Namibian rhino poacher gets seven years in prison

A KUNENE resident convicted of poaching a rhinoceros and possessing the endangered animal’s two horns was sentenced to an effective seven years’ imprisonment and fined a total of N$13 000 at the end of his trial in the Opuwo Magistrate’s Court yesterday. Magistrate Lena Iiyambo sentenced Tjetuura Uapungua Tjiumbua, who is in his early forties, to seven years’ imprisonment on a charge of hunting of specially protected game, a fine of N$10 000 or three years’ imprisonment on a charge of possession of controlled wildlife products, a fine of N$2 000 or a one-year prison term for the possession of a firearm without a licence, and a fine of N$1 000 or six months in prison for the illegal possession of ammunition. If Tjiumbua pays the fines he will have to serve a prison term of seven years. The term of imprisonment will increase to 11 and a half years if the fines are not paid. Tjiumbua has spent the past year and nearly eight months in custody. He was arrested in late December 2012 in connection with the poaching of a black rhino cow in the Sesfontein area in Kunene. The cow had a calf when she was killed. Her calf also died a few days after the poaching of its mother. Sources who attended the court proceedings at Opuwo yesterday said Magistrate Iiyambo noted that tourism was a pillar of the local economy in Kunene, providing employment to many of the region’s residents, and that rhinos are one of the main attractions that draw tourists to the region. The poaching of rhinos could put employment and livelihoods in the region at risk, she noted.It has been reported that Tjiumbua admitted that he had poached the rhino when he was questioned in connection with the killing of the animal. After making the admission he also led investigators to a place where he had hidden the two horns that he had removed from the poached rhino.The court was told that Tjiumbua is married and is the father of three children. Tjiumbua, who was convicted last month, was not represented by a defence lawyer during his trial. Obert Masendeke prosecuted. Source: www.namibian.com.na

African elephant populations tragically close to extinction - study says

Washington, Aug 20 (IANS) In a shocking revelation, a most comprehensive survey of elephant poaching to date has estimated that 100,000 African elephants were illegally killed between 2010-2012, threatening that many elephant populations may be wiped out in the next 10 years. This level of poaching has led to a decrease of 2-3 percent of the population across the continent, said researchers, confirming that the ivory trade has reached unsustainable levels. "What we are seeing is that there are a number of (elephant) populations that are at really high risk of being wiped out. Some populations could be completely gone in 10 years," cautioned George Wittemyer, a conservation ecologist at Colorado State University in Fort Collins. Wittemyer and his team examined elephant demographic data and analysed causes of death to obtain evidence-based estimates of local, regional and continental poaching rates - meaning how many out of every 100 living elephants are illegally killed each year. The researchers began by looking at wild elephants in Kenya's Samburu National Reserve, where every birth and death has been recorded since 1998. They used surveys of elephant carcasses to determine whether each death was attributable to natural causes, to poaching or to other causes. They found robust evidence that the rates of illegal killing began to surge in 2009. Moreover, the team showed that the poaching rates were strongly correlated with increases in the local black market price of ivory, and with the seizures of ivory destined for China. Wittemyer and his team also identified proxy variables that were correlated with killing rates, including Chinese household consumption and expenditure - related to the demand for ivory "as well as an index of local government corruption and poverty rates. They used these to further extrapolate their model to 306 elephant populations across Africa. At the continental scale, the poaching rate was approximately 7 percent per year from 2010 to 2012, the team calculated. This translates into an average of 33,630 elephants annually, based on current population estimates. "This is probably the most important publication for elephant conservation in the last 10 years and one that we had all waited for with bated breath," said Fiona Maisels, an adviser for the Wildlife Conservation Society's wildlife survey and monitoring programmes in Central Africa. The "proportion of elephants estimated to have been lost annually is highly cautious, but still shockingly high", she added. The study appeared in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Source: IANS Live

