Africa’s climate future must be built, financed, governed by Africans — Onuigbo

President of GLOBE Legislators International, Rt. Hon. Sam Onuigbo, has urged African leaders to take ownership of initiatives to mitigate climate change and move the continent from participation to climate agency.

Onuigbo made the call at the 14th Conference on Climate Change and Development in Africa (CCDA-XIV), held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The conference, themed “From Pledges to Implementation: African Agency and the Belem-Antalya-Addis Roadmap,” brought together dignitaries and climate stakeholders from across the world.

Onuigbo said Africa’s climate challenge had moved beyond vulnerability to one of agency, noting that although the continent had contributed the least to historical greenhouse gas emissions, it continued to experience some of the most severe effects of climate change.

He said the situation should continue to inform Africa’s demands for climate justice, finance, technology transfer, adaptation support, and compensation for loss and damage.

He identified three key areas for African leaders: setting the tone and shaping the rules and institutions that govern climate action; translating climate pledges into laws, budgets, projects, and measurable outcomes; and building climate leadership around African institutions, capital, and authority, backed by fair international financing.

According to him, Africa, with its critical mineral resources and vast oceans and seas, must move beyond participation in global climate discussions to exercising greater influence over the policies and institutions that shape its future.

“Implementation is now the real test of climate ambition—pledges must become laws, budgets, projects, accountable institutions, and measurable outcomes for African people,” he said.

Onuigbo, who sponsored Nigeria’s Climate Change Act 2021, said Africa’s climate future should not depend solely on commitments made elsewhere or interventions for which it must wait.

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He recalled a declaration by Nigeria’s former Head of State, General Murtala Mohammed, at the Extraordinary Summit of the Organisation of African Unity in Addis Ababa on January 11, 1976, when he said, “Africa has come of age … The fortunes of Africa are in our hands to make or mar.”

According to Onuigbo, the declaration remained relevant to Africa’s climate struggle 50 years later.

“Fifty years on, that charge is the argument of this presentation, not its ornament. Africa’s climate future will not be granted by pledges made elsewhere, nor rescued by interventions we wait for.

“It will be built, financed, governed, and defended by Africans, on terms Africa itself has written,” he said.

He commended the ClimDev-Africa Programme and institutions supporting the conference, including the African Union Commission, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, African Development Bank, Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance, and Afreximbank, for providing a platform for dialogue and collective action.

The former lawmaker said Africa had reached a point where it must go beyond presenting its climate priorities to the international community.

“Climate priorities describe what Africa needs. The climate agency defines what Africa decides, designs, builds, finances, governs, and defends for itself,” he said.

Onuigbo cited Nigeria’s Climate Change Act 2021 as an example of translating climate ambition into law and institutional action.

He explained that the legislation established a statutory framework for climate action and created institutional responsibility through the National Council on Climate Change (NCCC), which coordinates climate-related activities at the highest level of government.

He said placing the council under the presidency, with the president as its chairman, was intended to address what he described as a common governance challenge in Africa—inter-agency rivalry.

According to him, competition among ministries and agencies for visibility, budgets, and authority could undermine climate action when institutions should instead coordinate delivery.

Onuigbo said that for more than three decades, international climate diplomacy had strengthened the language of ambition through conventions, agreements, Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), and net-zero commitments.

“But the central question before Africa today is different: it is no longer whether governments recognize the climate crisis, but whether the institutions, financing, technologies, and political will needed to implement those commitments actually exist—and who controls them,” he said.

He stressed that participation and representation were not synonymous with agency, arguing that Africa could be represented in global institutions without having the power to shape the systems governing climate action.

“Agency is different. Agency means Africa sets terms rather than merely responding to terms set elsewhere. It means designing instruments rather than qualifying for instruments designed by others.

“It means deciding who assesses, who approves, who disburses, and who benefits. A continent can be well represented in a system it does not shape. Climate leadership means moving from being consulted to being the author,” he asserted.