Firoze Manji and Nnimmo Bassey discuss the environmental threats posed by the Trump administration’s policies, particularly the withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and the prioritization of oil and gas drilling. Bassey highlights the severe environmental degradation in the Niger Delta, including contaminated water and soil, and the health impacts on local communities. He emphasizes the need for African unity and transformative leadership to combat these issues. Bassey also notes the broader implications for Africa, including potential environmental genocide in other regions like Senegal and Botswana. He calls for cultural and environmental education to foster sustainable practices and solidarity among African nations. (Transcript below).

Audio file:

Nnimmo Bassey discusses the threats to Mother Earth from the Trump Regime

Thu, Feb 06, 2025 12:01PM • 53:46

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Trump regime, climate change, Paris Agreement, environmental justice, oil drilling, endangered species, genocidal policies, African continent, environmental activism, Niger Delta, oil spills, environmental genocide, food sovereignty, cultural heritage, Ubuntu.

SPEAKERS

Nnimmo Bassey, Firoze Manji

Firoze Manji 

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you may be. This is Firoze Manji from Daraja Press Podcasts. Today we’re going to be discussing what is the future for Mother Earth in the light of the new regime in the USA.  I mean, there’s a lot of material that’s appeared about the withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement from USA, the largest polluter in the world, the removal of all constraints on industry, oil, offshore drilling. There’s the issues that were articulated in Project 2025; the dismantling environmental justice, the gutting of endangered species act, the prioritizing of drilling for oil and gas and other minerals, to say nothing of the genocidal policies that were part of the Biden regime and the military contribution to greenhouse gasses emissions. So what are the implications for the people and environment of the African continent? What threats are now posed? What are the potential oppositions and protests likely to come from? How do we organize against that?

My guest today is the amazing Nimmo Bassey. Nimmo is, I’m sure, known to many of you. He is the director of the think tank Health of Mother Earth Foundation, HOMEF, and a member of the steering committee of Oil Watch International. He was Chair of Friends of the Earth International until 2012 and Executive Director of Nigeria’s Environmental Rights Action until 2013. He is the co-recipient of the 2010 Right Livelihood Award, also known as the alternative Nobel peace prize. And in 2012 he received the Rafto Human Rights Award. And in 2014 he received Nigeria’s national honor as a Member of the Federal Republic, in recognition of his environmental activism. He’s a fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Architecture, and has authored numerous books on environment, architecture and poetry, amongst which, more recently, we have the wonderful collection of poems I See the Invisible. It’s that which I’d really like to build on, because I think Africa is invisible. There’s a lot of discussions about North America, about Latin America, about Middle East, about Asia, but Africa seems to be outside that discourse, even though the effects and policies that are likely to be implemented or are being implemented will have very serious effects on the continent. So it gives me great pleasure to have you on our show today, Nnimmo. Thank you for sparing time. I know how incredibly busy you must be, so I appreciate your taking time.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Thank you so much. Firoze, nobody could be as busy as you are, so I think we’re the same this time.

