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Setting the stage
Welcome to Imaginize World, where we hear from forward-thinkers, activists, and sci-fi visionaries. Today, I’m with Nicolas Omonuk, a climate justice activist. Present in global events, he stands out because his work is based on real-life grassroots experiences. Let’s hear his story.
You talk about climate justice. Not climate activism, not climate environment or climate change, but climate justice. I think that’s very important. What do you understand that to mean?
What do you mean “climate justice”?
I think for me, the reason why I call it climate justice activism is because I don’t just focus on only what happens when we see the weather changes or what happens when we see floodings, but I focus on also the aftereffects and also focus on issues of access to justice. So for me, climate justice is not just about climate change itself impacting our communities, climate change itself affecting us, but it’s also about the causes of the climate change. About who is causing it and about who is meant to pay, about who is meant to provide justice to communities in the Global South including in Uganda. And of course, linking it to the different perspectives of, also like of colonialism, of racism. And also, connecting it to migration, connecting it to where movements are, like also seeing that we have a very wide big movement. But then the people, of course, who are being listened to are not people who are coming from the Global South, are not people who are coming from communities that are impacted by the climate crisis.
Supply chains and politics hurt human rights
And it’s also about who is causing, the companies themselves, and these companies having unfair supply chains. And these unfair supply chain’s affecting the people’s human rights, where of course, there’s unfair treatment of people. Like, who are working in these areas where they’re mining also resources for just transition, because climate justice is not just about the climate crisis itself but it’s also about the transition away from fossil fuels.
And also, this transition is affecting countries in Africa. It’s also escalating conflicts. So for me, it’s about linking the climate crisis to the politics, the climate crisis to the social lives, to the economic crisis. To all the crises and connecting it as one, and seeing these connections because we cannot address one without addressing the other. Everything is very interconnected.
JANE
That makes a lot of sense, and I think that is quite a challenge. I saw that you are a member of a group called M-A-P-A or MAPA, I don’t know how you refer to it, the Most Affected People and Areas. And you represented that group at the COP27 with some other young activists.
So you’ve reached the global scene, haven’t you?
NICHOLAS
Yeah.
JANE
Congratulations. That’s a big deal.
NICHOLAS
Yeah, thanks.
JANE
It is. It’s a really big deal to reach that point. And I think, then you have an opportunity to make a difference. People will pay more attention to you.
COPs are restricting activists more today
People pay attention but it’s not really that much attention. For example, when we go for these COPs, you find that we are going to these COPs with observer badges. We are going to these COPs where, of course, there are also limitations coming in because at COP27, when you realize a lot has changed. At COP27, we were allowed to march around the area to do our campaign. And of course, we put a lot of pressure. And by that time also, we had a lot of people supporting us during that time. And during this COP, I think we got the loss and damage. We put pressure until the loss and damage was put onto the agenda. But when I look at now, the other COPs that are coming in like maybe COP28 and of recent COP29, the restrictions have become more strict on activists.
The core processes themselves are not really like a very democratic space, I would say, because a lot of people are restricted to access these negotiation rooms. And sometimes, it’s very difficult to even do campaigns. Because for us climate activists, most of what we do is to actually campaign for equity, to campaign for fairness, to campaign for inclusion, and to campaign for radical change. Which, of course, is not happening. And to campaign for justice because we have had these COPs for so many years.
JANE
Right.
We are not allowed to march
NICHOLAS
And for us, it’s about us having to share a story and making this change happen, but this is not happening because we are not being allowed to march. We have to register our actions nowadays, which makes it very difficult, and you have to stay in only one location. Everything seems very scripted, I would say. It’s like everything is organized. That all these outcomes that come in, it’s like a movie. Like, they already know the ending of it.
JANE
It’s not a democratic system, is it? I read somewhere that they had to reach consensus in the groups. And so, if you have one single member of a group, one country that disagrees with something, that will block the whole result of that group.
