Africa Wild

When numbers are so big what happens becomes even more impressive

Something weird

Uproar over plan to litter Botswana’s Chobe National Park with lodges


Chobe National Park in Botswana, a 50km wildlife corridor of viewing bliss. (Photo: Supplied)

By Don Pinnock | 13 Apr 2022

Chobe National Park’s goose that lays the golden egg of Botswana tourism is under threat of being killed by eight 75-bed lodges planned for its prime riverfront. If it goes ahead, wildlife people pay to see will most likely have fled.
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After entering Chobe National Park from nearby Kasane, you’re soon in one of the most iconic places in Africa — a wide, lazy river lined by classic savanna woodland. Towards evening, the elephants arrive without fail, sometimes hundreds at a time, to drink and frolic in the cool water. It’s a 50km wildlife corridor of viewing bliss.

On those very banks, Botswana’s Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism has invited citizen-owned companies and consortiums to submit “expressions of interest” to lease eight lodge sites of three hectares spaced two kilometres apart. Each could cram about 600 tourists and supporting staff — and add an estimated 70 game drive vehicles — into the park. At the moment, movement within the park is strictly prohibited after 6pm.

The move is being hotly contested by local residents, both because of its impact on the pristine area and because it appears to be fraught with illegalities. Opposition MPs have also raised objections in parliament. At this stage, the ministry appears unmoved and has not replied to questions.

A group named Concerned Stakeholders Chobe District, consisting of tourism groups and NGOs, has filed a Letter of Objection to the government, saying the move is a threat to both wildlife and the tourism industry.

“Wildlife corridors will be impinged on and human-wildlife conflict will increase,” it said, “necessitating mitigations like fences.” This would lead to dangerous encounters in an area already under severe crowding pressure.

“The impact of increasing an already high traffic volume by an estimated minimum of 70 game viewing vehicles will be devastating to the quality of the tourist experience and will certainly change wildlife behaviour and distribution.


There is an uproar over a plan to litter the Chobe National Park waterfront with lodges. (Photo: Supplied)

“It is our opinion that no amount of mitigating measures can be undertaken to offset the disastrous impact that ONE riverfront lodge would have, let alone EIGHT!”

It questioned whether a 75-bed lodge could be built on the three hectares allocated.

“Any entity that has built a lodge in a wildlife area will attest to the amount of space required to develop the establishment. Workshops, solar farms, staff quarters, wastewater plants and miscellaneous support infrastructure consumes a lot more space than tourist communal areas. Three hectares (30,000m²) is ridiculously insufficient.”

These lodges, it says in the letter, would create long-term, perhaps irrevocable, damage to a sensitive ecosystem, with impacts including deforestation, pollution, erosion and road degradation, as well as detrimental impacts on wildlife.

The proposal was “flashed” up on the government website and quickly removed.

“The rushed time frame offered on that brief public notification to participate in the EOI [Expression of Interest],” states the Letter of Objection, “was unrealistic and provides ample speculation as to the legality and inclusiveness of the process.

“It begs the question: had select participants already been established/offered the chance to tender before the all-too-brief public notice was made?”

A letter of objection was also sent to the government by the Botswana Hospitality and Tourism Association.

“The Chobe National Park is already experiencing significant environmental pressure and congestion,” it said. “This has been recognised since the early 1990s with the publication of the 1993 Chobe National Park Management Plan and, more recently, the 2000 Chobe National Park Management Plan. Both stipulated that no new lodges should be developed within Chobe National Park.”

Neither Concerned Stakeholders nor Botswana Hospitality have received a government response to their letters, or invitations for discussion and clarification.

Even the local Chobe offices of the Department of Environment and the Botswana Tourism Organisation were unaware of the “expression of interest” until approached by Concerned Stakeholders.

When challenged in parliament about the Chobe move, Speaker Phandu Skelemani claimed it was in line with the USAID-funded 2020 Management Plan. The consultants who drew up the plan dispute this and say it may have been illegally altered after being signed.

According to Africa Geographic, consultant Lin Cassidy requested that the names of her team be removed from the latest approved plans, saying “we have learned that versions of [these] management plans… that we submitted to the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (DWNP) and which were accepted and approved by DWNP may have been changed since our submission and completion of our contract”.

The government, however, denied that any objections had been received by the consultants, despite their letter being publicly shared.

Speaking in parliament, Minister of Wildlife and Tourism, Philda Kereng, said her ministry was allocating the Chobe sites without requiring environmental impact assessments “with the aim to fast-track initiatives geared towards allocation of land in Botswana and ultimately ensuring that Batswana have access to land.

“We want to increase the participation of Batswana in tourism, such as in Chobe National Park, where we are opening concessions or space for them to get into,” she said.

