The earth is one possession that all men have inherited irrespective of their social class globally.
One would have thought like good children we would be sentimental with our collective patrimony, instead our relationship with mother nature is one that resembles a zigzagged highway due to man’s actions in the name of development and innovation for the human race.
If we would treat things given to us by loved ones with so much care, the question is why have we not applied the same measure to our environment, a thing we all share.
According to the late scientist, Stephen Hawking, we are in danger of destroying ourselves by our greed and stupidity and we cannot remain looking inwards at ourselves on a small and increasingly polluted overcrowded planet.
If that seemed harsh then maybe the words of the late and great Ghanaian diplomat, Kofi Annan who warned that humans do not fully appreciate the issue of climate change as it is often treated like a problem waiting to happen. We really have to ask ourselves tough questions regarding the problems we have created to hurt the earth, especially the ozone layer which protects us from ultraviolet rays the sun emits, afterwards, then we really have to check if our answers have solutions to a problem that threatens the very existence of every living thing as we know it.
If we take Nigeria as a case study, according to the 2017 State of Global Air database, Nigeria ranked first in Africa in air pollution-related deaths with more than 114,000 linked to it. If the toxicity of air pollution which is the largest contributor on the damage inflicted on the ozone layer already kills hundreds of thousands, would it not be befitting to ask our leaders for steps Nigeria is taking to help in curbing the global climate crisis as a country that leads in Africa ?
What are we doing in terms of policy to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions? Or would we rather continue this in a bid to keep jobs that would have to change sooner or later ?
Does this threat bother us at all? Are we ready to deal with the global environmental crisis we are deliberately inviting due to our negligence?
Do we even care?