Firoze Manji 

So I’d really like sort of get your idea, your impressions of, well, what are the consequences of this new regime? What does it mean for us on the continent? What are the threats that we are going to be facing and what are the possibilities for organizing against that? And I think you know how many of us look at HOMEF as being one of the critical leaders in our thinking around this.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Well, thank you. As you said earlier, Africa is very clearly invisible in terms of global discussions about the tornado and volcanos that are being released across the world from one particular spot. And of course, that is not right, because Africa is extremely significant to the trends in the world, and Africa does really have solutions to many of the challenges that others are actually blind to. So yes, we can say right away that no matter what regime — and I like that term, regime — is in power in the United States, the implication for Africa largely runs the same. Because, as we all know, Africa has generally been seen as a storehouse for extracting certain resources where they are needed, destruction of the environment, mindless exploitation of resources, both human and material, and then, of course, leaving the mess behind without clearing anything up. So that has been our history, and right now, this may be compounded by the fact that the occupant of the White House has never made any attempt to hide his attitude towards Africa. One could say that he holds Africa in contempt. That that can be argued, but that appears to be what it is. And then, with the overall tendency to go it alone and to rule like a captain of the empire to have the world at his feet means that Africa would be holding wrong end of the stick unless the continent is united, is standing against the assault that is unfolding. What is going on may be shocking, but it’s not surprising, because we’ve never really been in the equation when it comes to doing things in a bilateral way that is respectable, and because the occupant of the White House is not really interested in multilateralism. That makes it more complicated for the continent. For example, we talk about the pulling out of the US, the indication of the US that they’re going to leave the Paris Agreement. Now, I’m not a very big fan of the Paris Agreement, but it does stand out as one critical agreement when it comes to tackling global change, global warming, from a global perspective. Indeed, is the only agreement we have. It’s a very defective agreement, because I do remember that at COP 15 in 2009, where we were all campaigning against the target of one degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels. That was one degree. Now the Paris Agreement celebrates 1.5 degrees as the best target. And it always shocks me when people you know keep parroting 1.5 or well below 2 as something as acceptable for Africa. That is clearly not acceptable, because for every change in temperature, Africa experiences about 50% more than the global average. So if the global average for the world is 1.5 we’re already sentencing Africa to burn. This is the situation where Africa is going to be cooked. And already within 2024 the world record on at least one day for temperature increase. It was at up to 1.5 degrees, if not above 1.5 degrees Celsius beyond preindustrial level. And we are not on track to keeping to that limit. Ah, so when the biggest polluter in the world pulls out of that agreement, as defective as it is, that indicates that they’re going to do things without regard to what happens anywhere else, without regard to the impacts on Africa. And you can be sure we’re going to have freak cyclones on the southeastern coast of Africa. We’re going to have more droughts, more farming, more low coast ruins. We’re going to have coastal erosions and loss. The map of Africa will likely change, because as coastal erosion rise, Africa surrounded by water body, as it as we have more floods and more coastal erosion, or certainly having territories washed out into the sea. So everywhere you look, something really, very harsh is coming to the continent. And you know, the sad thing is that no matter how powerful, how rich a nation is, no one can afford to be isolated, because we are having complex poly crises confronting the world. No one nation is exempted from the impacts, as we’ve seen from the fires in California. We’ve seen when they have hurricanes over there, things can get really bad. Even though the slogan may that we felt standing alone, we’re going to make it! That is a mindset of emperors and empires, but they never last.

Firoze Manji 

You really think they never lasted? Some would argue. I interviewed Kali Akuno a couple of weeks ago, and he argues that what is happening in the in the US and on an international level, is a major restructuring of the world economy, a complete overhaul. So that it will be short term pain for long term gain for the owners of capital. What’s your view of that?

Nnimmo Bassey 

Long term gain? If I understand, if I got you right, I would say that we are in for long term losses. For those who are controlling capital, those who are controlling technology, of course, they’re going to have short term gain, and they could gain a whole lot, because we’re seeing a kind of oligarchy that be playing out before us. They’re just a boys’ club of billionaires running the show, and the earth is now a source of resources, extracted, exploited resources, finances accumulated. So, extraction of both resources, extracting finance, because we are hearing stories of exploiting nations and having those nations exploited, paying for the exploitation. And we heard this in the first time. Now we are hearing it again. So when you we have people with this mindset running the show, and we can also understand why there’s so much investment in the race for space. Now, Africa is not on in that race. We’re not racing for Mars or for the Moon or anywhere. But if our resources are being extracted in a mindless way to fund technologies that would take humans to space, it means that those who are projecting into that dimension don’t really care what happens on the long term on planet Earth, because they believe there’s a place to escape to, and that place to escape to. Nobody is certain about what the future of living in Mars or living on the moon or even an asteroid would mean for humanity. And how many people go there? Maybe just a boys’ club. A few of them could get there, like we saw in the movie, Looking Up, or was it? Don’t Look Up or Look Up. Miss the title. But you know that movie really showed what

Firoze Manji 

happened. Don’t look

Nnimmo Bassey 

up. Look up, yes, and they refuse to look up. They still refuse to look up, except through rockets. So I think we are in for very bad for us in Africa the future, if this kind of approach takes root beyond one term. If the one term is already very dangerous, if it takes to be a one term, then that will be really harsh, and we have to take dramatic actions to ensure that we protect the interest of our common humanity.

