Dike Onwuamaeze
The Convener of the Our Tomorrow, an NGO that is dedicated to the promotion of a safer, cleaner, and healthier environment in Africa, Mr. Emeka Obasi (Jnr), has charged the youth of Africa to galvinise action toward averting the climate crisis that is now staring Africa in the face.
The 21 years old Obasi, who is the son of the Publisher of Hallmark Newspaper, Mr. Emeka Obasi, gave the charge yesterday during the media presentation of the “Our Tomorrow- A Pollution and Climate Change Initiative” before a gathering of undergraduate students of the University of Lagos, because he “wants to make every African youth an effective voice for a safer environment.”
He said: “My target is to mobilise the teeming numbers of youth of Africa to achieve a critical mass of climate change advocates, whose voices will resonate loudly and clearly and catalyse positive action.
“We will use the awesome power of social media to create this unstoppable army and empower their voices in every country in Africa.”
He added that it is important that young people should become involved in the global effort to ensure that the earth is in a fit and proper condition to constitute a worthwhile inheritance. “Therefore, the effort to improve the environment should be championed by the youth because the world of tomorrow belongs to us,” he said.
Meanwhile the Founder and Chairman of Zinox Group, Mr. Leo Stan Ekeh, has commended Obasi for providing solutions to, and leading the campaign for, a safer environment.
The three cardinal agenda of the Our Tomorrow, according to Obasi, are “to wake up the African youth to the reality of the existential threat climate poses to their future” and also to “sensitise African leaders, both at the government, corporate and governmental levels, to heed the clarion call for sustained action against climate change.”
The agenda also included the mobilisation of “resources, both material and human, to campaign and create sustained awareness of Africans, especially the youth, on the need to be actively involved in the battle to save the environment for their future and that of future generations.”
Obasi also identified ignorance of the problems of the environment and the challenges they pose as a major hindrance to providing sustainable solutions sustainable to these problems.
“I find such level of ignorance inexcusable, and almost unforgivable. What it underlines is the cute lack of deliberate policies to create awareness among the younger generation of Africans,” he said.