Chinese, Indian 'businessmen' appear in Namibian court over 4 elephant tusks

A NAMIBIAN man who is one of the five people - including one Chinese and one Indian national - facing charges of poaching after being found in illegal possession of four elephant tusks in a car in Windhoek two months ago was granted bail of N$5 000 on Friday. Hamutenja Stanislaus Hamutenja (34) had spent a month in police custody before the prosecution agreed that he could be released on bail. Magistrate Jermaine Muchali granted bail to Hamutenja a week after the fifth accused in the case in which two Chinese citizens and an Indian are also charged had been given bail in an amount of N$5 000. The fifth accused, George Mashala (42), was granted bail on 31 July, when he made his first court appearance following his arrest. The first accused in the case, Chinese businessman Hou Xuecheng (37), was granted bail of N$30 000 on 29 July. Hou and a compatriot, Sha Zhiwei (27), an Indian shop owner, Rajaiyah Ranjith Kumar (30), Hamutenja and Mashala are jointly charged with counts of dealing in and possessing controlled wildlife products. Hou, Sha and Kumar were arrested after police officers found four elephant tusks in a car in the Northern Industrial Area on the night of 11 June. The three men were at the same scene, where they had arrived in another car. The driver of the car in which the tusks were found ran away when police officers arrived at the scene. During the hearing of a bail application by Hou, a police officer told Magistrate Muchali that the car in which the tusks were found belonged to Hamutenja. The officer also said that Hamutenja had told her that he had travelled with the ivory from Rundu to Windhoek. In Windhoek, he was in contact with a middleman, who made an arrangement with him to meet at the place in the Northern Industrial Area where the police later found the tusks and arrested the three foreigners, the officer testified. Hou alone is further charged with another count of possession of controlled wildlife products, after the police allegedly also discovered two cheetah skins in his office in the China Town shopping complex in the Northern Industrial Area. He has been released on bail of N$10 000 on the charge in connection with the cheetah skins. Both cases were postponed to 26 September on Friday.Sha and Kumar are still in custody.

Hamutenja Stanislaus Hamutenja (34)and Chinese businessman Hou Xuecheng (37) in court Source: Namibian

China and African governments to blame for elephant genocide, says Michael Tomasky

The planet’s elephant population is plummeting, and they may go extinct within the next 20 years, thanks in large part to China’s lust for ivory. The presence of the Africa summit here in Washington directs our attention to a range of matters we don’t pay quite enough attention to—the global AIDS crisis, what used to be called “Third World” development, and more. But here’s what may be the most important one to me, put in the form of a question that I think every adult human being on the planet, especially those in China, ought to be asking themselves on a fairly regular basis: Do we want to be the human beings who eradicated elephants from the face of the Earth? If you pay no attention to things like this, that question shocks you, maybe to the point that you think I’m being ridiculous. But if you do pay attention, then you know very well the situation I’m describing: The vicious trade in ivory could lead to the extinction of the species in 20 years or even less. The number of elephants in Africa has gone from around 1 million to roughly half that in the last 35 years. And the population is falling even faster now. The story is this. When humans first became alarmed at the vast proportions of the slaughter of these astonishing animals back in the 1980s, a worldwide ban on the ivory trade was enacted by the United Nations Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). It worked. Poaching fell off dramatically, and the black market price of ivory dropped.Ivory tusks are stored in boxes at Hong Kong Customs on August 7, 2013, after they were seized from a container at Kwai Chung Container Terminal a day earlier. But then some countries with large elephant populations began unilaterally disobeying the ban. Unsurprisingly, the thuggish Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe was among the first, along with then-apartheid South Africa. By 1997, the ban had pretty much collapsed, and in 1999, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia were permitted a “one-off” legal sale of 108,000 pounds of ivory to Japan. Tusk weights vary a lot, but that’s maybe 1,400 dead elephants. There was another “one-off” sale in 2002, and then in 2008, the big one: After some aggressive lobbying by China in particular, CITES approved a sale of 110 tons of African ivory to China and Japan (which split it 60 tons to 50, respectively) on the theory that legal sales of large ivory stockpiles might depress the price and thereby slow poaching. The opposite happened—China controlled the supply of legal ivory tightly, which meant the demand was being met by the illegal stock. Today, ivory prices are at record highs, having tripled since that 2008 auction, up to around $1,500 a pound.