Firoze Manji 

What one of the problems with the sort of discussions about the implications of the kind of environmental policies that the Trump regime will be implementing is that, you know, people talk about the continent or our countries, but let’s look at Nigeria, where you are, and let’s look at the specifics. I mean, we have a have a ruling class in Nigeria, you have a government which colludes with the American government, does it not?

Nnimmo Bassey 

You are absolutely right. We have politicians who who have completely yielded to whatever comes from outside the continent, whatever comes out of the country, because it’s a way of protecting themselves and a way of thinking they could have a safe haven where they could damage everything at home and then escape to so that that is a very sad reality, but is the truth? And yeah,

Firoze Manji 

is it? Is it not just that they are responding to things outside? Are they not becoming part of an international, uh, ruling class that has a vested interest in this, in that its source of accumulation is that. That they don’t have a difference in politics with those in the US.

Nnimmo Bassey 

You know, Firoze in a certain sense, yes, they are completely aligned. Because, I mean, we see in the US clearly that the leaders just care all about their own pockets. They don’t even care about rules. They don’t care about ethics. They just thinking of themselves. It’s something we have here. But the difference is that when it comes to pulling the shots, calling the shots at an elevated level, the Nigerian politician doesn’t have the clout to do that when it comes to dealing with the United States, for example, and this is why we’re seeing the mass deportations that have started, which affects, virtually, affects Nigeria. And the Nigerian government has, so far, as far as to my own knowledge, have not made any critical comment on that. You know, we’ve seen even other countries having difficulties standing up against that. But again, nobody really wants people to evacuate from their own countries to somewhere else. But the fact that humans have always been on the move cannot be denied, and no one can stop that movement, no matter how many walls we build, no matter the military will amass at the boundaries no one can stop the fact that we have to cross pollinate, and by moving, we help each other grow. So movement is positive, but not forced movement and not forced deportation.

Firoze Manji 

Let’s focus down on where you are in the Niger Delta. I mean that history over the last what 40 years, 50 years, is one of major environmental destruction, major destruction of a society and of its people and its cultures for the interests of well, you know, the oil drillers and a collusion, both at local and federal level, in those policies that have destroyed so much of the Niger Delta. Perhaps you can help some of our viewers understand what has actually happened in the Niger Delta.

Nnimmo Bassey 

You know, when it comes to this situation of ecological destruction of the Niger Delta on the altar of crude oil and gas is very difficult to explain in words. Is best seen and experienced to understand it is utter destruction, complete degradation. It is the best definition of ecocide, where you have massive, extensive environmental degradation that may never be recovered and that could not recover in one lifetime, that you could just look at the places. I look at it in Niger Delta, and I know that no matter how long I live on planet Earth, I can never see them return to normal, because you go to a community and the entire river is coated with oil. We have massive gas furnaces burning like Dante’s inferno, burning day and night continuously for decades. Ah, without any respite. I mean, we can understand flaring of gas occasionally to relieve pressure from oil wells, but this is routine gas flaring going on at more than 100 fire furnaces across the region. So we have, you know, the best way to really explain this is, if you want to once understand how degraded the environment is, you can just read the United Nations Environment Program research of Ogoni land, which was published in August 2011. That report showed all the water bodies in that territory. Ogoni is a small territory. That’s the home of Ken Saro Wiwa, who was executed in 1995. When we look at that, if that report shows that all the water bodies in Ogoni land are contaminated. It showed that the soil in many places was contaminated to a depth of five meters. You dig onto five meters, your carbon pollution all the way down and so. And then, of course, if you go to communities, the fumes from hydrocarbon are so thick in the atmosphere that you will be wondering whether people survive in those territories. But of course, people don’t survive for long in those territories. Life expectancies, they are abysmal, 41 years. Then in 2023 the government of one of the states in the in the region set up a commission called the Bayelsa State Oil and Environmental commission, and they undertook a study of pollution. This, to me, is the most polluted place in the region. And they publish a report called Environmental Genocide. Anybody could Google and find that Environmental Genocide was published in May 2023. Now that report showed that it’s a per capita contamination of 1.5 barrels of crude oil in the region. And that, of course, we have heavy metals in the waters. You have hydrocarbon pollution in the waters up to 1 million times above safe limits, you know. And we are talking about pollution ongoing at every moment. As we speak right now, there is a well that blew up in May 2020. Has been burning and spilling off the coast of one of the coastal regions in shallow waters, not deep waters. It’s been burning for almost five years now, day and night, nonstop. Now, in all the pollution we talk about in Investigator, the oil companies from the US and from Europe that are involved, they have been exploiting, extracting, damaging the environment, and they get on with it because they do this in joint venture with the government. This is when we talk about the alignment of the forces local and external, and now, of recent, these oil companies have tried to do what they call divestment. In other words, they’re selling off their shares for the onshore activities in the Niger Delta, to local companies, to Nigerian companies, to indigenous companies, and they’re moving away completely, or moving to deeper waters where they will have less oversight. But you know, this is a very tricky situation. One of the companies, a company like Shell, is selling to a company that is lending money to buy from them, I know, just think about the logic of that. I want to buy something from I want you to buy something from me. Then I give you the money to buy from me. It’s not logical. It doesn’t make sense. And then the staff will still be working, so it’s like a shift in the corporate shield, so that what you see is not really what is going on. And they want to avoid historical responsibility for pollution that have been piled on since 1956 when the first commercially viable well was drilled. Recently, I was at oil number one, number two, number three, number six, number nine and number 12, just to see for myself the situation. These were drilling in the 1950s. They were abandoned, mostly in 1970s but those wells are still polluting environment, abandoned, not decommissioned, not properly secured. They’re still polluting the environment. And recently, one of the activist groups in the region undertook blood sampling and testing of women who live close to this abandoned oil wells, and they found hydrocarbon in the blood sample of more than 80 women who were tested. I mean, our people are like moving corpses. And the world is silent to this. The US with this corporation doing this, nobody is asking questions, they say “drill, baby drill”. And of late, the government is making moves to reopen the oil wells of Ogoni, which were shut down in 1993. And in 1993 when they shut down, they militarized the whole region. Militarized the region, and now they’re sending the military again. They applauded a military for increasing oil or extraction in the region, and the military adviser to the president, is now coordinating a move to get your gun is agree for the always to reopen. So it’s like the Nigerian state believes that crude oil, barriers of good oil flow from barrels of the gun. And this is very disturbing.

