Greenpeace Africa’s newly released documentary, “CRUDE: Wentworth Community vs Big Oil”, is a shocking reminder of the true cost of the oil industry in Africa.
According to a press release from Greenpeace Africa, the documentary, highlighting the plight of the community of Wentworth at the hands of surrounding fossil fuel industries, was launched at the 1-Minute Film Festival and will soon be available for streaming.
Wentworth residents have been resisting the surrounding fossil fuels companies for years, which regularly sideline them and erase them from decision-making while destroying their health.
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The micro-documentary tells the stories of the residents of the South Durban Basin, their battles with ill health, their suffering at the hands of the surrounding fossil fuel companies and their attempts to bring change to their community.
It also details research from the University of KwaZulu-Natal into the health impacts in the area, and how Wentworth came to be a cancer cluster.
“CRUDE“ details the shocking knock-on impact of air pollution in Wentworth, where epigenetic changes (relating to or arising from non-genetic influences on genes) make community members prone to certain respiratory illnesses, trap them in a spiral of chronic poverty, substance abuse and gender-based violence.
Greenpeace International content editor and documentary director Angelo Louw said that “communities like this, that have decades of first-hand experience with the exploits of the fossil fuels industry, are systematically excluded from the public eye”.
“When we ignore the voices of society’s most vulnerable, we leave everyone vulnerable to the same kind of oppression, because how are we to make decisions when we do not have a full understanding of the consequences?”
Oliver Meth, gender-based violence activist and Wentworth resident, said: “We will never address GBV without addressing the root causes. South Durban Basin has seen numerous events of ecological damage that feed into violence and femicide in the surrounding communities.
“Climate hazards from water shortages to air pollution create chronic stressors which trap these communities in poverty and rigid gender roles. We must hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for its role in the architecture of chronic injustice", said Meth.
The documentary explores how communities such as Wentworth are locked into cycles of poor health and poverty, at the intersection of apartheid spatial planning and fossil fuel dependence, while fossil fuel companies continue business-as-usual with little accountability.
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