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National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula has sounded the alarm that the adverse effects of climate change were fast turning to a major setback in the fight against poverty.

Wetang’ula who was speaking in Uganda emphasized on the critical role played by nature in safe guarding the environment.

Wetang’ula, addressing the Commonwealth Speakers Summit in Uganda, pointed out that climate –related shocks are becoming more frequent and severe hence hindering poverty eradication in Africa.

“Commonwealth countries, especially those in the global south, are the most vulnerable to the vagaries of climate change and environment degradation despite contributing the least”, said Speaker Wetang’ula who was accompanied by his Senate counterpart Amason Kingi.

Wetang’ula emphasized that Africa was unfairly being impacted more than other regions by climate change despite the continent’s contribution of less than 4 per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions.

Speaker Wetang’ula further raised concerns that African countries have to spend more than their fair share for adaptation efforts, currently estimated at 10% of GDP annually according to the African Development Bank.

He implored on the critical role of Parliaments saying that Parliament as the representative of the people, has a crucial role to provide leadership in confronting these global challenges in setting the policy direction; a role in translating outcomes of global processes to domestic legislations; a role in creating awareness; and a role in pushing the Executive arms of governments to act responsibly. 

He called upon Commonwealth Parliaments to continuously build capacity for legislators on the issue of tackling climate change menace, provide adequate budgets and offer law makers opportunities at the global stage to interact and share knowledge on how to further mitigate the challenge geared towards saving Mother Nature.