It would be
interesting to see how much more economic activity has resulted from this
development and further still how many people were lifted out of poverty or at
least saw their incomes increase as a consequence.
I want to bet
that the Bujagali activists now live in houses – they probably built with their
paychecks from the campaign, powered by the dam fought so vehemently.
"The anti-Bujagali activists were dead wrong then as the anti-EACOP campaigners are today....
In fact, to stop
these developments will be to damage further the very environment they claim to
be seeking to protect.
Because it is
true that in our part of the world the biggest cause of environmental degradation,
is not the fat cats who are reclaiming wetlands for construction, but the poor
who have decimated 90 percent of our forest cover in search of new farmland and
firewood for their survival.
The history of
poverty eradication is quite clear. Countries interested in doing so, exploit
their natural endowments to create economic activity, which leads to a rise in
incomes across the board and therefore reduction in poverty. In some countries
they have done it so well they have surplus resources to bankroll a welfare
state, where everyone is entitled to an income in or out of a job. This did not
happen by wishful thinking.
"Because we do not have the luxury of enslaving people or colonizing other countries to push economic growth, we have to employ what we have, that is our natural resources and our people. Our confusion about how to do this – due partly to the handsome paychecks from foreign environmental lobbyists, means we are not even doing a good job on this front.
That being said the exploitation of these resources can be done in
a way that does not cause irreparable damage to our environment. As it stands
now voluminous environmental impact assessments have been carried on the
project and provisions have been put in place to mitigate against the damage to
the environment to the extent possible. This is not the Niger delta.
If we are truly sincere about conserving the environment we should
be poring over these reports to ensure every possible measure was taken to conserve
the environment.
The increased revenues to government and to the private citizens
involved in the industry, have the potential to improve the provision of public
goods and social services that will give more and more people a chance to climb
out of poverty.
You do not fight poverty by dishing out money at street corners
but by empowering people through better education and health to take advantage
of and to create new economic activity.
So if to banish poverty takes the exploitation of our natural
endowments and some do-gooder, clearly who knows better than us what is best
for us, is fighting this time tested progression, you have to wonder what their
intentions are.
"To be charitable to them I would say they are ignorant parotters of slogans on an issue they have no clue about (African poverty), he more cynical view would be that, it is in their interest to remain in our state of under development so our living standards do not rise to their level, because they would have to better share the globe’s resources...
The latter is the conspiracy theory I choose to favour.