“Blame them all. But most of all blame China and the despicable hunger of its status-conscious middle class for baubles of worked ivory.” Blame the African countries and the amoral people who go into the savannahs and the forests and slaughter the animals. The governments of Africa are trying, or at least some of them are. A report on NPR Tuesday morning featured a number of African heads of state speaking at this week’s summit about their need for “high-tech help” to fight the poachers. “When the four presidents were asked what they need from the United States, the answers revealed how militarily sophisticated the poachers have become,” reported NPR’s Gregory Warner. “Namibia asked for light attack helicopters. Tanzania for night-vision goggles. Togo for infrared scanners to use at its port.” Blame also Japan, along with Thailand and Vietnam. Blame the United States, too. There still is a trade for ivory here, although the Obama administration to its credit did just consummate a ban on the commercial import of African elephant ivory. The ban is opposed by—well, guess who? The NRA. Because there’s ivory in some antique guns. The new regs say: “Personal possession of legally acquired items containing elephant ivory will remain legal.” This hasn’t stopped the NRA from announcing that the ban will turn gun owners into criminals overnight. Congressional members of the Republican Party, which may have to ditch its mascot in 20 years and find an animal we didn’t obliterate, are rushing to its aid. Blame them all. But most of all blame China and the despicable hunger of its status-conscious middle class for baubles of worked ivory. And of course the government, which promised as it lobbied to participate in the 2008 sale to create effective enforcement systems for monitoring both tusks and worked ivory. It did neither, according to Allan Thornton, the head of the Environmental Investigation Agency, a Washington- and London-based nonprofit that conducts undercover investigations to expose environmental crimes, including those against wildlife. “They really just didn’t have the political commitment to enforce anything,” Thornton says. Thornton says pressure is building, even inside China, for a ban. Yao Ming, the former NBA star who’s an icon there, has lent his prestige to the campaign. “We can only save African elephants if China and Japan ban the ivory trade,” Thornton told me. “That’s the only way to stop it, so that enforcement can be more effective.” You shouldn’t need me to tell you what magnificent creatures elephants are. The marvels of elephant cognition are well known. They possess complex intelligence. They have rich emotional lives. They laugh and they cry. They use tools. They have enough self-awareness to recognize themselves in a mirror (think about that). They paint. Not walls. Art. They practice altruism. They have compassion. They form extraordinarily sophisticated communal societies. They hold funerals for their deceased and have well-established mourning rituals. They’ve been known to help others species in need. Even humans. And as they’re probably aware of what we’re doing to them, they’re surely smart enough to know that that was their fateful error.

Three Chinese poachers arrested with 14 rhino horns in Namibia

THE case in which three Chinese men are charged with trying to smuggle 14 rhino horns out of Namibia near the end of March has again been postponed for further investigations to be carried out. The three accused men – Li Xiaoliang (30), Li Zhibing (53), and Pu Xunin (49) – have to appear in court again on 11 September, after Magistrate George Mbundu postponed their case in the Hosea Kutako International Airport Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday. Their case has also been transferred from the periodical airport court to the Windhoek Magistrate’s Court in Katutura, where the three accused should make their next appearance before a magistrate. Public prosecutor Anthony Wilson, who asked for the postponement, informed Magistrate Mbundu that the investigation of the case is continuing and that the police might still arrest additional suspects. The three accused were arrested and charged with possessing and exporting controlled wildlife products after 14 rhino horns and a leopard skin were found in two suitcases that Li Zhibing and Li Xiaoliang had checked in at Hosea Kutako International Airport as part of their luggage for a flight on which they were supposed to leave Namibia on 24 March. All three of the men have claimed during a bail hearing in May that they did not know what the suitcases contained.Li Zhibing claimed that a Chinese citizen living in Zambia had asked him to take the suitcases with him to China. He said he was promised US$3 000 as payment if he delivered the suitcases to someone in Shanghai. He also told the court that he had asked Li Xiaoliang to book one of the suitcases in as part of his luggage. Pu denied having had any involvement with or knowledge of the suitcases. Magistrate Mbundu, who presided over the bail hearing, also heard testimony that DNA tests done in South Africa have confirmed that the rhino horns found in the two suitcases were of Namibian origin. The three accused remain in custody, after Magistrate Mbundu turned down their request to be granted bail. Source: Namibian ends

