In a world increasingly defined by climate extremes—floods swallowing coastlines, heatwaves scorching crops, and droughts stretching farther into the calendar—one group remains steadfast, often unseen, often unheard, but unwavering: climate defenders.
This past week in Geneva, during the 59th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, an urgent gathering took place. It wasn’t just another side event. It was a moment of reckoning. Titled “Climate Defenders’ Right to Participate in Climate Action,” the discussion brought together human rights experts, environmental activists, and legal minds to address a deepening crisis: the shrinking space for those who stand up for the planet.
To defend nature today is often to invite danger. Across the globe, climate defenders face violence, criminalization, surveillance, and social exclusion. And Kenya is no exception.
Indigenous communities—custodians of some of the country’s richest biodiversity—have seen their homes razed in the name of forest conservation. Environmental activists have been met with threats and intimidation. Youth campaigners, though louder than ever, still struggle to find their rightful place in policy spaces dominated by seasoned bureaucrats and commercial interests.
And yet, despite this, they persist.
In the Embobut Forest, Milka Chepkorir has spent years defending her Sengwer community against repeated evictions. Her calls are simple: recognize Indigenous people as protectors of ecosystems, not threats to them.
Along dusty village paths, where children fetch water from shrinking rivers, young people like Eric Njuguna raise their voices for intergenerational equity. He has spoken at COP summits not for fame, but for urgency—because the droughts that killed his neighbors’ livestock are not abstract data points, but lived realities.
And we remember, always, the echoing legacy of the late Prof. Wangari Maathai. Long before “climate justice” became a buzzword, she planted it—seed by seed, tree by tree, woman by woman. She knew that defending the environment was defending life itself.
The Geneva talks offered more than solidarity; they offered a roadmap. Human rights and environmental action are not separate spheres. To protect the climate, we must first protect the people protecting it.
This means legal reforms that shield defenders from harassment. It means inclusive policies that don’t just invite participation but make it meaningful. It means climate finance that trickles down not just to governments, but to community cooperatives, women’s groups, and Indigenous networks that are already driving change on the ground.
And it means acknowledging that without freedom—of speech, of assembly, of movement—climate action will remain a hollow promise.
Africa, and Kenya in particular, sits at the heart of this global conversation. We are the continent least responsible for emissions but most vulnerable to their consequences. Our landscapes are changing. Our seasons are shifting. But our people are rising.
From reforestation projects in Taita Hills to mangrove restoration on the coast, Kenyans are not waiting for saviors. They are doing the work. What they need is protection, recognition, and resources.
#ClimateJustice #DefendTheDefenders #Big3AfricaVoices
