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Wangari Maathai smiles while holding a globe-shaped trophy, wearing a patterned headwrap.
WonderStory

Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan biologist, founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977, training rural women to plant trees to stop soil erosion, protect water sources and provide firewood. When the movement opposed grabs of public forests and parks, the government had her arrested several times, and police once beat her unconscious.

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Maathai earned a doctorate in veterinary anatomy in 1971, the first woman in East Africa to do so. In 1989 she campaigned against a 60-storey tower, with a large statue of President Daniel arap Moi, planned for Nairobi's Uhuru Park. Members of parliament ridiculed her and the government forced her out of her office, but foreign investors pulled out in January 1990 and the project collapsed. In March 1992, during a hunger strike in the park for the release of political prisoners, police knocked her unconscious and she was taken to hospital. By 2004, when she became the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, the Green Belt Movement had planted more than 30 million trees. She died in 2011.

Türkçe oku
Kenyalı biyolog Wangari Maathai, 1977'de Yeşil Kuşak Hareketi'ni kurdu; kırsaldaki kadınlara erozyonu durdurmak, su kaynaklarını korumak ve yakacak sağlamak için ağaç dikmeyi öğretti. Hareket kamu ormanlarının ve parklarının yağmalanmasına karşı çıkınca hükümet onu defalarca tutuklattı; bir keresinde polis onu dövüp bayılttı.

Maathai 1971'de veteriner anatomisi alanında doktorasını tamamladı; Doğu Afrika'da doktora yapan ilk kadındı. 1989'da, Nairobi'deki Uhuru Parkı'na yapılması planlanan, Devlet Başkanı Daniel arap Moi'nin büyük bir heykelini de içeren 60 katlı bir kuleye karşı kampanya başlattı. Milletvekilleri onunla alay etti, hükümet de onu ofisinden çıkardı; ama yabancı yatırımcılar Ocak 1990'da çekilince proje suya düştü. Mart 1992'de siyasi tutukluların serbest bırakılması için aynı parkta açlık grevi yaparken polis onu dövüp bayılttı ve hastaneye kaldırıldı. Maathai 2004'te Nobel Barış Ödülü'nü kazanan ilk Afrikalı kadın olduğunda, Yeşil Kuşak Hareketi 30 milyondan fazla ağaç dikmişti. Maathai 2011'de öldü.

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Wangari Maathai with an award from Kenya’s national human rights commission, 2006.

“Wangari Maathai” — Demosh, 2006, via Wikimedia Commons. CC BY 2.0.

Image source · CC BY 2.0

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