Angola - Africa's latest illegal ivory trading post

LUANDA, Angola — At Benfica Market, south of the Angolan capital, Luanda, tables are stacked with carved ivory items from elephants illegally hunted in the forests of central Africa. The buyers are from China’s 250,000-strong expatriate community, as estimated by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang in May, in Africa’s second-biggest oil producer. At the cement block and dirt floor market about 10,000 ivory pieces, mostly from the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo, are on offer, according to Esmond Martin, a wildlife trade researcher based in Kenya who visited the site in March. The ivory is carved into Asian designs of Buddhas, dragon bracelets and necklaces to attract buyers. “I was shocked,” Martin, 73, said in a July 2 telephone interview from Nairobi, Kenya’s capital. “It’s very rare to see so much ivory for sale in one specific small market. Underneath the tables were 10 trunks with more.” The illegal trade in ivory stretches across Africa to Asia: From Kenya, where poachers hacked the tusks off two of the country’s oldest elephants last month, to China, where smugglers supply a growing middle class eager to display new wealth. Benfica is second only as a public ivory seller in Africa to Nigeria’s Lekki market in Lagos. Together, Nigeria and Angola have fewer than 3,000 elephants, according to the United Nations. ‘Internal issues’ Angolan craftsmen buy wholesale ivory for $150 to $200 a kilogram (2.2 pounds) while the price in Beijing is $2,100 per kilogram, said Martin, who has visited the Chinese capital. “We have some internal issues as to who should be responsible for monitoring and evaluating this kind of illegal trade,” Soke Kudikuenda, head of biodiversity and conservation at the Angolan Ministry of Environment, said in a telephone interview in Luanda. “We have submitted documents to the Council of Ministers to determine whether this should be under our umbrella or under the umbrella of the Ministry of Agriculture.” Angola last year joined the UN’s Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, according to its website. The 180-member group began in 1973 and tries to protect more than 35,000 species, it said. “Angolan government authorities said late last month they’re unable to take action against the Benfica market until they change outdated legislation,” Tom Milliken, head of the World Wildlife Fund’s Traffic International department, which tracks illegal trade in rhinoceros and elephant products, said in an e- mailed reply to questions. “This is worrying as Angola is the country with the largest expatriate Chinese population in all of Africa and the market is humming.” Central Africa is estimated to host 81,000 of the continent’s 500,000 elephants, according to a 2012 report by the UN Environment Program. Southern Africa, with about 290,000, has the most, with many of the pachyderms in Botswana and Zimbabwe. About 22,000 African elephants were killed illegally in 2013, said Martin, citing information from Nairobi-based Save The Elephants. Martin, a native of Manhattan who’s lived in Kenya since the 1960s, does contract work for organizations including the World Wildlife Fund and the New York Zoological Society. “Many of the sellers of the ivory are foreigners and they’re French-speaking, so they’re coming from central Africa,” Martin said. “There’s organized crime in a large quantity of the raw tusks being sent. The people buying among the 10,000 pieces are mostly contract workers from China. But they also buy in bulk. They’ll buy 10 or 20 of the same thing.” “Ivory-based products are bought mainly by Chinese and other Asians,” Pedro Miguel, a 47-year-old seller of carved wooden items alongside the ivory sellers, said in an interview at the market. “We know this is an illegal art but it’s also a way of living.” Customs officials in Hong Kong netted 790 kilograms of ivory valued at HK$7.9 million ($1.02 million) in 32 suitcases off one flight from Angola, the South China Morning Post reported June 11. Chinese construction crews abound in Angola after the Asian country was the first to help Angola secure oil-backed loans following the end of a 27-year civil war in 2002. “China remains the single most important contemporary player in the illicit trade in ivory and the pattern of seizures confirms the global reach of China’s illegal trade activity,” Traffic said in a report last year. Kenya, Tanzania and South Africa are the most common conduits for the Asia-bound trade, Traffic said. Last month in Kenya, Satao, a 45-year-old elephant that may have been the world’s largest, and Mountain Bull, a symbol for the Mount Kenya region, were killed in separate attacks. “Get rid of the middlemen and the kingpins who are the traders who know the contacts in Asia and Africa and it would be very easy to close these markets down because the legislation is there and it’s wide open,” Martin said. It’s public trading “because they want to attract the customers who are over 95 percent Chinese.” ends