Firoze Manji 

Wow. Wow. I mean, I think, I think what you’ve raised a really important point about the report that came out Environmental Genocide. And I think there’s often a tendency for people to think of environment as something different from humans, but we are part of that environment. We are a product of that environment. You can’t talk about genocide of the environment without actually thinking about a genocide of the people.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Absolutely, it’s, you know, the genocide of the environment and environmental misbehavior by oil, for example, and mining companies around the world and refineries across the world, the genocide caused by environmental misbehavior is just as dastardly as bad as environmental that come from the barriers of the gun, just that the gun shoots and kills you at once, but the. 100 people may give you five years, 10 years to live. Now we’re having children born with several kind of birth defects. This cancer. Cancer is so prevalent people used to have, I mean, cancer was like a story in the past, but now it’s something that people are living with because of the level of environmental deprivation. So it’s really genocide. And I really Baylesa State, applaud the writers of that report and the government of the state that commissioned the report, for receiving the report and pledging that they will do something about it. Now, environmental genocide was just the right terminology, right time to declare the devastation that we have in the region.

Firoze Manji 

So this is all being done by the Nigerian government in collusion with these corporations. It’s not something that being they’re being told to do. It’s not that they are getting messages from the White House saying, Please, would you pollute the environment? They are doing this directly themselves. And isn’t this the problem we face across the continent, each of our countries that that we are living under conditions where we have an elite that is that is exploitative. It isn’t merely a victim of of Washington.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Again, that is true. We have elites who have completely forgotten that they ought to be leading the people for the people and for the best interest of our countries and continent. But we have elites who are completely… I don’t have, I don’t have a respectable word to use, but they’re completely gone bonkers when it comes to thinking about the common good. They just don’t care. And this is why it’s time for Africans to support young people when there’s an uprising calling for justice, calling for true government that really cares about the people. Is this the time to have transformative leadership on the continent? We can’t keep doing the same thing and expect a different outcome. Now actually the pollution and the crisis, the violence we have in the Congo DRC. The time Lumumba was killed, for Lumumba was killed for access to resources, both by external and internal forces.  That is still the same story, devastating that country today, the crisis we’re having across the continent. In South Sudan, for example, South Sudan is almost as contaminated, including all pollution, as the Niger Delta, and we hear very little about it. The area should be a very rich, powerful nation, but it’s completely impoverished by reckless exploitation, which is being again condoned by the local elites. The problems we’re having across the Sahel have led to the rise of the Alliance of Saharan states, which is threatening to wreck the ECOWAS block. And so when we look at the way our countries have completely, ah, we have leaders who don’t care, and of course, they’re not getting directive from the White House to contaminate your country. No, they are not getting that, but they are. They are being encouraged by corporations, our governments.  Our politicians are like shoe shine boys for these corporate leaders, because whatever the corporations say, that’s what they do, and they allow them to get away with murder because they’re not being held to account for environmental crimes that are being committed across the continent.