NICHOLAS
Yeah. Of course, it also depends because it’s a consensus. But at the same time, the G7 hold more bargaining power than the G-77 and China. So, it’s not a fair consensus, I would say. And at the same time, it’s not a consensus that treats the countries in the Global South fairly. So this is, most of the times, the countries in the Global South party delegation, in the Global South, demand that… What they are demanding for is actually prioritized because of recent…
Climate change treated as a money-making opportunity
At COP29, it was headed actually by Uganda. Uganda was leading the G-77 and China. Of course, the main focus for Africa itself was adaptation, and this was insisted at COP29. But at the same time, we realized that this was not a priority for the G7. At the same time, the G7 want prioritizing carbon markets, carbon offsets, because they’re profiting from it. So we are seeing that also, the issue of the climate crisis and climate change is being treated as a thing to make money, to make business.
Yet, it’s a matter of justice. These are the injustices that we try to also address and share. That this is not a fair process and it’s not really putting in consideration what the Global South want.
JANE
Let’s just take it for granted for a moment that these big, global media-loving events are not really making a change. What do you think can bring about change? Are there bottom-up movements? Are there other things that can bring about change?
We need bottom-up change, from communities themselves
I think the change that we want is a change… Like, the theory of change itself. Like what you talked about, the bottom-up approach. This is how things have to be addressed actually when we want to address the climate crisis itself. I will give an example of one of the communities in Uganda that we went to and we tried to bring an eco-friendly stove in the school. And then just a year later, we found that the eco-friendly stove was, just the way it was built, they didn’t even use it. It means we don’t have to just bring solutions in communities that are affected by the climate crisis but we also need their solutions. We need to hear what solutions they want. We need to hear how they want the solutions to be implemented.
The way the system is structured is from the top to the bottom. And most of the times in the Global South, you realize that the resources, the climate finance itself does not reach the people who actually need the climate finance. There were many reports with Oxfam and other NGOs indicating that over $30 billion US in climate finance has been not accounted for.
JANE
Wow.
Lack of financial transparency
There has not been proper accountability for the climate finance in the past, so there is a problem with transparency. And the way that everything is structured makes things also non-transparent for most communities in the Global South. So, there has to be a system change in how these solutions to tackle the current crisis that we have now. The way we have to tackle them has to be from the people. The people themselves have to bring the solutions. The people themselves have to be empowered in such a way that they can address the issues of climate change, they can adapt to the impacts of climate change. They can know how to adapt, and this will include so many things.
It includes capacity building development. And of which also, development itself needs a lot of money. But at the same time, the climate finance has been coming also in form of lending, and this kind of lending already also increases the debt burden in our countries. So, there’s a lot of things. How we have to address this has to be considered on a matter of justice, like a matter of looking at who is responsible. A matter of saying that, “Yes, we are responsible. We have to be accountable for this.” And what matters is what happens before the conferences. What happens in the US? What happens in Europe? What happens in China? In all these countries that are actually emitting the most. When there’s a lot of change in these countries before the conferences, then there’s an impact at the conferences themselves.
Neocolonialism and people suffering from your comforts
So there has to be people building up the pressure within the countries, social movements, every stakeholder. You don’t have to be an activist. You just need to be responsible. You just need to think about your responsibility so that others can have a better life, so that others can have a life that you’re living because there are a lot of people who are suffering from your comfort. There are a lot of people who are dying from your comfort. So, these are the things that a lot of people need to understand because most of… Also, when you look at where these companies are coming from that are extracting oil in our countries…
For example, in Uganda, we have a certain project, an oil project by a French company itself. So you realize that to the people in these countries, they don’t know about these projects. They don’t know what’s happening in these countries. They don’t know that they are extracting. There’s an extractive, neo-colonial way of taking our resources from these countries. And at the same time, these countries face impacts of climate change, these countries face human rights violations. They suffer from oil spills at the comfort of the Global North.
JANE
It makes me think there must be a role for education to play for schools, universities. To make people aware of everything you’re talking about before they actually go into the working world. Do you think there are changes that could be made in the education of young people? Are there things that people need to learn when they’re young that could make a difference?