Dawie Groenewald - Zim awaits justice

BULAWAYO - Any search around the name of South African national Dawie Groenewald would be incomplete if it omits to mention that the man is a former member of the South African Police Services (SAPS) who was dishonourably discharged from the force after an internal probe found him guilty of taking stolen cars straight out of the recovered stolen vehicle pound and selling them back to criminals and unsuspecting citizens. It is also known publicly that Groenewald is the director of Out of Africa Adventurous Safaris, a hunting outfit operating out of the small outpost of Old Days about 100km from Musina. The company is also registered in the same name at Overland Park in the United States county of Kansas. OAS, which also operates in Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania and has a European business representative based in Paris, France, also trades as Adventurous Safaris on the world wide web offering safari hunts in in its African bases. But that is all there is to be known if one does not burrow deeper into the operations of the 43 year-old Groenewald, the man arrested by the South African Hawks special investigations unit on allegations of being the mastermind behind what has come to be known as the Musina Mafia, an outfit which could turn out to be Africa's biggest rhino, elephant and lion poaching syndicate if proven to have existed. Eleven members of the "Musina Mafia", led by Groenewald, his 35 year-old American born wife Sariette, professional hunter Tielman Erasmus, veterinarians Karel Toets, Manie du Pleiss and Marissa Toet were early this month remanded to September when they appeared in court to face charges of poaching, illegal gun posession and many other associated crimes in the border town of Musina.The busting of the syndicate uplifted the spirits of South African conservation farmers and animal rights activists who have reasons to believe it was behind sophisticated poaching raids that killed even those rhinos deemed to be in the safest of the country's animal sanctuaries. However, an investigation conducted over the last two months by the Daily News reveals a paper trail of the Groenewald operations that leads into Zimbabwe and exposes how he used his links with top ZANU PF officials in the murky safari hunting business to take full advantage of the utter chaos created by President Robert Mugabe's fast track land reform to carry out illegal rhino, elephant and lions hunts while earning even more illicit dollars from inflating the number of hunts on his legally acquired qoutas. That was until the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority noticed his activities banned him from operating in the country, first in mid 2003 and finally in September 2004. On the contrary, evidence gathered by the Daily News shows that the ban did not stop Out of Africa Safaris and its international agents from conducting business in Zimbabwe until 2006, shortly before Groenewald was suspended from the South African Professional Hunters Association for conducting illegal hunts and abusing legally acquired hunting quotas. From its base on 7930 W 155th Terrace, Overland Parks, Kansas 66223 in the US, OAAS has over the years been able to attract scores of American hunters into the five African countries that still have rhino, elephant and lion territory - South Africa, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Information available to the Daily News suggests that OAAS came to the notice of Zimbabwean animal rights activists in 2003 when 250 bateleur eagles were exported to a falcon-breeder Sheikh in United Arab Emirates, the Middle East's equivalent of the proverbial island plenty in a sea of grinding poverty. According to a March 2003 report posted on wildlife website Africa Indaba, the international concern at the sale rose because it was allegedly done thorugh a deal facilitated by ZANU PF-linked Ed Kadzombe whose safari hunting business E.K Safaris trades out of Number 30 Golden Stairs Avenue in the plush surbub of Avondale in Harare. At that time it was known that EK Safaris was the Zimbabwe partner for OAAS and operated in many parts of the Gwayi Valley Conservancy and around the Sinamatela and Matetsi Five concessions near Victoria Falls where the company is also alleged to have facilitated the sale and translocation of 160 sables from a private conservancy in the Chinhoyi area to South Africa, allegedly with the help of Vitalis Chadenga, then acting director in the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority. The South African Professional Hunters Association