Excellencies,  

I would like to begin by thanking you for the kind invitation extended to the United Nations to attend and address this important meeting.

Through the important work culminating in today’s deliberations, African leaders are setting a global precedent to address pressing climate-change and conflict-related challenges through what is nothing short of an exemplary Common African Position on Climate, Peace, and Security.

By highlighting how climate change can lead to increased security risks, and by identifying related gaps in Africa’s development and governance architectures, it is clear that the Common African Position on Climate, Peace, and Security represents not only a crucial global precedent but also a truly important step for continental adaptation.

Excellencies, 

As we all know, our planet is beset by a system of socio-economic development, fuelled by hydrocarbons, which has not only generated unsustainable levels of global inequality but has also endangered the health of our planet.

This perpetuates a cycle whereby developing countries must continually brace for further inequality, food scarcity, resource conflict, and famine. This cycle must be broken – in favour of a sustainable and more ethical approach to fostering not only peace and security on the African continent, but a just, peaceful and secure world at-large.

Excellencies,

In 2006, following decades of escalating concern, Secretary-General Kofi Annan sounded the alarm bells on the security risks that climate change poses, stating, I quote: “climate change is a threat to peace and security . . . sceptics are out of step, out of arguments, and out of time”. In 2021, with the same sense of urgency, Secretary-General António Guterres stated, I quote:  “this is a Code Red for humanity . . . the alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable . . . there is no time for delay”.

Despite these urgent warnings, we are still a long way from resolving the current climate emergency. Even more troubling, our negative impact on the environment—through burning fossil fuels, deforestation, degradation of biological diversity and industrial processes that are overwhelming our environment—has worsened significantly.

This has happened not because of global ignorance, but despite the fact that we have already reached a scientifically informed consensus on what needs to be done to address the current climate emergency.

Indeed, we have done more damage since we committed to sustainable development and established the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Rio in 1992 than at any time prior.

Excellencies,

With shared but differentiated global responsibility, we threaten to do more harm than good to the environment, worsening climate change and damaging the planet.

As the Secretary-General warned the world in Sharm El Sheik at the opening of the High-Level segment of COP27 in 2022, I quote: “We are on the highway to climate hell with our foot still on the accelerator”.

In March of this year, the Secretary-General confirmed that, I quote: “the impact on sustainable development is devastating”, and, to repeat an old adage, there can be “no peace without development and no development without peace”.

To achieve the 1.5°C global warming target under the Paris Agreement, studies suggest that a third of current oil reserves, half of the current natural gas reserves, and nearly 90% of remaining coal reserves must remain in the ground. Applying this to Africa would leave a potential 6.7 trillion dollars of fossil fuels locked on the continent.

Moreover, according to Pricewaterhouse Coopers International, I quote: “it will cost Africa around 2.8 trillion dollars to reach a net-zero energy mix by 2050”.

In short, Africa is being asked to forgo 6.7 trillion dollars, in addition paying 2.8 trillion dollars, and brace for the shocks induced by climate change.

At the same time, major emitters on our planet seem to continue their business-as-usual approach with far-reaching negative implications disporpotionally affecting African countries.

Forgive me for emphasising the injustice here.

Excellencies, 

The reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are alarming, demonstrating, that climate change threatens traditional ways of life and patterns of livelihood, while impeding social, economic, and political development and exacerbating vulnerabilities. Climate change operates both as  “a threat multiplier”, and “a conflict catalyst”  and, consequently, as “a fragility amplifier”, as noted by the Secretary-General.

And yet, according to the Global Adaptation Index, the Index of Physical Vulnerability to Climate Change, and the Vulnerability and Adaptation Readiness Index, African Countries rank among the most unprepared of UNFCCC signatories in the world.

At CoP28, the Secretary-General stressed that, I quote: “up to eighteen times more finance is needed for adaptation to meet the current requirements of developing countries”. 

Excellencies, 

Africa has an abundance of solar, wind, and geothermal energy potential, alongside green hydrogen production, as well as the largest reserves of metals critical to the manufacture of green energy fuel cells, including platinum and iridium.

Furthermore, Africa is endowed with many of the metals required for green energy storage. And yet, remarkably, as the Secretary-General stated at COP 28, I quote: “Africa only received 2% of global renewable energy investments in the last two decades”.

If the implications for the continent were not so tragic, the situation would be almost laughable. Again, Africa is being asked to forgo 6.7 trillion, pay 2.8 trillion, adapt with one-eighteenth of the required financing, and make do with 2% of global renewable energy investments, while exporting precious resources.

Excellencies, 

With diminishing natural diversity, growing global power and resource competition, mounting impacts on basic livelihoods, negative outcomes for health and morbidity, inflationary pressures on the prices of goods and services, extreme and mounting weather events, rising sea-levels, rising global temperatures, crippling levels of state fragility, and forced displacements on an unprecedented scale, who can question the impact of global climate change on security in Africa?

The Secretary-General has made it clear that there is a low-carbon-emission pathway to a secure and sustainable social, political, and economic future, stating that we must implement the Paris Climate Agreement, the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, as well as the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, while providing early warning systems for all.

I emphasize this solution for a low-carbon future because, considering the specific challenges faced by the continent, nothing less than global justice is at stake; along with all the adverse continental and global ramifications if we fail to act. And, to rehearse a well-known catch-phrase, without justice there can be no peace.

Consequently, I truly commend your work on the Common African Position to climate-proof African peace and security and, therewith, to climate-proof Africa’s development aims, consistent with Agenda 2063.

We welcome the Common African Position as an act of self-protection and continental adaptation.

And, going forward, I urge serious consideration of the security risks identified in the Common African Position in future UNFCCC negotiations. Meaningful partnership will be indeed essential in addressing the global climate emergency, upon which our common sustainable future hinges.

I wish you great success in the coming consultations and congratulate the African Union for its tremendous foresight, as well as its leadership ahead of the Summit of the Future next month in New York.

I thank you for your kind attention.