Nobel Peace Prize for ‘green militant’

The award will be handed out in Oslo on December 10. While Maathai has not been widely known to the general public, she is a legend among global environmental activists and feminist leaders alike and a presence at international environmental conferences. She has been described variously as an ‘‘ecofeminist,’’ ‘‘ecowomanist’’ and ‘‘Kenya’s Green Militant.’’

The impetus for Maathai’s movement was deforestation in Kenya, a process that has taken 90 per cent of the country’s forest over the past 50 years. In 1978, Maathai, then a US-educated college professor at the University of Nairobi, suggested the planting of trees as a way to help rural women survive the decrease of firewood. The movement spread across Africa, and was responsible for planting over 30 million trees.

In 1989, the deep-voiced and statuesque Maathai led a one woman-charge against the autocratic government of Daniel Arap Moi, the former president, when he wanted to build a skyscraper and six-story statue of himself in gritty Nairobi’s only public green space. She lost her case in court. But because of her protest no financiers were willing to work on the project. Today, that area of the park is called ‘‘Freedom Corner.’’

—LAT-WP