Chronicle Editor
Leonard [email protected]
HWANGE-based environmentalist, Daniel Sithole and singer Rachel Rashyn have collaborated to produce a song that raises awareness on climate change impact and the need to come up with immediate solutions.
Sithole is the founding director of Green Shango Environment Trust, an organisation that strives to protect the environment through various activities, including music.
The trust’s mission is to conserve, enhance and restore the natural environment in Hwange District and Matabeleland North province with the ultimate goal of mitigating climate change and global warming through reforestation and civil protection activities as well as engaging the local mining industry, which is accused of causing both land and water pollution in Hwange.
Sithole was once featured in one of the videos live-streamed by the global network advocating for the maintenance of environments in their pristine state.
The Trust recently won the Environmental Stewardship and Social Impact award at the Matabeleland ESG and CSR Achievement Awards for outstanding environmental work.
Rachel Rashyn, (real name Rachel Nyasha Njomboro), is a contemporary traditional music artiste who embarked on her musical career in 2021 specialising in traditional music blended with various genres.
She has released about a dozen songs in various languages with a number of collaborations with other artists.
She has won a number of awards like Voice2Rep where she came 3rd at the Shoko Festival.
Sithole and Rashyn collaborated on the song “In the Heart of Africa” a climate action awareness song which seeks to emphasise the need for climate financing, inclusive solutions, and collective action.
The song is already out and this week the duo was in Victoria Falls to shoot a video as they targeted to have it out before the end of the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (CoP29) which is underway in Baku, Azerbaijan where the general call is for every economic sector to play a part towards zero emissions and reducing the impact of climate change.
Sithole wrote the song highlighting how the developing world including Africa is suffering from the effects of climate change such as recurrent droughts, cyclones, floods, heatwaves and hunger.
This is despite the global south contributing just less than 4 per cent of world greenhouse gas emissions.
The song states that in two decades the continent would need a cumulative US$300 billion to US$50 trillion to mitigate and adapt to climate change, which can be avoided if measures are taken now.
They chose to shoot the video in Victoria Falls to showcase the impact of climate change on the natural environment and beauty of the destination.
The song encourages everyone to join the African climate change movement, support adaptation and call for change, and advocate for unlocking financing and cooperation.
Rashyn is the lead vocalist, while Simasiku Kalalambili, studio name Willie Gates Africa, of Life Records, a leading music producer and director in Hwange, produced the song.
The song is sung in Engish, IsiNdebele and Shona.
-@ncubeleon
Online Reporter