My life as a child in farming Iteso tribe
Yeah. I think there’s a lot of things that people need to learn when they’re young that could make a difference, and there’s a lot of things I’ve learned also from my activism itself. Because when I first became a climate activist, I was looking at it in form of how climate change is affecting us. What we see? The droughts. What we see? The floods. Flooding, the landslides. But when I actually looked at where I grew up from, how I grew up, where I come from, because I come from a rural area. I come from Pallisa and I come from a tribe called the Iteso tribe. I grew up from a peasant family. My dad was a farmer, and he’s still a farmer until today. And how we used to face difficulties in terms of also accessing water for our livestock, we had to walk really long distances actually to access water. We had to really walk long distance to access grass for our livestock.
And all of these things were very impactful, especially also on our economic side because my dad was not able, actually, to raise enough income. Because in our community, we are livestock keepers, and we sell livestock to get money to take our children to school most of the times. That’s how my dad was trying to take us to school. But we found there were cases where most of the livestock also were not really healthy enough because they were not getting enough food or not accessing enough water. And this also forced my dad to sell off most of his livestock. Also, my grandfather.
And my dad had to get chicken. And when he got chicken, he started selling eggs. And this is how he was able to get some extra income, but there are so many families in my region who did not have any option. They had to sell off everything they had to. And after, they didn’t have a hope to also take their children to school because they could not get any other way of earning money because most of the people, they have not… They are farmers. They have not gone to school. They cannot do any other work. So, it’s just like an Indigenous sort of community. And so when I tried to connect this, how I grew up from and also the area I grew up from, and also the people who had been impacted because of their dependence on livestock keeping and their dependence on agriculture, and how the changes in weather patterns affected them not just in terms of the weather. It affected them socially. It affected them economically. It affected them also in terms of moving, because some people also had to migrate.
World with different ethnic groups, species
So I think for me, when we go to school, when we have this sort of education to understand these things, then we can have an impact. And what I can say to most students is it’s not just about you. We have to learn that we are living in this world not as one, but we’re living this world with other people. We are living this world with other ethnic groups. We’re living this world with different species that actually help us to survive, because everyone helps another to survive. This is how actually nature was made. This is how we were made on the planet.
But how we are living is that we are living to oppress other species, to oppress other people, to oppress other ethnicities so that we are always superior, and we are always in control and not accounting. And these kinds of injustices are actually also one of the things that are causing the climate crisis. It’s a major issue. It’s also an inequality issue. It’s also an issue of racism, is also an issue that connects to colonialism. So, it’s very interconnected.
JANE
Nicholas, overall, do you feel optimistic or pessimistic about the future? And why?
Achievement then steps back, Slow progress over time
I think it’s a little bit of both. For example, for me, when I look at… Because I’ve been an activist for three years and we have really done a lot as climate activists to bring our voices onto international tables to share our stories, to actually let people understand all these topics. But with all these hard work from the climate movement, from different people also who are working on different social issues, you see that there has been slow progress.
JANE
Yes.
NICHOLAS
Yeah, there has been slow progress. And most times also, when we get a lot of achievement, we celebrate on them. But in the end, you find that the governments change when different things happen in the geopolitics. A lot is reversed and a lot is affecting the small progress that we have made. For example, I would say that currently right now, I am very pessimistic because the current geopolitics itself. I know with the US elections, with what’s happening in the EU, also in Germany itself, there’s a rise in climate denial.
There’s a rise in denying of accountability. There is a rise in far-right. I would say, a far-right movement is rising, and this is a threat to a lot of things. This is what is actually also a big threat to seeking justice. And for me, I would say that I feel like there’re still hope, especially for our countries-
JANE
Good.
NICHOLAS
… because we don’t have a choice. That’s the truth. We don’t have a choice to decide what to fight for or to decide what we want to fight against or what we want to agree to, because we are already in an oppressed… We are mostly in oppressed systems, non-democratic. And for us, our only hope is to keep moving.
That’s what we always do. We keep trying, we keep pushing, because there’s always a time where we can have the radical change.
JANE
It seems to me that maybe the legal profession needs to be doing more climate lawyers. I interviewed a climate lawyer a few months ago. And she talked about how difficult it is to prove in a legal sense, in front of a judge, what damage has been caused, who’s responsible for it, and how the victim should be compensated. And I have a feeling that the legal profession is advancing very slowly.