Firoze Manji 

I want to come back to this issue of what’s happening in West Africa and the Alliance that is being formed as we speak. But I just want to go back to the local, what was been happening in the Niger Delta. And it’s, you talk about the resurgence of oil exploitation, gas exploitation in Ogoni land, that has been a long, long battle and an opposition and a movement that has arisen out of that and the slaughter of Ken Saro Wiwa and his comrades by the Nigerian regime that wasn’t a US-pushed agenda. We this is something that has been going on a major scale. So I mean the question I want to pose in in that context, how much worse could it get?  I mean, the same question arises, you know, when, when we are talking about the genocide in Palestine. A lot of people saying, Oh, well, if we had the Democrats, things would be better. But it was the Democrats who carried out that genocide, you know, and so, people say, Well, it’ll be worse under Trump. Well, how much worse can a genocide be? And so I pose the same question to you, how much worse can the situation be for the people of Ogoni, for the people of Niger delta in the Trump regime,

Nnimmo Bassey 

Well, for the people of Gaza, what is going on is completely unthinkable. But unfortunately, it is the reality. The resilience of the people of Gaza tells us a lot. It gives us a lot of reasons to believe that resilience of humankind, of humans, something that cannot be ignored or wished away. But again, we don’t want to show that we are powerful. We can resist when we are being trashed, and environment is destroyed and everything is being leveled and genocide. Can we have a worse form of genocide? I just hope that we don’t have but what we’re having is deepening every time. Ogoni land is a shadow of itself. I mean, Ken Saro Wiwa was executed by the Nigerian state 30 years ago. This year is 30th anniversary of the execution. In fact, if for those who are watching, who watched history when it happened, when he, when he and eight other compatriots were sentenced to death. They were given one month within which to appeal, but within 10 days, they were executed. In other words, the period, appeal period had not even elapsed. So was clear, clearly, a state mother of Ken Saro Wiwa and the rest. And this is the 30th anniversary, a time we should pause to look back. This is when they want to reopen the oil wars.  It’s like a celebration on the grave of the dead, on the graves of Ken Saro Wiwa, completely unthinkable. Then when it comes to the can genocide get worse? Now, at the same time, you know, this morning I was, I mean, yesterday, there was a report about a new oil spill in Ogoni land. There’s been a clean-up exercise going on, I must say, but this has not gone as far as we would say. Well, Ogoni is being cleaned up now. There was an oil spill going on yesterday within one of sheriff’s facilities, and they have admitted that it was equipment failure. That is, is what they call the silver pit, where they could put some, some of the influence in god of overflowing over got the whole thing overflowed into the environment. Now we have in that situation where pollution is still happening, oil spills are still happening, and somebody will think of reopening the oil wars. It’s simply incredible. And so, how can genocide get worse? Apparently, it could get worse in the Niger Delta. Because, for let me say something, because, I mean, I’m, I live in Ignite, and I travel a lot in within the United delta is there’s still some traces of places that are beautiful, which we intend to, we fight to maintain that they don’t destroy everything. But you know, the level of militarization that started in 1990s is completely, is unimaginable. You go in a boat in the canals, and wherever there’s a pipeline, oil pipeline crossing the water, there’s also a little checkpoint, and everybody in the boat, if you’re 100 in that boat, or ferry or wherever you are two, you are three. Everyone on sighting the checkpoint must raise your hands. It is very humiliating, and you can’t put your hands down until the military tells you to put down your hands. And all this is to make the people to pacify an intimidating people, to allow exploitation without any complaints. Can genocide get worse? Apparently, to get worse in the Niger Delta, life expectancy is now 41 years, so err life expectancy could possibly get to 30 years or less.

