Bad politics fans policy violence in climate crisis

This photo taken on Feb. 28, 2023 shows a Maasai trader gazing at emaciated livestock at a livestock market in Kajiado County, Kenya. [Xinhua]

Political leadership is always on your screens whenever disruptive and deadly disasters occur, sometimes reaffirming beliefs that disasters are mere acts of nature, bad luck, or God punishing the sinful. Disasters appear unprecedented.

In Africa, the loss and damage associated with climate change are not mere acts of nature but sometimes also a result of poor policy choices, bad governance and misplaced economic priorities that focus on profit, not people. Such happens in the form of housing projects and infrastructure in areas meant to absorb climatic shocks, such as flood plains, or draining of wetlands for real estate. Such key ecosystems are viewed as idle land.