Africans Speak about Their Lives and the Climate Crisis

At the recent Workshop for Leaders on the Climate Emergency [see the article “A Workshop for Leaders 
on the Climate Emergency,” by Jan Froehlich, on page 5 of Present Time No. 211], African Co-Counselors had the opportunity to talk about the conditions of people’s lives in Africa and the impact of the climate crisis. 


Urbain Bamana, Bafana Matsebula, Alfred Asika, and Ethel Okoh made the following comments: 


  • If you have power twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and a room in which to have a Co-Counseling session; if you can attend workshops; if you have stable Internet most of the time—you are more privileged than most.
  • The reality is that for most Africans it is a privilege to sit here [at the workshop] for two to three hours.
  • In our communities, most people are poor. They need to put food on the table. They cannot sit at workshops for two or three days.
  • We lack the bandwidth for stable Internet. It is not our fault that the infrastructure is not there.
  • For most workshops, we have to rely on phones, with no video. Using phones costs more money, and we are often disconnected within an hour.
  • Our networks are on and off continuously.
  • If there is unrest in our communities, our governments shut off the Internet to interrupt the resistance.
  • It would help us Africans if you Co-Counselors would discharge on this. We can see your impatience, the intolerance. We get the message that we are a nuisance. You hear noises in our background. Our families want our attention. They do not understand why we are cooped up in this room with you for hours. It is often very hot here, and our children cannot sleep.
  • If you are going to a workshop with Africans, discharge on your privilege and have more tolerance.
  • When we come to these workshops, we are trying hard to be here. We get cut off from the Internet, and come back, and get cut off again.
  • When we are in a support group, we often can’t see you. We don’t know who you are. We might hear you, but we might not be able to respond.
  • Some of the things we hear are not always positive, welcoming, or appreciative. We are often made to feel like we are not serious or trying hard enough.
  • I thought this was an organization in which I would be made to feel special, but sometimes I am made to feel invisible in the room with you.
  • I cannot mute; I cannot unmute. Our technology is bad.
  • We encourage white people to understand that we are not lazy. What is happening is the direct result of colonialism and imperialism.
  • A lot of our governments are not what we have chosen. They are what you have chosen so you can keep extracting resources from Africa.
  • We are told by you, “Why not choose another president?” Our candidates are killed. We cannot do anything about this.
  • We start to feel like our lives are not important. There is no outcry from the world to save us.
  • The conditions are such it is not safe for us to say anything.
  • Recently I had a gun pointed at my head and was made to lie on the ground, face down. My car, my computer, and my phone were taken. My wife and children were in the same room where this happened. Those who did it were not caught.
  • Seventy percent of the people of my country are below poverty, and there is huge unemployment.
  • My community is mostly subsistence farmers, but because of climate change, they cannot farm. They go to the cities where there are no jobs; they turn to a life of crime; they are used for political purposes.
  • Police tell us to get a gun and shoot intruders.
  • We try to use this RC process to discharge. I do not know what my life would be like without it. I try to remain hopeful. It’s not easy. I know discouragement and powerlessness are old feelings, but we are here in this situation.
  • One of the hardest things as a Black man is that they took from me the opportunity to see how brilliant I am. I sometimes don’t think I am doing enough and spend time beating up on myself when I should be celebrating my successes.
  • Thank you for coming. We all have work to do. Thank you for being a part of this project with us.
  • A lot of people in my community don’t care and don’t want to know what is happening to them. And there is no way to blame them, as they are fighting for things they don’t have—food, power, water—and you bring the climate crisis to them. They have an empty stomach.
  • My people can no longer farm where they did before. Farms were taken by illegal mining and greedy-acting people. What can I tell them? I do not have solutions; I am not a government; I cannot provide food for them.
  • What do I tell people who are breaking the rules when I cannot provide any resource for them?
  • The Western world sends things we don’t want that are not good for us, and they come and destroy our land—for example, with mining.
  • We used to be known for our agriculture and for fish farming. In my country the sudden discovery of oil and gas made us throw everything away.
  • Before, we could go into the bush and get many fruits—oranges, mangos, apples. Now there are no more free trees. We cut all of them. None of us are asking questions about why there are no more trees for growing fruit to eat.
  • Now we import food, especially things we used to grow.
  • We sell our agricultural land to foreign companies.
  • Our younger people are not concerned about the climate emergency.
  • The climate crisis and racism affect us a great deal. Racism is in my subconscious. I feel inferior, no good, less intelligent. Thanks to RC, I’ve learned that I am intelligent and a good person.

Report by MacClurg Vivian


Rochester, New York, USA


Reprinted from the RC e-mail discussion 
list for white allies ending racism

(Present Time 211, April 2023)

Last modified: 2023-04-18 12:36:31+00