Duty of Vigilance Law
It’s very true. The legal profession itself, it’s highly important, but at the same time, it’s… Say, the legal profession itself is favoring a lot of corporations, big companies, because I would give a case study of the project in Uganda. There was a legal case filed against this project in France under the law called Duty of Vigilance Law. And this law is mainly addressing the supply chains being fair. We filed a case to demand that this project is stopped in the first place, and we addressed a lot of issues. We brought how people had lost their land, how people had been unfairly compensated, how also this project itself is in the middle of reserved areas including a national park and close to a lake shore, which also has denied so many communities access to fishing. So, we also try to address the loss of livelihood of the people itself.
Corporations with more lawyers, money, and sometimes deceptive
And you know what happened is that the company itself had more lawyers than us. So, it’s also a matter of having the capacity itself because we are coming from countries that are not rich. We don’t have enough money. We cannot pay for many lawyers. We cannot have… We have the evidence, we have everything. Because in this case… This case took almost three years. It was a case to stop the East African crude oil pipeline which is a pipeline in Uganda. Under this case, we were basing on the due diligence plan of Total Energies, whether it had addressed these issues of human rights, whether it addressed issues of land grabbing before the project started. And what happened is that they kept changing their plans and they were not sharing this information transparently to the communities. And some of the strategies they used is sharing misinformation on TV that they’re sustainable, that people’s lives are getting better.
But in the end, we were proving also this wrong. Because there was also a case where they showed an advert of someone having a beehive business or a bee-making business, and they were saying that this person was coming from this area. And when communities and activists themselves went and observed, these hives had no bees and this person was not even from this area. We are fighting against corporations that are rich. They can openly lie to everyone. They can openly show nice adverts that they are sustainable, that they are doing this transition. But what’s really happening is that they have a lot of money, they can buy all the lawyers. And if we get more support from the people themselves, because the money that these companies get, this money is coming from the people. The money that is invested in this oil project is from the people themselves.
So, the people have a choice. They can say no. They can decide to fight for policies. They can decide to even financed good lawyers, enough lawyers to support such communities. And I think that the issue is also understanding that it’s a matter of justice. Most of the times, you realize that people might not prioritize something because they don’t understand it really critically.
JANE
Right.
NICHOLAS
So if people can understand something really critically, if people can understand the importance of accountability, the importance of also putting into focus on, “Which product am I consuming? How is it being consumed? Are the supply chains fair? Is this product going to affect the climate? And is this product going to affect my future?” This is how people have to live.
Grassroots impact
How can you deal with that, Nicholas? What can be done? What should people be doing to change this? I know you’re out, and you’re speaking, and you’re talking about it. What are you and your activist friends able to do to achieve?
NICHOLAS
For us, we are just trying to make impact on this grassroots level. So, this is something that we are trying to do because we know that it’s very hard to have this change very fast because we have a lot of things that limit us, the geopolitics. We also have an issue where we are not heard, like our voices are not being amplified to the right community. In such a system where, of course, it’s important for us to have grassroots activities, and this is how we are doing. We try to organize and bring solutions to our communities themselves. We go there and we tell them about climate change. We educate them about their rights. We try to tell them about… They can also say no to big companies when they come in. And we also try to educate them about the importance of protecting the environment.
Of course, they already know it. They already have this in the different tribalistic customs. It’s already there. But we try to improve it and try to connect it with the culture because there are many cultures in Uganda. We have about 54 tribes. And in Africa itself, there are so many different tribes. So, we have different groups of people that are working with different communities at grassroot level to support them, to help them to build capacity, to bring solutions with. There are some activists who are installing solar panels on people’s houses, like communities that don’t have access to electricity. These are the rural communities. So, they’re installing solar panels. And there are people who are working on energy projects to bring sustainable energy in communities. So, we are trying to do grassroot activities. We know that we need a lot to work within our communities and this is what we are trying to do.
And at the same time, we are trying to also work along with international grassroot groups to bring a connection to our fights because we need to work on this together. We need to unite. We need to unite different struggles, whether it’s the struggles for climate justice, whether it’s the struggles for racial justice, whether the struggle for social justice. All these struggles are very connected and this is what we are trying to do. We are trying to make it connected and bring a big movement that can fight against the people in power, the people who are rich. To actually tell them that, “Enough is enough. We are fed up.”
