Portfolio Committee Report on Public Hearings

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Report of the Portfolio Committee on Environmental Affairs on Public Hearings on Sustainable Development Goals, Climate Change and Rhino Killing in KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and North West Provinces, dated 21 October 2014.

4.1 INPUTS AND DISCUSSIONS FROM KWAZULU-NATAL

RHINO KILLINGS
Killing of Rhinos: It was reported in the briefing at the offices of the Big 5 False Bay Municipality in Hluhluwe that the killing of Rhinos was impacting on the tourism industry in the area. The tourism industry had already expressed concern that the area was no longer popular with tourists, leading to dwindling numbers in recent times. This was attributed partly to the mining activities in the surrounding areas that brought ‘strangers’ into Hluhluwe, thereby furthering Rhino killing.

Trade in Rhino horn: Support was expressed for a limited regulated trade in Rhino horns, mainly from the existing stockpiles and also from future cases of natural mortality. Money deriving from this process could be used for incentivising Rhino conservation on public, community and private lands. The same revenue could be used for establishing co-management initiatives in the buffer zones of protected areas, thereby serving effectively as firewalls against poaching.

Rhino ambassadors: It was indicated that certain community members should be appointed as Rhino ambassadors to help mobilise and garner support for Rhino conservation in areas where killing of Rhinos occurs. It was also suggested that Rhinos could be protected better in the face of ongoing onslaught by having one person recruited to protect only one Rhino at a time. It was further stated that the State should bear the cost of such one Rhino/one man conservation initiative.

Prosecution of poachers: There were concerns that those high up in the chain of poaching syndicates are not arrested and prosecuted as they ought to be. Even when they are arrested in the country, the case appears to be moving slowly, for example, the case of two Vietnamese who were released in 2010, but were rearrested due to increased publicity of their involvement in this illegal trade. There is a need to find better ways of arresting and prosecuting Rhino killing syndicates who reside in south-east Asian countries and even in the neighbouring countries.

4.2 INPUTS AND DISCUSSIONS FROM MPUMALANGA

RHINO KILLINGS
The majority of inputs and discussions in the Mpumalanga Province dwelt extensively on the killing of Rhinos, seemingly due to the fact that the Kruger National Park where most of the killings occur is located in this Province.

Limited regulated trade: one stakeholder suggested that there is a need to think carefully about the proposal to introduce a limited regulated trade in Rhino horns, and suggested the need for the nation to learn from the diamond and drug trade. A conservation-related businessman stated that releasing South Africa’s Rhino stockpiles onto the market to meet current demands and hence lessen demand for horns obtained illegally is meaningless, considering the massive ever-increasing demand for Rhino
horns from China, let alone other consumer States. A further key stakeholder (Alison Thompson) was against the idea of opening up trade in Rhino horns, citing the Government’s inability to stem out illicit trade in abalone as the main reason. She disagreed with the assertion that the Government is at war with poaching syndicates, as no one goes to war with only 100 soldiers, referring to the number of SANDF soldiers stationed inside the Kruger National Park. Thompson pointed out that working against
the killing of Rhinos in our national parks and at the same time proposing trade in Rhino horns are contradictory in our anti-poaching messaging.
Consequently, the following have been suggested:
• Consider putting up the fences again.
• Seriously consider scaling up the involvement of the SANDF in securing the border with Mozambique. It is better to involve people who can respond competently to the threats of Rhino killing.
• Do not consider de-horning of Rhinos, as the horns play a critical role in the life of a Rhino.
• Met long sentences to convicted poachers and attach their assets to deter potential poachers.
• Consider exchanging staff, for example, transfer park staff and law enforcement agents regularly from Rhino killing hotspots to avoid corruption and/or prevent collusion with potential poachers in the area. This is significant in the light of assertions by some community members that the killing of Rhinos is an inside job, and that the staff in the Kruger National Park know what is happening in that Park.
• Search every vehicle that enters and leaves the Kruger National Park, irrespective of whether it is a police vehicle or not.
• Work with communities to raise awareness and also to seek their support in protecting Rhinos, as this is already bearing fruit in the Sabi Sands Game Reserve where the killing of Rhinos is well controlled.
• Involve communities to strengthen beneficiation of Rhino conservation, and also prioritise recruitment of community members into game ranger positions from the immediate surrounding areas to enhance the sense of ownership of national parks and Rhinos in these communities.
• Tenders for service delivery or development in the surrounding area should be awarded to members of local communities, rather than distant people or those who come from cities.
• Engage game reserve owners in finding solutions to problems that confront them, rather than imposing tailored solutions on them.
• Develop the full eco-tourism potential of protected areas to reduce the impact of poverty on Rhinos, considering that many wealthy international tourists are willing to pay for photographic Safari, with the Big 5 serving as a draw card.
• Strengthen community strongholds for Rhino protection by mobilising local communities to see value in life Rhinos, rather than in horns by divesting the ownership of Rhinos on communal lands to respective communities.
• Initiate a reward system that pays individuals whose information led to successful conviction of members of criminal syndicates.
• Use electrical fences in the border with Mozambique to deter breaching of our borders with the aim of entering the Kruger National Park and also have cameras located at strategic points to monitor the movement of potential poachers.
• Create a ‘Rhino Stronghold’ within the Kruger National Park and step up security.
• Involve private investigators to track the illegal trade and those involved to ensure successful conviction of those responsible for illegal killing of South African Rhinos.