However, Eco Tours director Othusitse Ranko said it seemed that only companies which are operational and own a tourism-related business are favoured or afforded an opportunity to express their interests in the sites. They would also need to show proof that they already have the funding available. To build a new lodge costs millions of pula, something only the biggest companies could afford.

In a complaint filed with the ministry, Ranko said it was “our considered view that the above is discriminating to individuals and companies, especially the youth who haven’t had an opportunity before to own and operate tourism-related facilities and who by default won’t have the required tourism licence”.

Apparently, opening up pristine parks to concessionaires will not be confined to Chobe. In parliament, Minister Kereng said the Chobe call for expressions of interest was part of a range of initiatives by the government to empower citizens to enter the tourism industry. She said 41 tourism concessions were being set aside in Kasane and Kazungula.

“Similar plans will take place in the Okavango Delta, the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park and other national parks, and we will be running these programmes at the same time to help increase citizen participation.”

Since coming to power in 2018, the government of President Mokgweetsi Masisi has been constantly accused of using the country’s famous wildlife to buy votes.


The Botswana government has reintroduced trophy hunting. (Photo: Supplied)

Trophy hunting, banned under the previous administration, was opened to foreign hunters (part of Masisi’s election media campaign was funded by US hunting associations). Even one of the most important transboundary wildlife corridors used by migrating elephants dispersing into Namibia, Angola and Zambia (NG13) is now a hunting concession. A huge migrating bull was shot there this month by a trophy hunter.

It was also recently announced that the government would provide “start-up” wildlife stock to encourage locals’ participation in agro-tourism and wildlife farming. However, fencing and feeding wildlife in limited areas on Botswana’s dry terrain would be way beyond the means of any citizen smallholder, so the benefit would go to large landowners only.

With the country clawing its way out of the pandemic sinkhole, moves that downgrade wilderness in favour of votes have the potential to harm an already stressed tourism product.

It could also further tarnish the country’s hard-earned conservation reputation damaged by trophy hunting. DM/OBP

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Wild show-stoppers — baby beasts and birdlife in breathtaking Chobe


Elephants cross the river as a boat of tourists watch. (Photo: iStock)

By Lorraine Kearney Follow 25 Apr 2025

Though the green season in northern Botswana means having to deal with tall grass and fewer waterhole sightings, it also means all manner of baby animals are being born. Cue cuteness overload.
It almost started in disaster. My Proflight Zambia plane from Cape Town was landing in Livingstone and going on to Lusaka. This I did not realise, and I sat blissfully ignorant in my seat, headphones on, while the flight attendants, and all the other passengers, waited for me to get off – the only person disembarking. They eventually tapped me on the shoulder and turfed me out. Just in time.

Bags collected, I was off to The David Livingstone, my lodgings on the banks of the Zambezi River. Confession time: the Zambezi, at any point from start to Mana Pools, is one of my favourite places in the world.

So I was as happy as a clam when my cruise on the Lady Livingstone set off that afternoon. Nothing like jumping in immediately, almost as you hit the airport.

River cruise

We dawdled along the river towards Mosi-oa-Tunya, as the Victoria Falls are known in the local languages of Leya and Lozi.

I sipped on a Mosi, as one must in these parts, and watched elephants, hippos, crocs and plenty of beautiful birds.

Later that night, I was struck down with an unwelcome virus and I took to my bed for two days. It was not an auspicious start to my month-long wander through the massive Kaza region, the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, the largest conservation area in the world. It stretches from Angola and Namibia in a wide band all the way through Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe.


Warthogs emerge from the grass during the green season. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)


Mosi beer on the Lady Livingstone. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)

It’s a marvellous project that is opening up ancient animal migration routes, boosting conservation through community participation and working to mitigate human-wildlife conflict.

The Botswana leg

My next stop was delayed a day, but eventually I set off for Chobe in Botswana, across the Kazangula Bridge. It has knocked several hours off the journey, and the one-stop border crossing has made it all even easier.

Although the bridge was only opened in 2021 to replace the Kazungula ferry, there are several potholes forming already and banks of tar growing ever-larger as the huge, overloaded trucks barrel along in temperatures so high you could fry an egg on the pavement.

If you have not been – and you should go – be prepared to walk through the disease control trays or disinfection mats as part of Botswana’s biosecurity measures to prevent the spread of foot-and-mouth disease, with all your shoes in your bags, before you’re allowed into the country.

Vehicles have to drive across a similar mat or dip. They take this seriously. Foot-and-mouth affects cloven-hoofed animals and it can wipe out bovine populations, including buffaloes, which are a virus reservoir.


Elephants crossing, just two of many seen on the trip. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)


A road sign in Chobe. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)

Chobe is one of those bucket-list places if safaris are your thing. And it has been ever since Liz and Dick (Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton) got married in the magistrate’s office in Kasane, the local frontier town, half a century ago.