JANE
Do you feel that you’ve made some progress in this area? Are there some movements or things that happen that you’re proud of?
Success when banks and insurance companies step out of project
Yeah. For example, we have been fighting the pipeline project for a long time because it was meant to start around 2017 or 2018. But we built a strong alliance against this oil pipeline and we addressed the issues of the people, and we also exposed the banks that were involved. So many banks in Europe, so many banks in the US, so many insurance companies. And of course, when we did this mobilization, when we did this global activism where we had also movements in France, movements in the UK joining, we saw so many insurance companies stepping out. We had over 20 insurance companies stepping out of this pipe project. We had over 20 banks stepping out of this project.
JANE
Good. That’s a very big deal.
NICHOLAS
And currently, of course, the project itself, they already started bringing the oil but the project itself is still struggling with funding. So, this is something that a global movement can do. But we are also, at the same time, at a threat because we are seeing that the oppression is increasing on, also, climate movements. It’s not just in Uganda but also in the UK. We are seeing that they’re making long sentences for activists. They’re putting so many charges. They are terming activists as criminals. So, something like this of which this is not true. This is something that they’re trying to bring out.
Success means people from different countries, tribes, Indigenous communities work together
I would say that we have achieved this and I am very proud to be part of the movement itself, to also demand for different perspectives of justice. Because I’ve not just participated on this campaign but also campaigns for debt justice, for debt consolation, campaign on human rights. Campaigns on, also, issues connecting to migration and climate. So, I think it has made me feel like I am not alone. And of course, I’m not alone. And I think that we can unite as one. We have the potential because we are facing this crisis. We are facing different crises and they’re very connected. And even though we are coming from different ethnicities, we are coming from different races, I’ve seen that in the movement itself, there are people who are coming from different countries, different tribes, different Indigenous communities coming together.
And the stories are always the same, whether it’s someone from Latin America, whether it’s someone from Asia, whether it’s someone from an island state. It’s always the same stories. Always the story of the cries of oppression, the cries of big companies exploiting. The cries of, also, effects of climate change and affecting different perspectives of people’s lives, also affecting the ecosystem, affecting the biodiversity. And so with all of these stories, there’s a lot of unity, I would say. But our power is being limited in different ways. Also, it’s limited in terms of traveling because we cannot easily travel to another country. For example, it’s not easy for me to come to the US itself because of a visa. It’s very difficult to get a US visa. I personally have been denied visas twice to come into Europe, and the reasons are very invalid most of the time. It’s just like they just don’t want you to come and share your story.
So, we are limited by different things and it’s important for many communities to understand how important it’s for our voices to be heard, how important it’s for us to bring the reality to them. Because most of the countries, they are not really facing these impacts at firsthand. So we need people to talk about this, people coming from our countries.
JANE
What are your plans for the next year? Do you have a movement in mind, an initiative in mind, the way you see what you’re going to do in the near future?
Ambition 2025 – grow movement, bring solutions to communities,
Yeah. I think for me, next year, I would do… I’m planning, of course, to change the way I’ve been doing my activism. To see how I can organize more help in organizing more to actually make people in the movement itself understand, especially people from Europe, how important it is for our voices to be at an international scale. I want to make people understand to feel what we feel, for example. Because most times, people are not willing to support if they’re not understanding. So for me, I want to do more to make people understand. And at the same time, to also grow a movement in Uganda itself. Because now, there are so many movements also in Uganda but I want more movements to be there also in Uganda, to support communities.
And specifically, I am a co-organizer and also a co-lead at End Fossil: Occupy. It’s a local grassroots movement in Uganda. And we are also planning to do campaigns on energy access, to actually bring solutions to communities, because our communities also want to see the solutions. They don’t want us to just say that we don’t want this big oil company to drill oil in our country, but they also want to see the solutions that we bring onto the table.
JANE
Good.
NICHOLAS
So-
JANE
So, you want to bring solutions to people so they can see that they have options.