There were concerns that police tend to discourage people with certain critical information on the killing of Rhinos from coming forward, as instead of conducting proper investigations into allegations, they reveal the names of voluntary ‘informants’ to the potential suspects, putting the lives of those with information at risk. There were also allegations that traditional leaders are involved in Rhino killing, as those intending to enter parks to kill Rhinos for their horns, consult Inyangas for protection from law enforcement agents. Finally, a lady who was considering participating in illegal killing of Rhinos, confessed that she was impressed upon by the deliberations on Rhino killing and indicated that she would not participate in killing Rhinos for income.


4.3 INPUTS AND DISCUSSIONS FROM THE NORTH WEST

RHINO KILLING
The MEC, Ms M Tlhape indicated in the public hearings at the Tlokwe Local Municipality that her Department is dealing with conservation challenges in the Province, including Rhino protection. She further stated that they were looking at the concept of co-management as an avenue to beneficiation of conservation to broaden the constituency base for Rhino protection. Other participants in the public hearings provided the following suggestions to stem out Rhino killing:
• Develop a good network of informants at the grassroots to identify poachers.
• Involve the Department of Home Affairs in dealing effectively with undocumented foreigners, as their involvement in criminal activities, including Rhino killing is currently difficult to determine.
• South Africa should seek strategic partnerships for Rhino protection with like-minded nations and should consider severing diplomatic relations with those countries found to be complicit in the killing of Rhinos.
• The police should lay roadblocks at strategic positions in the vicinity of protected areas.
• Recruit honest immigration and police officials to manage South Africa’s borders to avoid bribery and hence prevent illegal entry of foreigners into the country.
• Consider dehorning of Rhinos.
• Install cameras at strategic points at the perimeter of parks to monitor illegal entry.
• Private game reserve owners did not know who to report incidents of Rhino killing on their properties: nature conservation authorities, police or the Hawks. Police at local police stations often directed them to the Hawks and vice versa.


6. PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE’S RESPONSES

8. OVERSIGHT VISIT TO THE KRUGER NATIONAL PARK
Reflecting on the passionate pleas by South Africans at the public hearings in the three provinces, the Committee decided to visit the Kruger National Park, the ‘Rhino killing hotspot’ to see for itself the reasons that make the protection of Rhinos in this flagship Park a huge challenge for SANParks and all participating strategic partners. It was in this context that the Committee flew to the Kruger National Park on 24th September 2014 to interact with SANParks and its board and other key role-players involved in Rhino protection, notably the police, especially the Special Taskforce; military (SANDF); Park rangers; and senior departmental staff, as SANParks is one of the entities of the Department of Environmental Affairs. Members of the Committee and the staff were accommodated at the Nkambeni Tented Safari Lodge in the Kruger National Park. It suffices to state that the Nkambeni Safari Lodge is a successful 50/50 partnership between the Mhaule Rural Community and private capital. It offers a unique rustic, eco-friendly accommodation with all the sights, sounds and smells of unadulterated nature in one of South Africa’s most beautiful wildlife areas, the Kruger National Park. It was obvious that the owners and/or the management of the Nkambeni Safari Lodge are committed to the preservation of pristine wilderness areas, as their tented suites were designed and built on wooden stilts to ensure minimum impact on the natural habitat of the area.

