Nuclear deal ‘must be fought’
Ex Greenpeace head and human rights activist, Kumi Naidoo, says South Africans need to fight the government’s proposed nuclear deal with Russia.
|||Cape Town - The former head of Greenpeace and human rights activist, Kumi Naidoo, says South Africans across the board need to fight the government’s proposed nuclear deal with Russia, saying nuclear is “too expensive, too dangerous and as a solution to the current energy crisis would deliver too little too late”.
“This struggle is fundamentally about protecting our children and their children,” Naidoo said.
He was speaking at the Southern African Faith Communities’ Environment Institute business breakfast at the Vineyard Hotel in Newlands yesterday.
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Earlier this month, Energy Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson said the nuclear energy expansion programme was a central feature of the country’s future energy mix, given the need to provide base load electricity and also to meet the significant greenhouse gas emissions reduction target that had been set.
Earthlife Africa Johannesburg and the institute went to court over the matter last year to stop what they believe is a flawed and illegal non transparent nuclear procurement process.
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Liz McDaid, an energy and climate adviser to the institute, said South Africans needed to put their hands in their pockets to help fund the court case if they wanted to make sure the wrong decisions weren’t made now.
“We will take this to the Constitutional Court if needed because if we can’t get this right we may as well give up on our democracy.”
THE ARGUS