Selous: The killing fields
From This Day News
October 26, 2009
TANZANIA’S wildlife sanctuaries, particularly the world-famous Selous Game Reserve, have now been turned into vast killing fields where hundreds of elephants are being slaughtered for their ivory, it has been revealed.
There has been a fresh spike in elephant poaching in recent years, with some disgruntled game wardens either turning a blind eye to illegal hunting activities or themselves taking part in killing the same animals they were hired to protect.
”An average of 50 elephants are being killed in the Selous each month...and that is a conservative estimate,” an official working in the game park told THISDAY last week.
”Sometimes, authorities torch the carcasses of elephants that have been killed by poachers to conceal the truth about the extent of the problem,� he added.
Ironically, as the country buckles under this latest wave of elephant poaching, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism now wants the ban on ivory trade lifted.
Tanzania and Zambia have jointly petitioned the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to further open up the trade by allowing them to sell off their ivory stocks.
The CITES ban on ivory trade was imposed some 20 years ago. Animal rights campaigners say the ban has been instrumental in allowing the elephant population in Tanzania to recover from the massive poaching of the 1980s.
Impeccable sources with many years of working experience in the Selous, which is Africa�s largest protected wildlife reserve, have confirmed that not less than 50 elephants are killed monthly by hardcore poachers in collaboration with ”an army of demoralized game scouts.”
”Poachers have colonized the Selous and the game scouts are aiding and abetting the killings,” said the sources who requested anonymity, saying poaching is a sensitive issue that sometimes involved powerful and dangerous syndicates.
The sources say the wildlife division in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism used to pay game scouts a working allowance of between 250,000/- and 300,000/- a month, but due to a razor-thin budget that allowance was suspended a couple of years ago.
Another source said he counted 60 carcases of the jumbos on roads within the Selous game reserve in the period between January and October this year.
�There is organized poaching masterminded by demoralized game scouts, which is more dangerous than the previous poaching of the 1980s,� said the sources, warning that if the government does not take urgent measures to arrest the trend, �we will have no elephants in two years to come�.
�The ministry (of Natural Resources and Tourism) is literally crippled and the anti-poaching unit is in the ICU (intensive care unit), because it has completely failed to control poaching,� said the sources.
They named Miguruwe (Kilwa district), Matambwe (Morogoro South), Liwale (Lindi region), Msola (Morogoro region), Ilonga (Mahenge), Kingupira (Utete), and Mtemere (Rufiji) as most affected sections within the Selous.
The sources said the game scouts used to patrol most parts of the game reserve on a weekly basis, but nowadays patrols may not be done for up to three months, allowing poachers to massacre the jumbos at will.
A source from the Kilwa open area situated adjacent to the Selous game reserve said he spotted 17 carcases of elephants between May and June this year.
�Kilwa was once renowned for its giant elephants. But you can hardly see those nowadays. They are gone. Elephant poaching is now a daily business,� said the source.
Abdallah Kanunga (49), chairman of the Magingo wildlife management area embracing nine villages situated in Selous game reserve buffer zones in Liwale district, said elephant poaching is no longer done secretly.
Other sources said the government should make anti-poaching a life-or-death matter otherwise �we will lose even the foreign exchange we are getting from foreign tourists because they will stop visiting Tanzania if there are no animals to see.�
The sources suggested the transfer of game scouts from their current work stations within the Selous game reserve, and recruitment of new scouts.
They also suggested the revival of Operation Uhai, which involved soldiers of the Tanzania People’s Defence Forces in fighting poaching in the 1980s.
The worst period of elephant poaching experienced in the country was probably 1977-87, when the elephant population dwindled from 184,000 to 55,000.
A joint crusade mounted by TPDF, the wildlife department, police and customs authorities resulted in the confiscation of more than 10,000 guns and at least 700 people prosecuted in connection with poaching activities in 1988 alone.
Tanzania is the leading country in illegally slaughtering and exporting of ivory in Africa, a new scientific research has revealed.
In March this year, authorities in Vietnam seized 6.3 tons of ivory originating from Tanzania, followed by another 2 tons, also coming from Tanzania, seized in August.
Between January and September, nearly 24 tons of ivory was confiscated worldwide. In the meantime, black-market prices for raw ivory continue to rocket, exceeding $1,000 a kilogramme, according to reports.
Contacted for comment, the current director of wildlife in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, Erasmus Tarimo, said the reports of elephant poaching in the Selous were exaggerated.
�A recent aerial count found 41 carcases of elephants. But 41 dead elephants is minimal compared to the total Selous elephant population of around 40,000,� he said, adding that some elephants had died of natural causes.
Tarimo said: �Our intention is to have zero poaching, but to maintain zero poaching is impossible. It is not easy to control poaching 100 per cent.�
He also acknowledged reports of demoralized game wardens participating in the poaching activities, saying: �It is very difficult to pin down those wardens involved in the malpractice.�
Tarimo called on people with information about game scouts involved in poaching to come forward and give such information to relevant authorities so that preventive action can be taken.