suspected that the OAAS, using its proximity to Zimbabwe, of facilitating the illegal deal which latter turned sour and became public when Ed Kadzombe, his South Africa buyer and the legal owned of the sable fought a court battle over the non-payment of money involved in the deal. Reporting on the court battle, South African newspaper Business Day said the average cost of a live sable in the SA market at that time was R4000, which placed the total cost of the animals involved at R93 000. At the the height of the international outcry over poaching in Zimbabwe in 2003, animal rights activists started expressing concern that the rhino and elephant poaching crisis was being fuelled by unscrupulos foreign safari operators in collusion with government ministers, wildlife management officers, elements of the security forces and ZANU PF henchman who had invaded the farms. But the identities were to come in January 2003 when 'well-organised' poachers slaughtered four black rhinos at Sinamatela camp. Officially, no one was arrested for the offence but information supplied by national parks investigations sources suggests that while the concession on which the animals were shot was legally under EK Safaris, it was a group of American hunters brought illegally into the country and by the OAAS and allowed to operate through collusion with EK Safaris who had carried out the massacre and left it with the hallmarks of a poaching scene. The investigation also revealed that OAAS, with the help of Zimbabwean partners EK Safaris and Inyathi Hunters, a company jointly-owned by former Matabeleland North governor and ZANU PF provincial chairman Jacob Mudenda and Enio Di Palmer (who owns Bulawayo-based steel-manufacturing firm Steelforce), used their American representative Richard Putman of Seminole Safaris in the US state of Alabama to lure hundreds of American hunters to conduct illegal hunts in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy, Hwange National Park and the Matetsi Five Intensive Conserrvation Areas between 2003 and 2005. In Zimbabwe, OAAS used its hunters-co-directors Nick Van Rensburg and Glen Van Rensburg were assisted by EK Safaris and Zimbabwean professional hunters Albert Paradzai, PH licence number 6016 B, described as a fomer pilot with the Parks and Wildlife Authority, Dawie Van Der Westhuizen PH licence no. 5957 B, who was then listed as a farmer in Karoi and Chris Chitsa, professional PH licence number 5780B. Between 2003 and 2005, conservationists records on the tracking of vehicles which were seen driving into and out of poaching hot-spots created a consistent log on which nine Toyota Landcruiser vehicles fitted with registration numbers DDM 850 N, DWF 519 N, FFC 217 N, MWF 519, DDM 865 N, FBG 847 N, FBT 052 N, FBR 649 N and FBJ 847 N. The letter N shows that all the vehicles were registered in the Northern Province. "These companies, professional hunters and motor vehicles were hunting within the Gwayi Valley Conservancy where they were mainly concentrating their illegal operations on Goodluck Ranch ,Chimwara Ranch , Railway Farm 35 and Sekumi Estates and Railway Farm 31," reads part of the summary of the 2003 Gwayi Valley Conservancy Hunting Report. The report also notes the illegal operations of professional hunters Bagman Chauke PH Licenec No.6092B, Dellerman PH Licence No. 5874B, Thulani Dube PH Licence No. 6096B, Guy Venter PH licence no. 5919B, Phil Palmer, PH licence no. 5801B, one Ndlovu PH licence no. 6070B, one Chimiaza PH licence no. 6064B, and a B Jolliffe with PH licence no. 5920B. They were all employed by Nyati Safaris and were seen by poaching watchers on many occassions guiding illegal foreign hunters, most of whom were Americans, in the black rhino zones of the Gwayi Valley Conserrvancy and Woodlands Estate in the Matetsi Five concession area. The report also reveals that the endless chain of American hunters who were guests of Nyati Hunters, came through the OAAS which got them through Nyati Safaris American agents Dick and Mary Cabella of Cabelas Outdoor Adventures, a company listed as operating out of Number 1, Cabela Drive, Sidney in Nebraska, USA. But the OAAS was not the only South African outfit involved in plundering Zimbabwe's rhino heritage. South African brothers Piet and Hendrik Uys, directors of Northern Weapons which is also trading in Afrikaans as 'Noordlike Wapens' out of Louis Trichadt in the Northern Province are ported to have conducted extensive illegal hunts in the same area at the same time. The Uys brothers are believed to be the owners of three Toyota Landcruiser trucks with registration numbers NWZ 