Firoze Manji 

So one of the things that came out of the struggles in Ogoni Land was the organizing, the formation of MOSSOP, the mobilization of communities. And were faced with this. This what was then and is still now, environmental genocide. So, so help me understand what? What are the possibilities? What is organizing? What is happening, for example, in the Niger Delta, what are the cracks that can light the light in? Where are the possibilities for organizing and not merely agonizing?

Nnimmo Bassey 

That’s a very nice way to put it. That reminds me of the fact that we are actually campaigning now for organizing, not agonizing. We want to go any situation replicated around the world, just in the same line with the Yasuni to Yasunize the world. The Yasuni people voted to keep it all in the ground. In Ecuador, people decided in 1993 to keep it all in the in the soil. So organizing and agonizing, terminologies that have to find that place in the Oxford English Dictionary. Ah, [not intelligible]What MOSSOP did was phenomenal, because most of did not only complain, they produced an organic bill of rights that was in 1990 where they presented the government. And government has not responded to that bill of rights. And that bill of right clearly states what they want. They want to stop economic marginalization, political marginalization. They want to end ecological destruction in their area. They want to be. They want prior, free, informed consent about anything going on. They want to show that they are not a colonized people. They are not a conquered people. And that has been the driving force behind Ogoni. Maybe that’s why Ken Saro Wiwa, was so hated by the system, a system he even operated in, you know, but you know, and most of us rose up by building up the sense of dignity within the Ogoni kingdoms. And they build, they got the people to respect their culture, to learn from their culture, to stand up for their rights, and that is what is sustaining that struggle to today. But unfortunately, MOSSOP has become fragmented, and that that really stops us. In the heart, you have several number of people claiming to be presidents of MOSSOP, and so that when, when you’ve got a movement, a clear, nonviolent, excellent, organized movement fragmented in that sense, then it makes it very easy to practice what we always we saw in colonial discourse as divide and rule. But organizing the Niger Delta is still very strong, because despite all the pollution or the disregard for environmental justice, environmental rights, people are still taking litigation, for example, litigating outside of the shores of Nigeria, because within Nigeria, the cases could go on forever. The plaintiffs will die before the cases are still in court. So tackling this corporation that home bases have become much more useful and brings quicker results. But beyond this, there’s also constant organizing, nonviolently, to resist any attempt to expand the genocide to sacrifice more zones in the region. And this gives us a lot of courage and a lot of hope that we cannot fold our arms and say, well, the train has left the station. There’s still a chance, still a chance, of bringing about a […], restoring the area, rebuilding what has been lost, and hopefully within one or two lifetimes, getting the environment restored to what it ought to be. It’s something we cannot achieve, apparently, in one lifetime. Because in the UN report we learnt when the United Nation Environment Program, should they report in Ogoni land that beyond the cleanup, it may take up to 25 years to restore the environment. Now, remediation is one, restoration is another one, and we add to that reparation, because the group must be paid for what has been lost. Those who are alive must be compensated for what has been lost. Because you live in a territory. The soil is polluted, the water is polluted. The fish you have if you if you manage to catch any fish, is contaminated. You grow crops in polluted soil. You are harvesting polluted products, and you are eating pollution. So people are born in pollution, they live in pollution, they play in pollution. They die in pollution. They are buried in pollution. It’s completely unthinkable that the elites can allow this to happen, and they still think of expanding the zones of destruction. It’s completely crazy. But again, I should also, I should add Firoze, if you permit me that there is the hand that’s coming from the outside, because the insatiable appetite of the of the global West for good oil has allowed this to happen that companies are exploiting to feed the appetite of the addiction to fossil fuels in Europe and in North America. This has added fire to the fuel in the Niger Delta and across our region. Now there’s the push to extract oil from the Okovango Basin, which is a UNESCO heritage site in Botswana and Namibia, the extracting oil now in […] Delta. Lower Heritage Site in Senegal. You know, the forest in the Congo is also being targeted. And none of this is for Africans. They’re not a strategy, just like the infrastructure about of our continent always start from where resources are to the seaport for export. So the force that’s going from the outside is the insatiable appetite, the addiction for the resources on the continent.