It was the second time they married, and they honeymooned in the national park, putting the month-old Chobe Game Lodge on the world map.

It was not my intention to visit Chobe on the legendary lovers’ golden anniversary; indeed, I was entirely ignorant of this historical fact when I made my plans. But it made me happy when I learnt of it.

Chobe sightings

The animal sightings in Chobe National Park are show-stopping, and I was prepared to be wowed, even if it was green season.

For those not in the know, green season is the wet season, when the grass is high and sweet, the trees filled with leaves and buds and water is everywhere. The Zambezi teak are in bloom, their pink-purple flowers strewn across the landscape.

Animals can be more difficult to spot, because they don’t need to come to waterholes and they can browse deep in the bush.

But – and this is a big one – babies are also being dropped and the birdlife is fantastic.

I saw a baby hippo trotting after its mom, so newly born it was the size of my small dog. Still wobbly on its legs, all rotund belly and cuteness.

Sure-footed little impalas bounced after their mothers while their older brothers practised their fighting skills. The afternoon air rang with the million-strong cicada choir, also looking for mates, and everywhere was the sound of birds.


A young elephant crossing the Chobe River. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)


A red-billed oxpecker on a female impala at the Chobe National Park in Botswana. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Baby elephants also made my heart sing, just discovering their trunks and not quite sure what to do with them. (Did you know infant ellies suck their trunks like infant humans suck their thumbs?) They mock charge, their little ears flapping madly, and play happily in the mud.

Elephants are truly awe-inspiring. The entire herd raises the babies, protecting them and helping the mothers. Babies are precious and adored. We could learn a thing or two from elephants.

Messing about in boats

The Chobe River flows year round from its source in the Angolan Highlands all the way to the Zambezi. And it makes for some fantastic safari adventures.

Many lodges have their own river boats, but there are also independent boats you can hop on. A small boat is best for a sunset cruise. It’s peaceful, quiet and gives you the best animal sightings.

I went twice, because if you can, you should. Every trip on a safari is different. I’ve seen the Big Five in the first 10 minutes, and no mammals at all in four hours. There are, however, always birds and bugs, two of my favourite things.

My first river cruise was washed out by an epic thunderstorm. We were not 15 minutes down the river from our mooring when the sky opened and water sluiced down in sheets. We’d forgotten to pack the rain ponchos (who would remember them on a clear and sunny day?) and there was much frantic covering of cameras with whatever could be found.

An elderly English gentleman, unperturbed, sipped on his gin and tonic under the flimsy tarpaulin and toasted the “jolly adventure”. He was a tonic himself.

We saw nothing but raced back to the shore, to try again another time.

I was back the next day, this time an altogether more successful safari. Crocodiles lolled in the sunshine along the banks, or floated menacingly on the water.

We tootled around Sedudu Island, watching the herons, African fish eagles, kingfishers, carmine bee-eaters and African darters drying their feathers on their perches. There are more than 450 bird species on the river.

On the river banks, hippos lumbered around. They come out of the water during the day here, although they don’t ever wander far and are quick to splash back in if they feel threatened.

And elephants. I saw hundreds of elephants, next to the river, in the river, browsing on the trees, grazing on the grasses. All fat and looking happy.


Hippos on the Chobe River (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)


An African darter dries its wings in the sun after plunging into the water. (Photo: Wikimedia Common)

Big cats

In the green season there are also fewer people to clutter up sightings.

Even so, at a lion sighting one early morning, my game driver was joined by eight others. I get it; lions are the king of the jungle for good reason. Their low growl hits you with a primal fear. Bone-chilling. Freeze or flee. But still, I felt claustrophobic and a bit cheated.

But we’re on a game drive and all is calm and fascinating. I’ve tracked lions on foot in the Waterberg in South Africa and it’s an entirely different affair. As you can imagine.


A lion sighting attracted many tourists. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)


Cruise before a storm. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)


Birds perch in front of Sedudu Island. (Photo: Lorraine Kearney)

There are also cheetahs and leopards, and smaller cats like caracal, but they are tricky to spot.

You can do a Chobe day trip from Livingstone or Victoria Falls, and busloads do.

To be clear, buses do not ply the bumpy dirt roads of the national park. Everyone gets off at Kazungula Bridge or at the entrance, and on safari game vehicles. Or you can opt for several days in the area; there are plenty of lodges inside the park’s borders, and even more around Chobe.

I stayed at Elephant Valley Lodge in Lesomo Valley and at Jackalberry Chobe on the beautiful river bank.

Botswana is a unique place. IYKYK (if you know you know), as the kids say. DM

The writer was hosted by Africa’s Eden and her flights were courtesy of Proflight Zambia. Accommodation was courtesy of The David Livingstone Safari Lodge, Elephant Valley Lodge and Jackalberry Chobe.

Nice!

Far too many elephants there, though...