918 GP, FBD 185 N AND DPK 173 N and the Gwayi Hunting Report of 2003 observes their actiona as follows: "These characters were very active through out the year with-in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy , mainly concentrating on Gwayi Ranch , Hankano Ranch , Lot 1 of Dete Valley Railway Farms 35 & 36 and Chimwara Ranch.They were hunting indiscrimantly shooting young animals, females etc." "In the course of the year, Gwayi Valley Conservancy members also questioned illegal hunters on their farms. The name given to them of the South African hunters were Andre De Jaager who was caught poaching while driving a blue Landrover Vehicle registration number DMT 498 GP and one R M Saunders of Jack Rand, Alberton in Johannesburg who claimed to have been brought into the country by Elephant Eye Safaris. The above were seen in the company of three American hunters and De Jaager shot and wounded a buffalo on Sotani Ranch.De Jaager is staying at the Lodge on Chamankanu Ranch. He has also been seen hunting on Lugo Ranch (owned by Vice-President John Nkomo) and Skukungwa farms. He has been arrested twice for hunting illegally on Skukungwa Ranch," reads part of the 2003 hunting report. South African national Mark Sparrow of Fair Chase Safaris in Polokwane, old Zimbabwean vehicle registration number 587 150F, was also reported to have conducted extensive illegal hunts. "Sparrow has been hunting on Hankano Ranch and Lot 1 of Dete Valley and reportedly wants to start a fishing safari business in Masuna island on the Zambezi. He has already made offers to property owners from Masuna. This desire to purchase land is not illegal, but is an indication of his presence in the area. He is involved with the Uys brothers of Northern Weapons, Louis Trichadt," the report noted in 2003. The report also reveals the activities of Henry F. Neil, a controversial Cape Town clergyman who is described as a story worth following. "Henry. F. Nel is a minister in the Rock of Africa Christian mission in Cape Town. He apparently would not allow any blacks into his church there, but is quite happy to form illicit liaisons with black Zimbabweans. He is apparently assisting a school in the Gwaai area to justify his position there. He is apparently working out of Kalambeza Lodge which is situated on Umkombo Ranch with in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy. "Further, this character is known to the Gwayi Valley Conservancy for the destruction and decemation of the natural resources and wildlife on two certain pieces of land known as Carl Lisa and Bindonvale which he was leasing.He was the first person in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy to receive an order to stop all activities , including hunting operations ,chopping of trees and general destruction of fauna and flora on his land." French national Jerome Sefridi, who is the director of Indaba Safaris of 10 Anthony Potts Road, Fortunes Gate in Bulawayo is also listed as having brought dozens of hunters from France to hunt illegally in the Gwayi Conservancy. Sefridi is a French national resident in Zimbabwe. He has been selling hunts to the French hunting community.He hunted extensively with-in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy, concentrating his illegal activities to Lot 1 , 2 , 3A of Dete Valley, Goodluck Ranch, Sikumi Estates, Chimwara Ranch, Gwayi Ranch and Hankano Ranches. He drives and hunts in h a green Mitshubishi jeep registration number 797-699 F." As evidence gathered by Daily News shows, OAAS moved out of the Gwayi Conservancy in early 2003 after being temporarily banned for carrying out illegal hunts but still used their Zimbabwean connections to set up another operations based in the resort town of Victoria Falls to continue operations until the final ban in September 2004. In June 2003 a tracking collar taken off a lionese that was shot illegally was found in the homestead of Lot 2 Dete Valley Farm during the stay of a group of hunters from Hwange Safari Lodge and some from OAAS were reported to be staying at the hotel whose major shareholders are ZanuPF. A surveillance log obtained by Daily News from the parks intelligence noted that on July 24, 2003, three South African landcruisers which had their number plates removed arrived in the Gwayi Conservancy and an occupant of one the vehicles was reportedly seen bribing officials at the veterinary road block before driving onto Goodluck Farm where hunting blinds were latter discovered to have been built around animal watering points. "On 2 September 2003 four Americans were seen arriving in Victoria Falls. They