I went on a successful leopard hunt in Bots in 2005 in the Kalahari. Because we finished the hunt early, we moved to the outditter's concession bordering the Moremi game reserve in the Delta for video and photo work. While there we dropped into the nearby Wilderness Safaris camp for lunch on 2 occasions ( my PH was friends with the camp manager). My PH asked me not to mention that we were hunters to any guests we met. Fast forward 6 days and we are at the Maun airport getting ready for me to leave. We went into the small restaurant across the street for lunch. Inside we sat with and I was introduced to the 2 primary Wilderness Safari owners/founders and their wives, who were friends of my PH and Outfitter. Turns out they are Zim expatriate PH's who left when things started turning bad there. I asked them both if they missed hunting and both admitted that they did but they were making a LOT more money with Wilderness Safaris. It's not a big surprise that the company swings a big bat in Bots when you look at how many camps they have, complete with their own fleet of planes.....of course it must also help having Khama as a shareholder.

And meanwhile the elephant population is exploding, turning up where never seen before, running down fences on farms, destroying crops, etc.

Khama is a corrupt idiot..

Kama is one of the least corrupt, least idiotic leaders in Africa. There is a behind the scenes story there. Don Heath knew it, and one day it will come out.

Khama. At the risk of bordering on hate speech, may the inventor of spellchecker die painfully.

https://www.reuters.com/articl...ailama-idUSKBN1AR1MV



#INTELAUGUST 11, 2017 / 9:45 AM / 5 HOURS AGO

Bushmen evicted from ancestral land appeal to Dalai Lama ahead of Botswana visit

Rina Chandran
3 MIN READ


MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Bushmen in Botswana's Central Kalahari game reserve have written to the Dalai Lama, asking him to appeal to the government on their behalf for restoring their rights over ancestral lands during his upcoming visit to the African country.

Tibet's spiritual leader is expected to address a human rights conference in the capital Gaborone next week and also meet Botswana's president Ian Khama.

In a letter dated July 31, Bushman spokesman Jumanda Gakelebone asked the Dalai Lama to urge Khama "to listen to us and respect our rights".

Hundreds of Bushmen were evicted from their ancestral homelands in the name of conservation, and moved into government camps between 1997 and 2002, following the discovery of diamonds in the Kalahari desert.

Botswana's High Court ruled in 2006 that more than 1,000 San Bushmen had been wrongly evicted and should be allowed to return.

But the government continues to enforce a permit system, which rights group Survival International has compared to apartheid-era pass laws.

The Bushmen are also accused of poaching when they hunt to feed their families, and face arrests and beatings under a nationwide hunting ban, rights groups say.

"We still cannot live on our lands freely. The government makes it so that children must apply for permits to visit their parents when they become adults," Gakelebone said in the letter published by Survival International.

"Yet (the) government is happy for mining to take place on our ancestral land."

Calls and an e-mail to the Dalai Lama's office were not returned on Friday.

The United Nation's special representative on cultural rights in 2014 questioned why the San were evicted to conserve wildlife while diamond mining has been allowed to continue.

"No independent observer believes the Bushmen pose any kind of risk to the country's wildlife," said Survival International Director Stephen Corry.

"But they're still prevented from hunting, and still being forced to get permits just to see their relatives."

The visit of the Dalai Lama, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, has irked China, a major investor in Botswana, which regards him as a dangerous separatist.

"We are the first people of the Kalahari. We are the ones who have protected this land and the animals that live there," the letter said.

Reporting by Rina Chandran @rinachandran; Editing by Astrid Zweynert @azweynert. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, property rights, climate change and resilience. Visit news.trust.org to see more stories.

Yep, Barry, sure sounds like Khama( an investor in Wilderness Safaris) is an impartial, non corrupt leader with no dealings with the Chinese. And of course the Chinese are well known defenders of African wildlife.

Ian Khama lacks common sense, and worse, has been educated just enough to expand his head, but not his understanding.

There is nothing worse than a wrong-headed, self-important leader who has been co-opted by expert manipulators, and who is oblivious to his own stupidity.

That is Ian Khama, IMHO.

quote:

Originally posted by Barry Groulx:
Kama is one of the least corrupt, least idiotic leaders in Africa. There is a behind the scenes story there. Don Heath knew it, and one day it will come out.

Barry, I beg your pardon on that one! Not only was Ian Khama raised largely by the Blackbeard family - I spent 12 wonderful days with Ronnie Blackbeard hunting the Chobe Enclave in 2008 for elephant, and he told me all about little Ian Khama. But Mr. Khama is a major share-holder in Wilderness Safaris / the largest photographic safari company in Africa. And of course, where better to have photo camps strewn about than the Okavango Delta in Bots?????

Khama told Ronnie Blackbeard, at Ronnie's, mom's funeral to find another line of work - as he was shutting down hunting as soon as he could. Khama was getting huge money from very wealthy / outside anti hunting sources. Don't be fooled - he's just like the rest of em. Its all about the money - corruption!!!!