9. BRIEFING AND HELICOPTER FLIGHTS OVER THE INTENSIVE PROTECTION ZONE
Major-General, Johan Jooste, who heads the anti-poaching team in the Kruger National Park (KNP) presented the KNP Special Project, outlining the “Anti-Rhino Poaching Strategy”, which essentially is an overview of the approach to be used in curbing the ongoing rampant illegal killing of Rhinos in the KNP. The presentation identified greed and poverty as well as high demands for Rhino horn as primary factors driving the illegal killing of Rhinos; the anatomy of the illicit trade; and the characteristics and tools of trade of a poacher. The growing statistics of the killings, from 2012 to date; the number of weapons recovered from the Game Reserves United (55), KNP (26) and Mozambique (19); the tactical capabilities; and the environmental asset protection alliance also featured in the presentation. Jooste indicated that the KNP has been divided into three protection zones to ensure the successful protection of the environmental asset currently under threat. The Composite Protection Zone covers approximately the northern third of the Park, with the Joint Protection Zone in the middle and the Intensive Protection Zone falling in approximately the southern third of the Park. The Intensive Protection Zone makes use of various integrated technology-intensive enablers to ensure the maximum of Rhinos in this ‘stronghold’. It is over this Zone that the Committee and relevant stakeholders flew in helicopters on the 25thSeptember to interact with key Rhino protection alliance members to assess the adequacy of implementation of the “Anti-Rhino Poaching Strategy” on which the Committee was briefed earlier in the day.

The four helicopters that took off from the grounds of the Nkambeni Lodge landed at a lone Ranger Post, after flying over the scene of two Rhino carcasses, where it was stated that a Ranger Post normally has about 15-20 rangers. The sight of the carcasses in the Intensive Protection Zone clearly indicated the bald-facedness of poachers to get their hands on Rhino horns despite the immense risks, and in a sense highlighted the magnitude of the challenge that the SANParks and the alliance partners face in protecting Rhinos. Members of the Committee asked for clarity on accommodating certain rangers in tents while others occupied formal houses. SANParks and members of the Executive Management of the Department stated that the tents provided accommodation for the newly recruited rangers, but that plans were underway to upgrade all the ranger houses and other facilities in the Park to make it a liveable home for them and their families. Taking off from the Ranger Post, many Rhinos were sighted, buoying the spirits of the parliamentary delegation after having been earlier upset by the two carcasses. In fact, in an area of approximately 500-metre radius, about 15 to 20 Rhinos were sighted, which indicated that despite the huge challenge of Rhino killings, SANParks and the alliance partners were working hard at protecting the Rhinos. Many more Rhinos were seen in groups of twos, threes, fours and even more on the way from the Ranger post all way through until the delegation landed at the Military Outpost to pay a courtesy visit to the SANDF members at the Post. The Chairperson of the Committee, Hon Mthembu introduced the Committee and departmental staff to the SANDF members at the base. He deeply acknowledged their crucial role in protecting Rhinos in the Kruger National Park against illicit killing by members of criminal syndicates.

From the Military Output, the delegation landed at a Police Special Taskforce base in the Kruger National where the Commander of the Special Taskforce “Operation Rhino” received the delegation. Colonel Vermeulen ‘Rubber’ outlined the mandate of the Special Taskforce both broadly and specifically with respect to Operation Rhino in the Kruger National Park. It was stated that the Taskforce made additional deployment of resources on 1st September, including a team busy with the recruitment of informants at the time. The major concern highlighted by Colonel Rubber was that unless additional budgetary commitments were made, the budget of the Special Taskforce would allow them to remain in the Park only until the end of October 2014. The Chairperson of the Committee assured the commanding officers of the Taskforce that Parliament would certainly intervene, if requested by the Taskforce for them to remain in the Park as a critical alliance partner in Rhino protection. The Special Taskforce Commander stated that they would appreciate it, if the law could be changed to prosecute offenders who are found illegally in the Park from trespassing to something serious to deter poachers from entering national parks, in general. Finally, the delegation was shown a group of highly trained Rangers and their gear that could allow them to go on extended individual patrols of up to seven days before returning to their post or base. The Chairperson of the Committee thanked the members of the Special Taskforce for the good work that they were doing in protecting the nation’s natural heritage.
From the Special Taskforce base, the delegation flew and landed at the Southern African Wildlife College where the delegation had lunch, and were presented the training mandate of the College in the ever-changing African conservation landscape. The delegation was taken around to see the training profile of the College; its mechanical workshop; and also to see the selection process and training of Rangers for the Kruger National Park. The Chairperson of the Committee, Hon Mthembu asked the CEO of the College, Ms Theresa Sowry, to state how the College benefitted the surrounding communities. Ms Sowry responded that lack of benefits to surrounding communities had been the criticism of the College, and it was in that respect that the communities threatened to burn the College. However, she affirmed that this situation has changed recently as the College offers bridging courses and training ‘attachments’ that benefit members of the surrounding communities. The delegation left the College in the four helicopters to land at a site where a forensic investigation and/or autopsy was being conducted on a Rhino that was put down by a Ranger on the previous day upon the realisation that poachers had shot the Rhino and had removed the horn, yet the Rhino was alive, without any hope for recovery. The SANParks veterinary team working on the Rhino carcase were collecting information on the human DNA, Rhino DNA and also sought to determine bullet entry and exit points.

