Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The United Nations has blamed a Cameroonian version of an American-style Wild West Range War control water and territory on climate change.
Climate change fuels violence and mass displacement in Cameroon
December 10, 2021Climate and Environment
The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, erupted in fighting between communities in northern Cameroon that has displaced tens of thousands of people and halted relief operations there. speak on Friday.
The development is just the latest in a difficult relationship between herders, fishermen and farmers in the area, who have seen the waters and tributaries of Lake Chad shrink dramatically. drought caused by climate change.
In Geneva, UNHCR Spokesman Boris Cheshirkov explained that clashes have broken out in recent days in the village of Ouloumsa, after the dispute over the dwindling water source.
The violence then spread to neighboring villages, causing 10 villages to burn down.
Tensions escalate
“UNHCR is deeply concerned by the new inter-community clashes that broke out this week in the Far North region of Cameroon, displacing thousands of people within the country and forcing more than 30,000 to flee to neighboring Chad,” said Mr. Cheshirkov. “Since Sunday, December 5, at least 22 people have been killed and 30 others seriously injured in several days of ongoing fighting.”
According to UNHCR, fighting broke out three days later, on December 8, in the Cameroonian city of Kousseri, a commercial center with 200,000 inhabitants.
In addition to the destruction of the cattle market, Mr. Cheshirkov noted that “at least 10,000 people have fled from Kousseri to the Chadian capital N’djamena… just a few kilometers across the Chari and Logone rivers, which mark the border with Cameroon.” .
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Read more: https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/12/1107622
This is too absurd. Climate change is not causing range war in Cameroon, but also range war in the Wild West.
In Cameroon, as in the Wild West, different groups of people think that their right to access to water and land takes precedence over the inability to resolve disputes verbally, so they resort to violence. . The cowboys won the first round, burning villages, after which displaced farmers retaliated by destroying a cattle market in The city of Kousseri, Cameroon.
The prolonged drought that everyone is experiencing is not unusual in an area known to have had a prolonged drought since the records began. Lake Chad has also experienced severe overuse due to rapidly growing population and the current drought, leading to a significant contraction of the lake.
overall Rainfall has increased in the Sahel region since the 1970s – The Sahel, including Lake Chad, is one of the regions where NASA has noticed significant greening since the satellite measurements began. But clearly this overall increase in rainfall is not enough to help locals in their current predicament. NASA also found evidence of land degradation in pastoral areas, but not by the rain.
In Cameroon there is a variety of origin, including longstanding tribal feuds and religious animosity between different faiths – like in the Wild West, between Indians, cowboys, and farmers.
Cameroon is not the same as the Wild West. In the Wild West, many disputes were resolved relatively peacefully in court, which helped quell some of the violence. I suspect a similar institution, more or less respected by most parties, exists in Cameroon.
No one needs to refer to climate change to understand the problems facing Cameroonians.
For the United Nations to attempt to exploit conflicts that are likely to continue for decades, if not centuries, and The local climate is improving significantly on overall rainfall, to advance their climate apocalypse agenda is, in my view, cynical and futile.
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