KZN steps up war on rhino poaching

August 12 2011 at 12:59pm

As South Africa prepares to record the worst rhino poaching death toll in more than a century, KwaZulu-Natal wildlife authorities are negotiating to send troops into the province’s premier game reserve, Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park.

Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is the cradle of South African rhino conservation. This was the reserve where the white rhino was rescued from the brink of extinction last century and subsequently served to restock game reserves nationally and around the continent.

Bandile Mkhize, the chief executive of Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife, expressed support for a mandatory minimum sentence for convicted rhino horn poachers and dealers.

At a media briefing in Durban this week, Ezemvelo released statistics showing that 238 rhinos had been killed by horn poaching syndicates throughout the country this year – and by year-end the toll was expected to reach more than 440 deaths.

This is about 25 percent higher than the death toll of 333 rhinos last year – and a staggering rise of more than 6 000 percent compared to poaching levels of 10 years ago, when an average of just seven rhinos were poached nationwide each year.

Mkhize said troops from the SANDF had been deployed along the northern border with Mozambique to guard against rhino poaching in the Ndumo and Tembe reserves, and he hoped troops would also be on patrol near the Phongola and Itala game reserves.

“Most of the troops are patrolling international border areas but now we are also trying to get them into the Hluhluwe/ Imfolozi Park and the Emakhosini/Opathe reserve near Ulundi.”

Mkhize noted that – because troops were trained specifically to shoot, and if necessary to kill – their deployment in a major tourist reserve was “something we need to negotiate very carefully”.

“But the reality is that this is a bit like a war. Confronting armed and highly sophisticated poaching syndicates can be a life and death situation.”

Jabulani Ngubane, who was appointed rhino security co-ordinator for Ezemvelo earlier this year, noted that the overwhelming majority of rhino poaching deaths occurred in Kruger National Park, where 150 rhinos had been killed so far this year.

Of the total national death toll of 238 in the first seven months of this year, 19 happened in KwaZulu-Natal.

Most of these killings were at Ndumo game reserve (eight), Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Park (three), Weenen game reserve (three), private reserves (three) and Emakhosini-Opathe (two).

Ngubane said the level of sophistication and tactics used by international horn syndicates had changed dramatically.

“Rhinos are now being shot at night in pitch-dark conditions with the help of special equipment, and the syndicates can organise a helicopter in the blink of an eye – things that were unthinkable just five years ago.”

Responding to a question on mandatory jail terms for rhino horn offences, Mkhize said: “I think that would be a very useful way to show how serious this issue has become.

“It will take a lot of lobbying with the law enforcement and justice system, but we are more than prepared to lobby for a mandatory sentence because any new measures to deter offenders are welcome.”