Live Earth

There is life after politics after all. Al Gore, the former American Vice President ,has proved by moving on, you can make a new life and contribute to the world in a significant way too.

By re- inventing himself, he is now the environmentalist icon. Not bad, for a guy who came here and caused a stir by publicly supporting Anwar Ibrahim and his “reformasi” movement, which went nowhere.Of course, Al Gore got all of Malaysia upset. Then, that was in the past.

The recent Al Gore’s Live Earth concerts in some major cities of the world to remind the world of the climate change was a good move, superstar Madonna who provided the finale at the concert was quoted as saying”let’s hope the concerts are not just about entertainment but about starting a revolution”.

How far these concerts will have an impact to revolutionize our daily lives remain to be seen. How genuine are some of the players? Questions have been asked if the performers at the concerts were suitable climate change activists.

Madonna herself has been accused of hypocrisy after allegations were made that she has financial links to some of the world’s biggest polluters like the giant American aluminium plant, Alcoa, the Ford Motor Company and Weyerhaeuser,an international forest products company.

A British act Arctic Monkeys when asked why they were not on the bill at any of the concerts explained that the whole thing was hypocritical as the power used for stage lighting alone enough to power ten houses, and their bass player said ,” we are always jetting off on aeroplanes”.

To save the world, we actually need to get rid of the system or at least modify the system that is in place now. A system that is based on the exploitation of countries, human beings and natural resources in order to maximise profits spells destruction.

A system that works on human greed is bound to destroy everything in its path. As long as the world’s economy is driven by oil, we can do precious little in saving the environment.

While Bush and his neo-conservatives tell you that they invade Iraq because of weapons of mass destruction, the real reason is oil. Iraq has some of the world’s biggest oil reserves, for America , she needs to control these reserves.

With their oil royalties, these countries will have to buy American financial instruments, with interests accrued from these investments, the American companies will then get paid for work modernising these countries. America and the rest of the world can then live happily ever after.

Whether these countries really need all these modern, glittering “toys” is not the issue here. The whole exercise is to maintain this capitalistic-imperialistic system, no matter how destructive or even at the expense of the climatic health of the planet, the show must go on.

Here, in Sabah, it was reported that the rhino population is declining . The exploitation of their natural habitat is obviously the cause. Land alienation for agriculture and other purposes is creating pocket areas and rhinos by nature are solitary animals are definitely affected by all these activities. For them to mate is next to impossible.

We will never agree if international reports say that Malaysia is “the nature destroyer”. Officially we are not, 52 per cent of our land in Sabah is protected. According to the Deputy Director of Wildlife Department, Laurentius Ambu ,we are not destroying our forests, the problem is that the rhinos are at the wrong place at the wrong time?!

Of course, it is never our fault, blame it on the rhinos, even though they have been in the forests longer than us.They cannot talk back, can they?

As long as we cannot control our greed,the planet is hurtling itself towards self destruction. What can we do? Maybe, we need to adopt the middle path development model where Schumacher says” small is beautiful”. We can also adopt the indigenous ways in preserving the environment,then, we do not want it to be too Penan like either. A little bit of country and a little bit of rock and roll, a little bit of native and a little bit of modern approach , that will do fine.

I am entitled to dream, right? Otherwise,what sort of world will we be leaving for our future generations?

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