As the world faces significant challenges arising from the COVID 19 pandemic, with its attendant huge impacts on the gains made towards achieving the SDGs, it is imperative to refocus energies on the top priorities that we must focus on now.
The Secretary General of the United Nations- AntonioGuterres, in a speech in a UN film celebrating its 75thanniversary said “The COVID-19 pandemic has shown how fragile the world is, a microscopic virus has put us on our knees and that fragility should make us humble”. It has indeed. This is why the world must reflect and learn and focus on solutions for our most challenging problem which goes beyond the vaccine for the virus. We must together think deep, make an enormous shift in our behavior so that our world can be safe again.
Radically transforming the world is the greatest, most urgent weight on our shoulders. The planet and our environment is atstake if we do nothing. The pandemic has its own upsides and advantages, besides reminding us of the need to make drastic changes, it has also proved that our environment can getbetter. During the lockdown, there have been improvements inair quality, water quality, wildlife thriving and a drop inpollution, deforestation and hunting because of the global reduction in human activities. Our environment, our planet could breath and slowly flourish as it should.
This is why we must consider the facts that the planet is warning us how bad our world can get if nothing is done soon.We built this unsafe world, only we can change it for the benefit of humanity and its future. The sort of peace that the world needs has gone beyond peace amongst ourselves – the planet and environment first has to be at peace with us else no other peace can be sustained.
On the latter points, addressing global poverty and inequality, enabling gender equality, and providing justice and governance frameworks that respect the rights of citizens are equally important.
But this is not just a ‘global call’ – actions must be taken everywhere, by everyone to change our future. We must all wake to shape our future. Our lives matter, our future matters and the future of the coming generations matter too. There is power in the decisions we make today.
What will we all do in Ebonyi State and in Nigeria to be part of the solution? Please watch the video for greater insights- https://youtu.be/xVWHuJOmaEk