 |
 |
|
||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||
   |
Speech of Rupert Neudeck at the Einstein Award“I’m going back to the office to save the world a little." These are the last words of the last sentence in Frank Asbeck’s biography, ‘Sonne was sonst?' (‘Sun, what else?’). I basically do the same, but I always tried first to overturn all the offices and the bureaucracy, or to subvert them, as the student movements used to call it in the sixties. There is also another experience that I did not have to go through, unlike Frank Asbeck, to whom we green helmets owe the Einstein Award 2009: politics. He was the founding chairman of the green party in the Rhein Sieg district and also the chairman of the parliamentary group in the district parliament. He then resigned, stating the following reason, which lingers to this day: in politics, one has to make too many compromises; you can change much more as a businessman. Or, to quote the biography again: you can save the world more. We, who grew up with an inborn distrust against anything just remotely connected to capitalism, often find it quite difficult to follow this rhetoric. Until the Platform of Ahlen this was actually the fundamental consensus of the Germans. But Asbeck seems to be right. And that is just what we need in Africa: solar energy, solar education, micro-credits, and many, many businessmen that work for the continent, since it pays out, yes, also for companies that go there. Take Rwanda for example. It is far from being the least significant among Africa’s smaller countries; after all, it has the irrepressible ambition of becoming the Singapore of Africa. And if German development politics could decide to enter into a mono-partnership, a unique connection, with the three up-and-coming countries Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda, and to then finally build and expand the railroad from Dar es Salaam to Kigali and Kampala, and on to Bujumbura with the help of these countries and mass employment, and then to make it so successful that these three states could become the first ‘African Tigers’ of the globalized international economy, then this would be a giant leap for the entire world. And – the pressing fear of letting the immigrants drown, of not being able to take them all in Europe and Germany – this is no mere pillow-crying. It is a challenge to do something, so that there will be countries that can offer them work and an education. And to begin with this in Nouadhibou. At this port, from which a continuous stream of immigrants unwelcome in Europe, of young Africans, is taking ‘our’ holiday islands by storm, at this port, we will install a solar plant with the help of a young catholic priest and his parish, which, according to Frank Asbeck, Solarworld will donate to us instead of the prize money for the Einstein Award 2009. There, on top of a small mountain, on which Jerome Dukayo has built a mosque-like chapel, there is also a social center, where he now organizes vocational training courses. During my last visit in February of this year, he told me that he would like to install a solar system on the compound of his training centers. For one, because of the good and environmentally friendly power source. But also because he wants to train young compatriots and fugitives, so they will have something to offer as solar technicians, maybe even in their countries of origin. This young priest has contacts to the entire underground of around 60,000 people who are gathered in Nouadhibou (formerly St. Etienne under the French) from no less than 16 African countries, and are waiting for the opportunity and appropriate weather to then take sail for Gran Canaria, Tenerife, or Lanzarote. A Spanish journalist filmed the incredible dangers of the pirogue passage by going on one himself. He reduced the risk for himself by taking a satellite phone, as well as the number of a helicopter service, which would have gotten him out in case of need. These young Africans only want to make use of their human right to work, to create some sorts of prospects for their families, clans, children, and villages through their work. An estimated 18 million young Africans are desperately searching for what Thomas Jefferson promised in the constitution of the United States of America. Everyone has a human right to "freedom, justice and the pursuit of happiness”. These young guys can’t simply go back. They cannot just go back to their villages, who paid for them, and say: “I took a look, but it all seems way too dangerous.” They will not just lose their face. They will also be asked what they have done with the hard-earned money. Therefore, we offer the training as an electric or solar engineer/technician and micro-credits. This would be something that could make it possible for them to return. Solar energy, solar panels, and batteries are not just a new technology that we are bringing to Mauretania, and others, thanks to the generosity of Solarworld CEO Frank Asbeck, they are also part of a new social and global ethic. Instead of depleting the resources of mother earth, the 21st century requires us to preserve them. We, the green helmets, will bring the first sun lights to the African west coast with the help of the Nigerian priest Jerome Dukayo. To set a sign for the scores pushing out of the continent that there is a large potential for development, so that they will stay there. And hereby, we will also do something for ourselves, for saving our mother earth. |
|
||||||||||||
(c) 2003-2008 Grünhelme e.V.