What does COP27 really mean for Uganda?

This November, focus across the globe was on Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt where world leaders and varied climate actors gathered, at the 27th Conference of the Parties (COP-27) to deliberate on climate Change - a global threat to humanity. COP is the supreme decision making body under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to which Uganda is  party. Uganda has incorporated the convention along with the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement as part of its national laws under the National Climate Change Act, 2021. 

The conference comes at a time when the effects of climate change continue to proliferate worldwide with each passing day. Uganda is no exception. This year alone, we have experienced many climate disasters – flooding, mudslides, among others, and the costs have been dire. Climate change has presented particular harm, especially to the socio-economic wellbeing of poor and vulnerable persons.  At worst, many lives have been lost due to both direct impacts and indirect effects – from both climate disasters and secondary impacts for instance as experienced from drought-induced famine in Karomoja. Along with many other nations in the global south, Uganda is very vulnerable to impacts from climate change.   

At the top of the agenda at this year’s COP were topics on food and water security, financing to support mitigation and adaptation actions, and achieving a just transition to clean energy systems. All these subjects are squarely represented in the adverse position in which Uganda finds itself.  COP-27 presents a golden opportunity to give careful thought as a nation on our approaches to climate action, to assess the effectiveness of such approaches, and to evaluate the progress of the commitments made at the last COP-26 held in Glasgow –UK last year.

So, yet again the world gathered to discuss climate change. But after all the moving but too often empty speeches and commitments are made, the salient question is; what does COP-27 really mean for Ugandans?

Particularly for instance, what will COP resolutions really mean to a farmer in Bugwagi in Sironko district whose crops were destroyed by the heavy off-season rains or to a hunger-stricken family in Karamoja - who to date may not have the slightest idea of what climate change is, though they continuously suffer its consequences. 

Whilst the well paid, insured, and pensioned principal duty bearers in climate action, fly back to their elegant homes and air-conditioned offices after COP, ordinary Ugandans continue to pay the heavy price of inaction in response climate change. Stories of people helplessly dying in Karomoja due to famine were such a shocking revelation of inadequacies of responses to climate change, and demonstrate the insignificance of COP if the vulnerable who suffer from climate change never taste of its fruits year after year.  These stories are the same across the nation. There are stories of many people who go hungry, because agriculture in Uganda – on which so many people rely for their sustenance and livelihood - has been negatively impacted, and resultantly Uganda’s food security is equally affected. 

The ugly and candid reality is that the poor in mostly rural and urban area – who may have no idea that leaders are meeting in Egypt are the most affected by climate change. To them with or without COP-27, life goes on, albeit with increasing difficulty each passing day. If we acknowledge that these are not merely effects but human rights issues, this will – and should - change our perspective toward climate change. 

The right to adequate living which encompasses rights to adequate food, adequate housing and the right to social protection are now being continuously jeopardized. From this perspective, COP must facilitate immediate action to ensure realization, protection and fulfillment of the rights of vulnerable and affected people.   

For COP-27 to be meaningful, all the deliberations thereat must translate into action to provide needed help to those affected by the changes debated at COP.

The concerned party states must deliver on their promises and move to implement the agreements they reach. Sadly, until that should occur, COP 27 is meaningless to many vulnerable Ugandans.

Jackson L. Wandera Makwasi,    lawyer