The delegation flew to the Air-wing Section of the SANParks to see the evolution of the Section over the years, and its future plans, including the establishment of a high-tech “Anti-poaching Coordination Room” that records, among other things, sounds of gun shots and mobility of law enforcement agents on the ground in real time. The parliamentary delegation flew back to the Nkambeni Safari Lodge.

Finally, the delegation was briefed at the headquarters of the Kruger National Park in Skukuza by SANParks officials, providing the overview of the Park, vision, mandate and economic impact. The Committee was presented the genesis of the Park and its development over the years, its scope and challenges, especially with respect to Wildlife-Human Conflict for which there is currently no legislation.
A significant part of the presentation dwelt on the Park’s enterprise and socio-economic development programme, highlighting existing contractual park agreements in the area, using the Nkambeni Safari Lodge and its operations, as an example. SANParks further indicated that overall one per cent of all gate fees paid for entry into national parks goes to local communities to facilitate provision of essential community services such as schools and their equipping with computers and water services, inter alia.


10. RECOMMENDATIONS
FOR PARLIAMENT

• Parliament, through this Committee, should engage the National Prosecuting Authority or other competent authority expeditiously to effect changes in relevant criminal legislation (e.g., the Trespass Act, 1959 [Act 6 of 1959]) in order to enable the prosecution of armed poachers and their accomplices caught in protected areas for more serious offences, rather than merely for trespass and illegal possession of a firearm to deter illegal entry into protected areas. In fact, this is a request made by the Police Special Taskforce (one of the key members of the Rhino protection alliance) currently based inside the Kruger National Park.
• Parliament should engage its Mozambican counterpart to sensitise them to the plight of South African Rhinos, with the aim of ultimately generating the necessary level of awareness and legislative activism in that country to effectively facilitate the prosecution of poachers on the Mozambican side of the border. There is indeed a need for South Africa to collaborate with Mozambique at different levels to assist cross-border investigations and prosecution.
• Similarly, Parliament, through this Committee should engage relevant parliamentary committees in consumer States to sensitise them to the challenges of Rhino conservation in our country, and that we need their cooperation and support to enable us to protect South African Rhino populations for the whole global community. Being public representatives, we would expect them to initiate progressive legislation in their respective countries to disallow illegal trade. They also have the potential to raise public awareness in their respective countries and communities by integrating Save the Rhino Campaign in their constituency work.
• Parliament should engage more proactively with relevant non-governmental organisations as well as community-based organisations to garner their support for Rhino protection and also to facilitate integrating their views in the fight against the illegal killing of Rhinos, and in dealing with broader development changes, including climate change.

FOR THE DEPARTMENT/SANPARKS

It is indeed appropriate for the Department to consider some of the suggestions that people made at the public hearings, particularly in terms of the relentless killing of Rhinos in our national parks and other forms of protected areas. The Committee supports the following recommendations and hence recommends that the Department and/or SANParks respond to them, and inform the Committee about the progress thereof, in the first quarter of 2015:
• There is a need for tighter security measures, eg fencing, on the Mozambique border, which were brought down in the spirit of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park. There were discussions between the Minister of Environmental Affairs and her Mozambican counterpart on this issue. It should not only be about erecting fences this time, but incorporating devices that could detect movement beneath the fences and hence alert law enforcement agents to respond appropriately. The Department should report on what has been done to put up the fences equipped with detectors.
• Tighter monitoring strategies on all vehicles entering and leaving the Kruger National Park should be implemented, irrespective of whether they belong to law enforcement agencies, considering that certain law enforcement agents and officials were implicated in Rhino poaching.
• There needs to be regular lifestyle audits among SANParks staff to ensure that none of them undermines the efforts being put into law enforcement to protect Rhinos.
• There is a need for a prompt response to the concerns expressed about the poor disposal of disposable nappies before they are washed into water courses and threaten the aquatic system or clog drainage systems, thereby posing both environmental and health risk in semi-urban areas. The Department should investigate and establish liability in this regard, considering that the National Environmental Management Act, 1998 (Act No 107 of 1998) requires the adoption of the principle of cradle-to-grave in dealing with waste management in the Republic.
• SANParks should furnish the Committee with a detailed breakdown of an average Ranger’s remuneration in the Kruger National Park in the light of the fact that certain Rangers have been implicated in the killing of Rhinos.
• The Department should ensure that reasonable efforts are made (by SANParks) to facilitate community-private partnerships (e.g., the Nkambeni Model) in buffer zones of national parks to create the sense of ownership of these parks in the communities who live in their proximity, and hence promote the protection of these environmental assets better. Existing private businesses operating within national parks should be conditioned to incorporate community dimensions where there are no feasible opportunities in buffer zones.