Reparations demanded for eco-destruction of Africa

(leadinglightcommunist.org) water-shortage

At a forum in Burkina Faso’s capitol Ouagadougou, African Union officials have demanded billions of dollars in compensation from the countries of the First World. The AU officials demand reparations for the damage done to their continent by climate change, pollution, and ecological disasters caused by the First World. Earlier, in December, AU official Jean Ping stated, “We have decided to speak with one voice” and “will demand reparation and damages.”

Even though the Third World accounts for only a third of greenhouse gasses, it will suffer 80 percent of the damage resulting from climate change. According to Ping, the state of Texas alone “with 30 million inhabitants creates as much greenhouse gases as the billion Africans taken together.” According to experts, parts of Africa are some of the areas the most affected by pollution, climate change, and damage caused by global warming.

Imperialist countries have a long history of damaging African eco-systems. For example, recently, the increase in piracy off the coast of Somalia is linked to the destruction of the Somali coastal areas and traditional ways of life.  According to Januna Ali Jama, a Somali spokesman, the actions of the Somali “pirates” are in response to “the toxic waste that has been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years.”

The UN Environmental Program (UNEP) reported that rusted containers of toxic waste were found washed up on the Somali coastline after the 2004 tsunami. A UNEP spokesperson said that the containers were smashed open by the waves of the tsunami. The UNEP spokesperson said that the “frightening activity” of dumping had been going on for a decade. He stated that hundreds of Somali residents had become ill, suffering mouth and abdominal bleeding, skin infections and other ailments due to the dumping. “European companies found it to be very cheap to get rid of the waste, costing as little as $2.50 a tonne, where waste disposal costs in Europe are something like $1000 a tonne.”

Third World peoples suffer to maintain the First World standard of living. Third World peoples suffer not only in terms of economic exploitation, gender, and national oppression, Third World peoples also have their environments destroyed by the First World. Massive reparations are owed to African peoples and Third World people as a whole. However, settling the accounts with the First World will not come about through empty declarations by international organizations or from charity. The only way that Third World peoples will receive justice is by taking it, through global people’s war by the global countryside against the global city. Justice will only come about when socialism is imposed on the First World by the Third World by the New Power of the Leading Light.

Sources:

1. http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20091011/wl_africa_afp/africaclimateenvironmentwarmingunau

2. http://monkeysmashesheaven.wordpress.com/2009/04/15/imperialists-are-the-real-pirates/