“Climate justice has long ceased to be just about environmental protection.”
The last time Nuclear and Coal-Free Bataan Movement mounted a very public resistance against an energy development project the communities did not agree with, they lost one of their own.
On July 1, 2016, Gloria Capitan, a 57-year-old grandmother who ran her family’s karaoke bar on top of helping organize her community around social issues, was shot dead by a masked man who until now has not been caught or identified. Several months before, Capitan had led a petition addressed to Barangay Lucanin, the Government of Mariveles and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to shut down the coal facility in her area. Residents had been complaining about pollution; they believed that an uptick in skin allergies and respiratory conditions were caused by toxic coal ash conveniently discarded into their neighborhood.
Capitan, wanting only the best for her 18 grandchildren, helped with petitions, formal complaints and other actions to make their opposition known.
For many environmental activists, Capitan’s story is an all-too familiar tale following intimidation, threats and bribe attempts in exchange for silence set against a dark time of impunity making the daily headlines. The Philippines, after all, was named the deadliest in Asia for environmental activists since 2017 by London-based watchdog Global Witness, and the Anti-Terror Law has only made the price of activism steeper than ever.
Despite all of this, five years after her death, Capitan’s fellow activists in the movement continue her legacy, persistently voicing out their concerns not only about coal plants contributing to climate change and environmental degradation, but also about communities like theirs being sacrificed in the push for energy development in the national agenda.
At the end of the day, they are the ones exposed to the pollution and health problems, and their everyday stories of harm, displacement and intimidation are glossed over feasibility studies and corporate social responsibility reports in the name of progress.
“Why shouldn’t we fight?” their women leaders told me back in 2018. “This is our lives we are talking about.”
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On February 28, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a major scientific report about climate impact, adaptation and vulnerability. Scientists, analysts and activists from the Philippines were quick to sound the alarm: Filipinos are already experiencing the worst impact, and we need to confront the climate crisis like the emergency that it is with transformative solutions that protect both people and the planet.
The very same week, however, the government made public President Rodrigo Duterte’s Executive Order 164, revealed to be signed the same day the IPCC report came out. The EO officially adopts a national position on nuclear energy, citing economic, political, social and environmental reasons, among them that “nuclear energy can contribute effectively to the mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and has strong potential to decarbonize the energy sector.”
It is a disservice to our people’s struggles, however, to only think of climate change as merely an issue about carbon emissions. Both the roots and impact of the climate crisis exacerbate long standing inequalities, the most glaring of them being the disregard for crucial concerns about the safety and public health of host communities. Fossil fuel companies have historically disregarded and endangered dissenting voices for profit and labeled it a public service. The fact that the nuclear industry is now being touted as a mitigation effort – in light of climate change concerns in the convenient packaging of also being an energy security solution – certainly ignores the very valid issues surrounding community safety, radiation, geological hazards, debt traps, contamination, and waste contamination and disposal being raised by the very people who will have to absorb these risks but are left out of the negotiating table.
A community organizer from Bataan, Veronica Cabe, says if the primary concern is reliable energy, we should look to a just transition to renewables. The conversations should be elevated to energy democracy as well – we don’t only need a steady supply of energy, we also have to ensure communities have access to reliable, cheap and clean energy. These sources shouldn’t endanger the environment, shouldn’t displace people from their land, and shouldn’t contaminate water sources. Debates about the development of energy are never limited to economic indicators, theoretical risks and emissions – at the end of the day, the energy and climate story is always about people.
We also have to remain vigilant about grassroots movements and opposition groups being further silenced, when history has proven how much abuse, intimidation and risks human rights and environmental activists go through everyday. Community-led organizations like Nuclear and Coal-Free Bataan Movement are certainly not strangers to this. Bataeños expressing dissent throughout the construction of the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant have mounted multi-sectoral opposition all the way since 1985, gathering workers, farmers, youth, women, and other movements to join their three-day Salakbayan (Salakay ng Bayan). They have proven that activism, seeking to protect both the environment and communities, works despite threats from various forces. However, we have a generational burden to uphold our democracy and our rights to protect our planet – we only have to look to the wisdom that movements hold for guidance on how to hold our leaders and ourselves accountable for our future.
In a country where extrajudicial killings of climate defenders co-exist with smiling leaders claiming to stand for the environment while being in the pockets of both the fossil fuel industry and false solutions like nuclear energy, despite the opposition of those most affected – the very people they claim to represent – climate justice has long ceased to be just about environmental protection.
Climate justice is now primarily about protecting the rights of the most vulnerable communities to both impact and interlinked systems of oppression while shutting down both the root causes of climate breakdown and profit-driven industries brandishing one-hit technological innovations that very rarely acknowledge the human costs of corruption and inequities surrounding the global energy landscape.
Most of all, it’s about listening to the most affected frontline voices, leaning on each other as we uplift grassroots solutions, and leading with love for people and the planet as we build the future we deserve.
Beatrice Tulagan, 27, is a writer and climate justice organizer exploring intersections of the personal and the political as we collectively confront the climate crisis. She is the regional organizer for 350.org in Asia and is the author of the monthly newsletter, The Very Best of Us re-launching this March.