Firoze Manji 

So to what extent, what has happened in Ogoni Land, what has happened in the Niger Delta, are these future mirrors for what is happening up in Okavango? What’s opening up in Senegal and so on. Are we going to see the same stories over again of a growing environmental genocide?

Nnimmo Bassey 

Absolutely and unfortunately, if they allow it to happen, that’s what they’re going to see. We tell our community partner communities and activists in Senegal, in Uganda, in Namibia, ah, in Congo, DRC, we’re telling them, Look, Niger Delta is a poster child of what should not be done and you don’t want it to happen in your country. But in Ghana, it was the same thing. When oil was found in Ghana, we told our kind of Ghanaian friends that, look, you’re going to have economic dislocation, going to destroy your fisheries, which was a major income earner, and you’re going to suffer what we all are suffering. They all love us, you know? They just say, we can’t be as bad as Nigeria. But what is playing out is not different from what we have. Their are fisheries is going to the dogs, and of course, gold mining is now getting more desperate and more destructive. Companies are having their rivers and stream polluted with cyanide, with acid, and it’s really horrible. We’re going to see the same thing in Senegal. We’re going to see the same in Botswana. We’re already seeing the thing happening in Uganda, where oil is being extracted, being drilled in a nature reserve. We’re seeing that even the communities have been moved into camps with nothing to do, nothing representing the natural way of living, and they’re complaining so and of course, there’s repression in that country.

Firoze Manji 

It’s not new, is it? I mean, Gulu has been like that for years. So turning the communities into camps, is an old strategy. I just wonder whether what I mean, you know, this goes on and the Nigerian government just simply closes its eyes to it and benefits from it. But what, what is the reaction of the Nigerian government to what’s happening to your neighbors in Burkina Faso, in Mali, in Chad in Niger, and beginning to happen in in Senegal, the formation of this counter to ECOWAS, yes, this alliance. What is the significance of that and what are the possibilities for an influence that HOMEF could have in terms of environmental policies in those regions?

Nnimmo Bassey 

Firoze, you’re asking me a difficult question. But let me yeah, let me just say that what is happening in Burkina Faso and Mali and the change of government, and even Guinea and the change of government in Senegal, it’s a big lesson for all the other countries in the region, because they look to see the citizens of this those countries are celebrating the change that they are experiencing. I mean, France’s colonialism in Africa has been one of the worst, long, lasting infractions that no nation should tolerate. And so, when any military says, Okay, I’m sending this group packing from my territory, the citizens were, yes, it’s time to have that happen. And now the signals were, unfortunately, when it happened in the Republic, Nigeria just had elections, and where the new president and he be had become the chairperson of ECOWAS, and he had to prove tough. Of course, those who are elected would not want to see those who are not elected in power in any country by on their borders. And you know, so they took an action which was, of course, received. There was a heavy pushback by Niger Republic, and I’m not too sure the relationship between the two countries as could be as cordial as was called Niger is so much symbiotically, ah, connected to Nigeria. We have, ah, people living across those borders, artificial. Borders created by colonialism, eh, even though they even impose language barriers, French and English between us. But you know, we had Nigerian government building railway lines into Nigeria,  building infrastructure. Nigerians are living on both sides of the border. So it’s very, very important that these two nations and other nations live in harmony, because the division between the nations of West Africa. Indeed, across Africa, they’re all very artificial. I’ve gone to Guinea from Mali before, but I just stepped over by a bridge in a village, and there was not one official who say, Hey, who’s going there? Where are you coming from? Where you going? And the people are living without knowing that there are different countries. So cooperation, solidarity is much better if we can actually come together to unite on a Pan African basis and regain our dignity continentally and fight together to build a strong Africa. So what is happening right now is very must be disturbing, but it could also be an incubation of change that we could all watch to see. We don’t want people taking power by force, but if they have that has happened is a fact of history. If those nations show that things can be done differently, then those who are elected ought better wake up and do things differently.

Firoze Manji 

Okay, so well, then to conclude, let’s just give us an idea about, well, what is, what is HOMEF’s plan for the next, next period, for the next five years, 10 years, What is your strategy? What are the calls on solidarity that you would extend?

