Urgent Call for South Africa to Support and Join Global Efforts to Phase Out Fossil Fuels

Petition to:
 The President of the Republic of South Africa and National Government

Geopolitical Crisis and Fossil Fuel Dependence

Triggered by escalating military conflict between the United States of America, Israel, and Iran—and the resulting global scramble for oil and gas—the world is once again on the brink of an energy crisis. South Africa remains one of Israel’s largest suppliers of coal, even as it has taken a legal stance against atrocities in Palestine—revealing a stark contradiction between its foreign policy commitments and its fossil fuel trade. War, fuel shortages, and rising prices—already being felt by South Africans—are the true costs of fossil fuel dependence.

Despite devastating floods, droughts, cyclones, wildfires, sea-level encroachment and biodiversity loss, the South African government continues to rely on dangerous, ageing fossil fuel refineries and failing infrastructure—knowingly exposing fence-line communities to toxic pollution that drives respiratory disease, cancers including leukaemia, and premature death—while advancing offshore oil and gas expansion under the false promise that more extraction will solve the very crises fossil fuel dependence creates.

Recent International Criminal Court cases recognise that continued fossil fuel expansion, and ongoing subsidisation, is contributing to climate harm constituting a violation of international law and human rights.

Countries across the Global South, including Kenya, are stepping forward in global efforts to transition away from fossil fuels. The First International Conference on the Just Transition Away from Fossil Fuels marks a critical moment to coordinate this shift. At the same time, the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty is gaining traction, with at least 18 national governments already engaging in efforts to advance a just transition through a binding international framework to phase out fossil fuels.

South Africa must step forward and take a leading role in this global transition.

What We Ask of Government

Key actions needed:

• Send an official delegation and public commitment to the First International Conference on the Just Transition Away from Fossil Fuels, with a mandate to adopt clear outcomes.
  
  
• Publish a national fossil fuel phase-out plan within 12 months, with legally binding targets and deadlines.
  
  
• Place an immediate halt on new offshore oil and gas licences and approvals.
  
  
• Redirect public funding away from fossil fuels by ending subsidies and shifting that money into climate mitigation, renewable energy and public infrastructure.
• Rapidly scale up socially owned and community-based renewable energy systems.
• Expand and modernise the national grid through large-scale public investment to connect underserved communities and enable community-owned renewable energy to supply power locally and feed surplus electricity into the grid on fair, guaranteed terms.
• Launch a national Climate Jobs Programme within 2 years, led by the state and shaped by workers and communities, creating large-scale, decent work in climate mitigation and resilience, socially owned renewable energy, public services, and ecosystem restoration.
• A 1.5°C overshoot is inevitable this decade, with RSA facing 3°C warming. We demand the country be placed on an emergency footing through a societal driven Climate Emergency Social Contract - a democratically shaped, justice-centred agreement to reorganise state action at emergency speed, to confront climate breakdown while transforming inequality.

Much of South Africa’s climate response has amounted to window dressing, while coal, oil, and gas continue to dominate. Viable alternatives already exist. This is not a question of technical challenge but of political will, with real consequences for whether people experience deepening crisis or tangible improvements in their daily lives.

We demand leadership that delivers real jobs and a real transition energy security. We ask the South African government to act now.

Sign this petition to demand action—not promises.

The following organisations stand in solidarity with this demand:

·      Oceans Not Oil Coalition

·      Climate Justice Charter Movement

·      Active Citizens Movement

·      Greenpeace Africa Durban Local Group

·      Sustaining the Wild Coast

·      Extinction Rebellion Cape Town 

·      Mycelium Media Colab

·      Co-operative and Policy Center

·      South African Food Sovereignty Campaign

.      Southern African Faith Communities’ Environment Institute