Need financing, half of the world’s solar energy not yet optimized
Yeah. Something like this to see that they have options because we are talking about the just transition itself. We are talking about phasing out fossil fuels. But in the end, you realize that in our countries, we don’t have the solar panels, for example. But we receive sunshine throughout the year. Like, the estimate of Africa itself to generate electricity from solar is about 40%. So, it’s almost half of the world’s solar energy that can be generated from Africa itself. But at the same time, the solar panels are not in Africa because there’s no finance being channeled to Africa, or there’s no finance being channeled to address this potential. Which, of course, has to be addressed. Which has to come from the obligations and the agreements that were signed. But this is not happening.
So we want to do this on a grassroots level to show that there’s potential in us, and there’s also potential for us to say no against projects that we don’t feel comfortable with or against projects that are going to displace us from our land. So, this is something that I am planning. And also, I want to plan that next year. I also be part of a group of activists to support other climate activists, not just me but other climate activists who attend international global events to share their stories. Because it’s not just my story, but there are other people who have more stories to tell. There are other people who have faced worst impacts. There are other people who have faced worst issues.
Apple accused of using conflict minerals in supply chains, fueling conflict
(Note Editor 28 Dec 2024: Apple issued statement saying they told their suppliers not to provide them with minerals sourced from the DRC and Rwanda. Information and status not clear at this writing..)
Like, there are many friends of mine who come from the DRC, and they also linked the conflict in the DRC to the minerals that are there. And they tell me very bad stories of people always migrating. Right now, there are over 5 million people in displacement camps because of these rebel conflicts. And these conflicts are not funded by the DRC. These conflicts are funded by Europe, they’re funded by the US, by China. So, you find that there’s a lot of competition when there are minerals itself. And at the same time, a lot of people are being impacted. They’re being displaced. And on top of that, these countries are not trying to account for all these issues. And I don’t know if you know this, but there has been a case filed against Apple in the… The DRC itself has filed a case against Apple.
JANE
I didn’t know that, no. What was it about?
NICHOLAS
It’s about, of course, the unfair extraction of coltan, which of course, is being used to make the smartphones. It’s not just like… All the smartphones that almost the whole world is holding is coming because of these resources like coltan, and that is in the DRC. So because of the conflicts that are coming in, because of these minerals and the rebel groups that are coming in, they are extracting these minerals unfairly and they’re extracting these minerals without fair supply chains. So, the DRC itself has filed a case against Apple in Europe.
So, you see that there’s a lot of things that activists can do.
JANE
Yes.
Insurgency in Cabo Delgado
(Note Editor: This page is regularly updated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurgency_in_Cabo_Delgado#2024)
So these are the things that activists have been talking about, not just this year but also last year. This is not a new case. There’s child labor being used in these cobalt mines and coltan mines. There’s also an LNG project in Mozambique that has also brought about a conflict in Cabo Delgado. I don’t know if you know about this, but this LNG project is being owned by two big oil companies, and all these big oil companies are coming from Europe, and the banks that are funding this are also coming from Europe and the US. And you find that conflicts are there and people are being displaced.
So, there’s a lot of things happening, cooperations, because of extraction. A lot of unfairness in the supply chains.
JANE
You have a lot of different areas that you can be active in. Is there any one last thing you’d like to say? Any one last message?
A Message for the Young
My main message also goes to so many young people, that they have a lot of potential as well, I can say. Because right now we are being governed, of course, by a different system. But we, the young people, can make our own system when we get into these positions. So if you’re hearing this message, wherever you are, just know that you can make an impact to change so many people’s lives in the world. Because there’s always a saying that goes, that it’s not your fault that the world is like this. But it’s your fault if you leave the world the way it is. So, it’s always your fault when you leave the world in this state where others have to die for your comfort.
So something that you have to act upon to have a fair, inclusive, equitable world for everyone. And this is my main message, especially to young people, and to also older people who are happy to listen. Happy to think about a progressive change. This is also the same message. That you can do something. You don’t have to be an activist, you don’t have to be a lawyer, but you can do something within your means to make others’ lives better because every action makes a difference.
JANE
That’s a great message, Nicholas. I want to thank you for everything that you shared. Thank you very much for your time and your passion, and thank you for everything that you’re doing.
NICHOLAS
Yeah, thank you too. Thank you so much.
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