Nnimmo Bassey 

Yes, you asked me that question before, and I did not answer it, so let me answer it now. Of course, Nigeria is our base. We are very African, and we are looking at our continent very close. We have allies across the continent. We have office in a couple of places outside of Africa, outside of Nigeria. We work with communities across the continent and everywhere we go. Stress solidarity. We are all … we hold the keys to it, because continent is traumatized decades by centuries of exploitation, that people are traumatized by environmental degradation, by economic mismanagement, and we believe that this is time to sit down again, with what is a true meaning of Ubuntu. How can Ubuntu help us as Africans to reclaim our dignity, to reclaim reclaim our lives, our territories, our systems of beliefs and systems of economic relationships? How can we rebuild a situation where might is not always right, where we can care about our neighbors and care about the welfare of everyone. How can we learn? What can we learn from Ubuntu that will build our awareness and well-being? What can we learn from Ubuntu that we call it in my language is Ibibio. The word for Ubuntu is a two way, the good life. Ah, living well. What does it mean to live well? Does it mean that, oh, you have power. You can give instructions to countries. You can grab and own Gaza, drive the gas, and say, Where I turn it to a real estate, piece of real estate, just because you are estate investor, you forget that you are leading a nation and not leading a firm, a company, you know. We’re working on our mindsets. You know, although we’re tackling environmental issues from the roots, which means, tackle first the missionary imaginaries, this is why we began a new program called culture and environment. And towards the end of this, we ‘ll  have a culture and environment conference. I hope you come to visit Nigeria and be a part of that conference. We are we’re having book days; we’re having poetry days, we’re having movie days. We see what we can learn from culture. Our culture is so rich, even the ways of bringing about change, correcting mistakes, correcting aberrant behavior, they’re all found in our songs, in our drama, in our conversations, elders have wisdom. Young people have wisdom. There’s this shared generational sharing is so, so critical. We are taking this up and looking for partners to help us understand the best way to first, go forward. And I believe that this pertains to every country in Africa, and we can work together to rebuild what has been destroyed.

Firoze Manji 

I think that’s really, really encouraging Nnimmo, you know, it reminds me of Cabral and his ideas that culture is the core of building an alternative world of organizing that it can’t be equated with, with the sort of touristy kind of exhibitions that we are often treated to, but rather as a very, very fundamental part of a struggle for human liberation. So I’m thrilled that that’s the direction that you are planning. So please, please keep us all in touch with that. And if there’s anything that we can do to help that process, you have only to ask

Nnimmo Bassey 

Very good offer, we’ll take you up on that.

Firoze Manji 

Your last message to the people watching and listening to the show. What should we all be thinking about now?

Nnimmo Bassey 

Well, what I would like to say is that things look very bad right now, especially with the change in the White House, but we also have to look at what we can do to ensure that things remain right in the black house. And one thing we could do from the withdrawal from supporting multilateral system is the fact that that could also help us maintain our food sovereignty, the United States have been a big polluter of our foods by promoting genetically engineered organisms. And this, if this, if they have less presence in our food systems, we have a chance of building our food sovereignty, recovering lost biodiversity and placing power back in the hands of our local farmers. They are the ones who feed us that, ones who keep us healthy. They give us food that is like medicine, not food that kills us. And we always say what we eat should not eat us. And so this is, this is a silver lining I see in the crisis in the world today. It’s a time to look inwards, and let’s not give up. Stand strong. Together. We can fight, and together we can go far,

Firoze Manji 

and maybe we can force the oil back into the soil and the coal into the hole.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Yes, we have to leave the oil in the soil and the coal in the hole. No better wisdom.

Firoze Manji 

Okay, well, Nnimmo, once again, thank you so much for this really insightful and informative discussion. We’ve had lots of people make similar comments here, and I really appreciate you giving us your time. I think there’ll be a lot of interest in many of the issues that you’ve posed, and reminder that this is the 30th anniversary of the assassination of Ken Saro Wiwa and his comrades, and sadly, It’s the 30th anniversary of the resurgence of oil exploitation in Ogoni land once again. So yeah, as if, as they, as they say, La luta continua, let’s not hope that it’s translated as the looting continues.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Vitória é certa

Firoze Manji 

Okay, Nnimmo, we’re going to end the broadcast here and but please stay online while we upload the recording. Okay? And thanks for joining us.

Nnimmo Bassey 

Thank you, Firoze, and thanks to everyone who joined us.