Kenyan activist gets Nobel Peace Prize
JOHANNESBURG -- Kenyan activist Wangari Maathai, who launched a powerful grass-roots environmental movement nearly 30 years ago by planting trees in her backyard, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize yesterday for work that also involved empowering women and fighting government corruption.
Maathai, 64, is the first African woman to be selected since the inception of the award 103 years ago, and the first environmentalist to capture the prize.
Her fiery opposition to the former regime of Daniel arap Moi in Kenya led to frequent imprisonment and a beating that left her unconscious. She received the award in a record field of 194 candidates that included Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency.
Many observers thought the prize committee might send a message about the conflict in Iraq, but the selection of Maathai indicated that it preferred a different focus.
''This is the first time environment sets the agenda for the Nobel Peace Prize, and we have added a new dimension to peace," Ole Danbolt Mjoes, the committee chairman, said at a news conference in Oslo.
Norwegian Television showed Maathai, who is deputy environment minister in Kenya, fighting back tears after hearing the news. Later, she emphasized the impact of environmental policy on global conflicts. ''It is recognized that the management of natural resources is very, very important in the promotion of peace, and that many wars that we witness in the world today are over the natural resources," she said by telephone from her home in Nyeri, north of Nairobi. ''Without a properly managed environment, our own lives are threatened."
The committee called Maathai a ''strong voice speaking for the best forces in Africa to promote peace and good living conditions."
In 1977, when she headed the National Council of Women of Kenya, Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement and focused her energy on environmental issues. The nonprofit group, consisting mainly of women, sought to curtail the effects of deforestation and desertification by inspiring poor people to plant 30 million trees throughout Kenya. The campaign led to similar efforts elsewhere in Africa, and the movement expanded its programs to education and nutrition.
At the Green Belt Movement office yesterday morning, the staff celebrated for hours. ''Everybody is so excited," project officer Mugre Muchai said from Nairobi. ''We just got a boost of energy to move on and continue our work."
Muchai added that much of the movement's success is due to Maathai's passion. ''We think it's because she has tirelessly worked on these issues and fought for environmental conservation," she said.
Environmental issues in Kenya, and throughout Africa, stem mainly from development pressures, rapid population growth, and deforestation. When forests are cut, the impact is felt not only in the loss of biodiversity, but also in new patterns of water flows. Without the roots of trees to retain water, rains flow freely into catchment areas, and soon what was once a year-round river becomes a torrent of water during some months and a dry riverbed in others.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who received the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize for his galvanizing role in the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, said the Nobel committee had showed itself to be ''a great deal more imaginative" in choosing an environmentalist. Tutu, meeting with Globe editors yesterday in Boston, said environmental and land-use problems in Africa and elsewhere cause hunger and provoke battles over resources such as grazing rights, a factor in the Darfur conflict in Sudan. He said the environment is thus ''a very real peace issue."
''This is fantastic for a continent that tends to be dismissed as a continent of disaster only," Tutu said.
Sam Kanyamibwa, deputy director in Africa for the World Wide Fund for Nature, who knows Maathai well, said her energy is infectious. ''She is filled with enthusiasm about what she does and about nature in general," he said. ''She is somebody you meet and you don't forget."
Still, he and others cautioned against expectations that the award will greatly elevate attention to environmental issues in Kenya and other developing countries.
''I hope the government will receive this message that the environment is very important, but I don't think it will necessarily lead to any sudden change. Things take time," Kanyamibwa said.
Maathai earned an undergraduate degree in biology from Mount St. Scholastica College in Kansas, a master's degree at the University of Pittsburgh, and a doctorate in veterinary medicine research at the University of Nairobi.
After joining the faculty at the University of Nairobi, she increasingly turned to political activism. Maathai protested environmental policies of then-President Moi, whose 24-year rule was marked by accusations of flagrant land-grabbing by Kenya's political elite. Among her victories was helping to stop plans for a skyscraper in Uhuru Park in Nairobi.
Maathai and her husband divorced in the 1980s. They had three children. He reportedly protested at the time that she was ''too educated, too strong, too successful, too stubborn, and too hard to control."
In 1997, she ran for president against Moi but garnered little support. But in elections in 2002, when opposition candidate Mwai Kibaki won the presidency, she was elected to Parliament. Last year, Maathai joined his administration.
The award carries a $1.3 million prize. It will be presented Dec. 10.
Globe correspondent Raymond Thibodeaux contributed to this report from Nairobi. John Donnelly can be reached at donnelly@globe.com
