During the celebration of the National day on Plaza Betico Croes on March 18, environmental activists came to protest at the time when Prime Minister Evelyn Wever Croes was giving his speech. In an exclusive interview, EAnews spoke with activist Nigel Maduro, who is an environmental activist and an indigenous person from Aruba.
According to Nigel Maduro, March 18 started with a protest where we fought for this day and this is our reason and in these moments we want to show the leaders that we want change. The environmental change. Nigel Maduro believes that no one is took the situation seriously. The environmental change, there are many situations happening in Aruba where there is a lot of damage to our nature, ecosystems, loss of land, land sales, many hotels and where the system will collapse in others. The ecosystem, social and economic system.
In the protest, Nigel Maduro demanded that the government and parliament have to take the issue of the environment as a priority. It’s a priority for all of us, Aruba is our island and March 18 is a perfect day to advance the cause. According to Nigel Maduro we need change, Aruba belongs to all of us.
We love Aruba and our national anthem says that Aruba is our beloved rock, but let’s show our love for our country. Our leaders need to start taking steps forward and standing up for nature. Many professional steps were taken where official letters were sent to the government, talks were held with parliament and many person in the law, but also with many activists, foundations and some ministers. However, despite all these efforts, Nigel Maduro feels ignored even though he sent letters to DIP and Prime Minister Evelyn Wever Croes and many others, but in the end was ignored.
Nigel Maduro himself studied and has a master of science in sustainability, but no one is listening. It should not be forgotten that he took the first step to put graffiti to wake people up, now in Aruba once again they will continue to show and give the message and now they will not be alone, but there are more activists who have joined. However, there is already a growing awareness that many people are realizing that we need a change. The important thing is to listen to our people.
We love Aruba, where the rules are, where the regulation and the law change are. Currently waiting for the leaders in sustainability to start standing up. Nigel Maduro with a security scream that we want our land back and demand our land back. The earth and the nature have no voice, but he speak for the nature, that it may give voice to the nature and Aruba.
However, it often seeks to combine development where people need to be able to live and eat while at the same time taking care of nature. He firmly believes that we have to brings a balance, but Nigel Maduro is of the opinion that there is a balance that goes a lot on the economic side and focuses a lot on tourism, but we forget that our nature is what brings tourism, which is what brings people to Aruba who want to see nature. This means that if the natural system collapses, our economy also collapses. It’s important to find balance but it’s also important to empower nature.
We all live with nature, we all live by nature, and we certainly want to see the balance come back to sustainable development instead of growth because many people confuse growth and development because we’re growing too much and we don’t have enough land. This means we need sustainable development because we don’t have it in Aruba. All of these are messages that want to move forward because the balance has shifted, according to activist Nigel Maduro.
