By Kizito Alakwe

The United Nations Climate Change Conference published its executive report on the 30th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP 30) on March 26, 2026. The conference took place in Belém, Brazil. After two weeks of intense discussion, member nations made a series of decisions that are now known as the Belém Political Package. These decisions were made in light of rising expectations and the effects of climate change. One of the main results of the conference is the demand for a clear promise to stop using fossil fuels. This demand was opposed by countries that produce fossil fuels, with Nigeria among the concerned parties.

The conference leaders promised to make a plan to move away from fossil fuels in a “just, orderly, and equitable manner” toward what they called “net zero” targets.

Many African countries don’t like this stance because Africa’s energy shift is at a critical point. Africa has some of the world’s richest renewable energy resources, including solar, wind, and water. However, it relies heavily on fossil fuels for energy. More than 70% of Africa’s electricity still comes from coal, oil, and gas.

Given the widely accepted notion that we need to protect the environment and use less fossil fuels, it is unsettling to see the sudden attention to oil and gas as the primary global source of energy, occasioned by the crises in Venezuela and the US/Israel-Iran war.

On January 3, 2026, U.S. troops captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a military operation and took him to New York to face long-standing federal drug trafficking and narco-terrorism charges. The Trump administration first called the operation a crackdown on a “criminal network” that was bringing cocaine into the U.S. This narrative, however, changed as the U.S. announced their desire to take over Venezuela’s state-owned oil industry, which has the world’s largest proven oil reserves. As of March 2026, the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) holds about 400 million barrels of crude oil. It also has 132 working oil refineries and can process 18.4 million barrels of oil per day. So, Africans are asking themselves why there is such a strong interest in oil when there is so much support for clean, green energy.

On February 28, 2026, the US and Israeli air forces initiated a military attack on Tehran and other major Iranian cities. They destroyed military and other official targets and killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, and several high-ranking members of the clerical regime. The BBC says that the goal of this military attack was to stop Iran’s nuclear program, prevent it from making ballistic missiles, and dismantle its support for proxy groups in the region. The attacks were framed as a way to protect American and Israeli interests from a rogue regime and eliminate immediate threats to those interests.

The president of the United States said that the war with Iran would likely raise petrol prices, at least for a short time. By the second week of the war, as oil prices were still going up, it was framed as a small price to pay to stop Iran’s nuclear program. However, it was promised that the flow of oil would not be affected.

In response, Iran effectively blocked the Strait of Hormuz, one of the busiest oil shipping routes in the world and a hub for about 20% of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) trade. This has caused a global energy crisis because stopping all oil exports from the Gulf region would remove almost 20% of the world’s oil supply from the market. 80% of that oil goes to Asia. As a result, petrol prices have risen significantly globally. Right now, fuel prices have gone up by about 49% in Nigeria, 40% in Sierra Leone, 27% in Spain, 17% in Germany, 13% in the UK, 50% in the Philippines, 68% in Cambodia, 25% in the US, 2.5% in China, and 30% in Canada. As the fuel crisis worsens, people in countries such as Ecuador, Angola, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines have been protesting.

By the third week of the Iranian war, oil had become a critical factor. The talks on regime change and nuclear weapons have waned, and people are concerned because the price of crude oil keeps rising. Oil has emerged as a strategic pressure point. Though prices have been rising steadily in the West, the most pronounced price swings are occurring in emerging markets such as the Philippines and Nigeria. These countries don’t have as much ‘padding’ in their budgets to absorb the shock, sending food and transport prices sky high. Countries like India and China are using up their strategic stockpiles right now to keep prices from going through the roof.

This current scramble for oil shows that the world economy will fall apart without crude oil, despite the global hype over “green energy.”

It’s strange that the West is still trying to get the oil it says should be phased out, while Africa is being told to skip oil and go straight to solar and wind energy.

Nigeria and other African countries that produce oil do not see it as a pollutant. Rather, they see it as an important source of foreign exchange and as the base-load power the country needs to build a modern economy. If fossil fuels are really out of date, why are they still the cause of wars between nations?

One can rightly say that this campaign for green and clean energy is more about protecting trade than protecting the environment. So, Africa should not support energy policies that blame Africans and make it look like they are the ones who are guilty. Any move toward clean and green energy must be fair, and Africans should be able to use their natural resources to pay for their own green future instead of waiting for permission from the West, which changes with every new conflict.

•Dr Kizito Alakwe is a Development Communication Specialist and Senior Lecturer at the Pan-Atlantic University.