05/04/2022
HEAVILY ARMED POACHING GANGS HAVE KILLED AT LEAST 75 RHINOS IN SOUTH AFRICA'S KWAZULU NATAL PROVINCE SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR.
Simon Bloch
MONDAY APRIL 4 2022
HEAVILY ARMED POACHING GANGS HAVE KILLED AT LEAST 75 RHINOS IN SOUTH AFRICA'S KWAZULU NATAL PROVINCE SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR.
Simon Bloch
MONDAY APRIL 4 2022
THAT INREDIBLY HIGH NUMBER OF RHINOS BUTCHERED WITHIN THE FIRST 90+ DAYS OF 2022 REPRESENTS THE HIGHEST RATE OF RHINO SLAUGHTER (ECO SIDE) EVER RECORDED AT SOUTH AFRICA’S HLUHLUWE-IMFOLOZI GAME RESERVE, A PROTECTED AREA REGARDED AS THE CRADLE OF GLOBAL RHINO CONSERVATION.|
Shockingly, that grotesque number represents more than two thirds the total slaughtered in the province during the whole of 2021.
This horrific escalation of the poaching onslaught and its resultant carcass count reflects Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife's struggle to perform its custodial duty protecting the country's natural heritage and biodiversity assets for future generations.
It also reflects the political indifference by the entire ANC provincial executive leadership.
In 2016, a specialized rhino task team was commissioned by the former KZN premier, Wi***es Mchunu, to investigate critical issues around rhino poaching and related criminal activity in KZN, including the efficacy and performance of provincial and national government departments and bodies tasked with dealing with such matters.
The task team’s terms of reference include conducting an assessment of the criminal justice processes in relation to the poaching incidents at all levels.
The said report was eventually compiled and finalized by members of a depleted task team, who handed it over to the current provincial premier, Sihle Zikalala, more than two years ago.
There has been widespread public interest and anticipation in the findings and recommendations of the task team. It is understood that their discoveries could have had a beneficial impact in finding solutions to the current rhino poaching crisis, however the members were forced to sign non-disclosure agreements and sworn to secrecy.
That the late Frank Dutton, whose work on State Capture for the Zondo Commission has been ardently admired and respected by the country's leading legal minds, was the chief investigator for the task team, raises the question whether premier Zikalala deliberately swept the report and its findings under the carpet for more than two years, leaving conservationists and the public none the wiser, or did he prohibit its release because the findings were so damning?
Either way, the consequences of his inaction have been severely detrimental!
What can now be revealed is that shortly after the appointment of members of the South African Police Services and the State Security Agency to the task team in 2016, their services were soon withdrawn without any explanation.
By dithering and dilly-dallying, and neglecting to capacitate anti-poaching teams with resources and reinforcements to combat enemy numbers, the KZN premier and his provincial government have failed to provide good governance and effective management at the Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife conservation authority.
The numbers speak for themselves.
While the carcasses pile up daily, and blood of the rhinos seeps into the soil of the iMfolozi wilderness, the Rhino Task Team report remains buried somewhere on the premier's desk.
Both the premier's Chief of Staff, Sam Khuzwayo, and his spokesman, Lennox Mabaso, failed to respond this writer's written requests for the report to be made available.
Numerous attempts by the opposition members on the environmental portfolio committee to secure access to the report, have also been turned down and ignored.
Questions also remain unanswered about the cost of the task team report to the taxpayer.
But most importantly, what must be boldly stated at the end of the day is the incalculable suffering, brutal carnage and irrecoverable losses our rhino population has endured as the consequences of disastrous leadership.
Does Premier Zikalala even care.....?
More to follow.................reflects
