Government is two-faced on environment, says NSHR

A LOCAL human-rights watchdog says Government’s environmental and investments policies are contradicting each other.

The National Society for Human Rights (NSHR) is specifically referring to a US$4,9 million World Bank grant for the Namibian Coastal Conservation Management (Nacoma) project. At the signing of the grant agreement, National Planning Commission Director General Helmut Angula said economic development along the coast had resulted in the overuse of resources and increased pollution.In a statement this week the NSHR said Government recently granted an Australian company, Paladin Resources, a licence to mine uranium within the Namib-Naukluft Park.This park is situated in the Namib Desert and stretches along Namibia’s environmentally sensitive coast, the NSHR emphasises.At the groundbreaking ceremony of Paladin’s Langer Heinrich Uranium Mine last month, Mines Minister Erkki Nghimtina described the project as a marvellous example of what the Government and the private sector must do to ensure sustainability of the mining sector, the NSHR says.On the other hand, in his inaugural speech at the Gobabeb Research and Training Centre on May 9, Prime Minister Nahas Angula said that human activities threatened the desert’s unique ecological systems.”This is therefore a strong indicator of Government’s policy contradiction, no policy co-ordination.On the one hand, Government is trying to preserve biodiversity by signing the World Bank grant agreement, while on the other, it is licensing the destruction of this very same ecosystems by allowing uranium mining there,” the human rights watch body said.The NSHR believes that the most lethal long-term pollution of Namibia’s biodiversity comes from increased uranium mining, the statement said.It added that local and international environmental pressure groups have also expressed strong opposition to the uranium mining in the area.At the signing of the grant agreement, National Planning Commission Director General Helmut Angula said economic development along the coast had resulted in the overuse of resources and increased pollution.In a statement this week the NSHR said Government recently granted an Australian company, Paladin Resources, a licence to mine uranium within the Namib-Naukluft Park.This park is situated in the Namib Desert and stretches along Namibia’s environmentally sensitive coast, the NSHR emphasises.At the groundbreaking ceremony of Paladin’s Langer Heinrich Uranium Mine last month, Mines Minister Erkki Nghimtina described the project as a marvellous example of what the Government and the private sector must do to ensure sustainability of the mining sector, the NSHR says.On the other hand, in his inaugural speech at the Gobabeb Research and Training Centre on May 9, Prime Minister Nahas Angula said that human activities threatened the desert’s unique ecological systems.”This is therefore a strong indicator of Government’s policy contradiction, no policy co-ordination.On the one hand, Government is trying to preserve biodiversity by signing the World Bank grant agreement, while on the other, it is licensing the destruction of this very same ecosystems by allowing uranium mining there,” the human rights watch body said.The NSHR believes that the most lethal long-term pollution of Namibia’s biodiversity comes from increased uranium mining, the statement said.It added that local and international environmental pressure groups have also expressed strong opposition to the uranium mining in the area.

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