The Environment Fights Back

In September 2015, I wrote in a post, labelled Consequences , about the danger we face when extreme weather events occur in a backdrop of environmental vandalism. What provoked me to write then was the loss of life and property that occurred in Freetown as a result of flooding that followed several days of heavy rain. Although the city of Freetown is used to rain during its rainy season, the intensity and quantity of rain on that occasion was unprecedented. At the time, I wondered whether the increasing ferocity of the rainy season could be a result of climate change associated with increased CO₂ emissions which began at the start of Europe’s industrial revolution and which has continued through to the present day.

And here we are again, barely two years on, facing exactly the same environmental circumstances with considerably greater human suffering: More than five hundred dead, six hundred others missing and thousands made homeless. How bad does it have to get?

Now, I am no geographer. Nor am I a climatologist. But, as a concerned citizen, when experts tell me that significant, and probably irreversible, climate change is imminent, I sit up and listen. And if they tell us further, that the threat is mostly due to unregulated increase in the accumulation of atmospheric CO₂ brought on by reckless human behaviour, that, I reckon, should instil in us a sense of urgency and make us want to modify our behaviour immediately.

But reducing CO₂ emissions is just one side of the equation. The other side is the protection and preservation of the naturally-occurring mechanisms that soak up CO₂ as part of the normal cycle of life. And, notwithstanding my lack of deep knowledge of climatology, I do retain elements of secondary school biology that taught me that green plants absorb CO₂ from the atmosphere to use for food, with oxygen as a by-product. All very neat, and consistent with maintaining a life-sustaining equilibrium. 

 We mess with this equilibrium at our peril. But everywhere around the world there are examples of man-made environmental degradation. And nowhere is this more glaring than in and around the city of Freetown. The hills overlooking the city, once covered in lush tropical forests, have been brutally stripped of their cover in a continuing act of environmental vandalism that the government of Sierra Leone has been complicit in. It is not certain whether this dereliction of duty has been deliberate or just negligent, but the result has been the same. It may be that the direct consequence on the micro-climate surrounding Freetown is insubstantial, although the direct effects on the stability of the ground itself has been all too obvious: Erosion of land without its trees and shrubs to anchor it to its substratum is inevitable. Indeed, no rain is required for this kind of topsoil loss to take place. The merest breath of wind is enough to remove the topsoil and blow it into the sea.  And then, if the terrain becomes sodden with the heavy rain that is typical for the months of July and August, the only predictable outcome is the one that we have just witnessed: A massive shifting of the land down towards the sea, sweeping everything in its path.

Quite possibly, the current disaster might have been mitigated had it not been that dwelling houses, if such structures can be so designated, had been built in the same ground that has been denuded of vegetation, weakening the land’s cohesion even further. Once again I have to deny any expert knowledge in engineering this time, but the dictates of common sense would preclude building in such locations without proper precaution and adherence to regulation that, not to put too fine a point on it, is stupid.

But what kind of stupid would lead to a catastrophe of this magnitude, right in front of our eyes? I will answer the question. It is the kind of stupid that is compounded with a corrupt system of land allocation and building codes regulation presided over by a government system that is, if not out and out corrupt, certainly languidly supine. I have no direct evidence of this. I am just saying. But if you look at the predatory tendencies of those who grab land, there is only one conclusion to draw. Namely, that those in charge have been complicit in the evolution of this disaster.

One might well ask, what is the purpose of government, if not to protect its citizens from death and destruction? Successive Sierra Leone governments have failed, and failed again, almost on a yearly basis, to meet this fundamental duty.

Tell Fren Tru