were collected by a South African operator who turned out to be OAAS and were overheard saying they wanted to shoot as much as possible. On 4 September, a white landrover, vehicle registration FBT052N and belonging to Out of Africa Safaris was seen dropping zebra meat at the PTC (now Tel One) offices in Vic Falls although public vehicles are not permitted into this area," reads part of the parks investigations report. As the watch on OAAS operations continued, undercover investigators witnessed the arrival of two Landrover twin-cab vehicles, registration numbers FBG 847 N and FBR 649 N with two American clients in Bulawayo on 15 September 2003 but the investaigators lost track of the vehicles and were unable to determine where they went until they re-appeared in Hwange National Park where they operated for the whole month. The surveillance log also states that on 25 September 2003, two vehicles from OAAS , a white Landrover twin cab with registration number DWF 519 N and a green Toyota Landcruiser double cab with registration number DDM 865N were seen in Victoria Falls filled with American hunters. The log submits that OAAS remained active in the national parks as confirmed by the numerous sighting of three OAAS vehicles with registration numbers FBG 848N, DWF 519N and FBG 847N between 30 September 2003 and 16 October 2003 around Bulawayo, Victoria Falls, Hwange National Park and Half Way Hotel inside the Gwayi Conservancy loaded with clients who told undercover investigators they were from America and South Africa. Based on the surveillance findings, the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority wrote OAAS the final notice of expulsion from Zimbabwe. "We refer to our letter dated September 24 and signed by Director General MZ Mtsambiwa and we wish to further clarify the letter and its effect on Out Africa Adventurous Safaris. Please be advised that in terms of the Parks and Wildlife Act Chapter 20:14, OAAS is not allowed to operate as a safari operator conducting any hunting nor safari operations in the whole country of Zimbabwe. Our previous letter cited the Gwayi Intensive Conservation Area which was then known to be the operational area of OAAS. However, the company and all its staff are not allowed to conduct any business without the requisite licences and or permits from the appropriate authorities in Zimbabwe in terms of the laws and regulations of the country," reads the main body of the letter that expelled OAAS from Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe Conservation Taskforce chairman Johnny Rodrigues told the Daily News that the trial of the Musina Mafia remains an issue of interest to Zimbabwean consrvationists who believe it will help lift the heavy lid on the politically connected rhino and elephant poaching syndicates which are still ravaging the parks. "OAAS left a big footprint of their illegal operations in Zimbabwe. They were very much behind the decimation of not just elephant and rhino, but the zebra population in the sanctuaries around West Nicholson in Gwanda has been decimated for hides. Our understanding is that most of these poachers take the skins to the OAAS taxidermist factory in Old Days where they are tanned and prepared for export to Europe while elephant and rhino products are sent on to the Vietnamese and Chinese syndicates which finance this carnage. We will be very happy to meet the Hawks and tell them what we know about OAAS and many other unscrupulous South Africans who got their riches from plundering the wildlife heritage of this country," Rodrigues said. By AEP

Source:AEP ***************************************************************************************************************************** This piece, painstakingly researched and written by Oscar Nkala in 2011 is being reproduced to rekindle memories among those who already know that Zimbabw hopes and prays that South African investigators will be so thorough as to follow Dawie's bloody trails into Zimbabwe, or ask us to help them do so, so that the Zimbabwean end of Dawie's crimes is also put on trial. I re-run this also as fresh information for those who don't know that Dawie's also has crimes to answer for in Botswana, which if investigated, can be proven and used as a basis for prosecution. It is my view that trying him in South Africa only when he is a regional criminal will make a complete mockery of justice in the Rainbow Nation, which we look to for exemplary regional leadership in all matter. ******************************************************************************************************************************