Text: Ian Michler. Article from the February 2012 issue of Africa Geographic Magazine.
The recent death of Kenya’s Wangari Maathai has left a large hole in the cadre of African conservationists, says Ian Michler. Known to ordinary people as the continent’s first female Nobel Peace Prize laureate, she will be remembered for her uncompromising stand for the empowerment of impoverished people and against environmental degradation.
On 25 September 2011 Wangari Maathai died in Nairobi after a long battle with cancer. Although a phenomenal achiever on a number of levels, Maathai was best known around the world for her work as an environmental, gender and political activist. She fulfilled these roles with such distinction that in 2004 she became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize.
With her passing Kenya has lost one of its most spirited and visionary citizens, and Africa one of its greatest warriors. Her counsel and support were constantly sought by local and global leaders and decision-makers, and she was granted a platform at the United Nations on a number of occasions. She held various ministerial positions after being elected to parliament in 2002, and both at home and abroad she served on advisory panels and boards of directors.
Born in a small village in Kenya’s Central Highlands midway between Mount Kenya and Aberdare National Park, Maathai enjoyed a rural upbringing surrounded by the natural world. After her schooling she went on to obtain a number of notable educational qualifications, including degrees in biology and science from universities in the US. In 1971, after studying in Germany and Kenya, she became the first woman in East Africa to gain a doctorate. She subsequently attained a professorship when heading the Department of Veterinary Anatomy at the University of Nairobi.
But it was the destruction of the lush and fertile forests and woodlands – the once-vibrant ecosystems she had known so well in her youth – that became the defining focus of her later life. In the 1970s and ’80s Kenya’s population growth rate was among the highest in Africa, and with this explosion in people came immense pressure on the environment.
In 1977 Maathai was instrumental in establishing the Green Belt Movement (www.greenbeltmovement.org), a non-profit NGO that takes a holistic approach to its work at the grassroots level of Kenya’s communities. Her mission was simple: ‘to mobilise community consciousness using tree planting as an entry point for self-determination, equity, improved livelihoods and security, and environmental conservation’. It was not simply the loss of childhood playgrounds that concerned her; more significantly, she was the first of Kenya’s leadership group to understand that the manner and rate of environmental degradation were absolutely unsustainable and carried dire long-term consequences for food, firewood and water security.
To her constituents and the many in the wider world who supported her, Maathai was a passionate and dedicated, at times even fearless, activist for both the environment and the exploited
Today, the Green Belt Movement thrives under two banners: a local Kenyan operation and a continental division, the Pan African Green Belt Movement, which operates in Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Ethiopia, Lesotho and elsewhere on the continent. Together they have planted more than 45 million trees to restore damaged ecosystems. The movement as a whole has broadened its education and advocacy programmes to include all environmental issues, including climate change and food security, and is now also involved in skills and leadership training, and human rights and empowerment awareness campaigns.
Maathai’s work often brought her into direct conflict with the top echelons of Kenya’s government, notably past president Daniel Arap Moi. While this group often viewed her as combative and controversial – she was continuously harassed and was jailed on a number of occasions – to her constituents and the many in the wider world who supported her, she was a passionate and dedicated, at times even fearless, activist for both the environment and the exploited.
But to simply frame Maathai as an icon without clarification is to understate her achievements; her legacy is far more substantial and significant. In the deeply nepotistic and at times tribal world of Kenyan politics, her fierce commitment enabled her to cut through age-old divisions to force environmental and empowerment issues onto the front page of the country’s development agenda. Indeed, it would not be amiss to call her Africa’s first true ‘green’ politician. Given the obstacles she faced and that political platforms across the continent had never before been based on environmental issues, history may judge her to have been ahead of her time.
Now the big question is whether Maathai’s work and the movement will continue to grow – and become more influential in the process. Already she is a role model and an inspiration to many of the younger generation. If the current leaders drop the ball, it will be no reflection on her vision, labours and illustrious career; rather, it will be a shameful indictment on them.
Follow Ian’s take on other environmental issues at
www.africageographic.com/ blogs/?cat=5
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