Human/wildlife - by Chrispin Inambao

From The New Era


SANGWALI – Recently, principal game ranger Crispin Makata rushed to Kasika after a group of villagers paralysed with fear raised the alarm about a hippo that was wreaking havoc and giving villagers nightmarish experiences by chasing their canoes.

Hippos often ram canoes and the force is so strong that canoes can disintegrate into tiny pieces like match-stick toy boats on impact, unceremoniously tossing occupants into the water.
His mission to Kasika, a village that teems with a wide array of wild animals such as buffalo, marauding elephants, territorial hippos that would not hesitate to ram into a canoe slicing in half any person coming into contact with its fearsome teeth, was also as a result of varying reports involving a rogue elephant and a nagging buffalo menace.

There were also unconfirmed reports of a monstrous crocodile that had caught and devoured a game guard who appeared to have lost his alertness in this remote wilderness.
Using a 3006, a high-powered rifle that serves as a weapon of choice for culling big game, he shot the injured buffalo, putting it out of its misery but he could not find the hippo or the crocodile or even the elephant.

Sooner rather than later, he may have to travel to Kasika if these villagers raise the distress call for him to go over to the game-rich area.

Makata’s mission personifies the so-called human/wild animal conflict that is so prevalent, particularly in settlements adjacent to conservancies in Caprivi and elsewhere.
And this again came to the fore last Saturday at Sauzuo where the Minister of Environment and Tourism Netumbo Nandi-Naitwah, accompanied by the chief control warden for the North-East Charles Musiyalike, officially inaugurated two conservancies.

Albert Zibiso, the chairperson of Balyerwa, one of the conservancies inaugurated at Sauzuo, bemoaned the fact that wildlife has increased tremendously in his area.

During the event, Dzoti Conservancy was simultaneously opened by the minister.
Zibiso acknowledged challenges abound though the conservancy has empowered his community as they occasionally receive game meat from trophy-hunted elephant, buffalo, hippo, kudu and other wild animal species for which hunting licences are often issued.

Zibiso bemoaned the fact that the “number one challenge is human/wildlife conflict, whereby our communities are losing their livestock, crops and even human lives”.
Despite the challenge posed by game, his community gainfully accrues benefits in the form of a hunting concession inclusive of elephant, buffalo, lions, leopards and hippos.

Since they forged a joint tourism venture with Wilderness Company, the benefits have been mutual as the community was able to establish a low-impact lodge with the remainder of the money from this revenue prudently being used to erect a new office.

About the newly inaugurated conservancy, Zibiso told an appreciative crowd that Saturday marked “a historic day for the community of Balyerwa Conservancy. We have been waiting for this day since the first day we heard our conservancy has been gazetted.”
“Again we managed to buy a 4x4 vehicle to help us with conservancy activities. Since 2006, we have managed to distribute N$180 000 to our members as cash dividends; and last but not least, unemployment has been reduced by employing a number of employees in the conservancy, the lodge and hunting camp,” Zibiso informed the minister and her delegation.

On her part, Nandi-Ndaitwah said Namibia’s conservancy legislation, the Nature Conservation Amendment Act of 1996, enables rural communities in communal areas such as Balyerwa and Dzoti areas to register conservancies for the purpose of sustainable utilization of wildlife through tourism and trophy-hunting.
“Our community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) is based on a number of underlying principles that have been developed through experience in community-based natural resource management in Southern Africa and elsewhere in the world,” she noted.

“CBNRM and conservancies in particular provide economic incentives by enabling land holders to earn income from wildlife, it gives land holders the management authority to take key decisions regarding the use of wildlife, it enables communities to establish management systems and institutions and reduces cost barriers that discourage sustainable management,” she informed the gathering that later lunched on eland.
“Our Swapo Party Government is fully committed to addressing the economic and social plight of our citizens, especially our rural communities as His Excellency President Hifikepunye Pohamba has indicated before,” she stressed.

On some of the concerns raised by Zibiso, she said trophy hunting is one way through which the sustainable utilisation of natural resources could be realised and that through the scheme, the two conservancies could derive beneficial gains.

Government has introduced the Human Wildlife Self-Reliance Scheme through which communities whose crops are devoured by hippos and elephants will have a means to offset crop and livestock losses resultant from lion and other predatory attacks.
This scheme will apply to both conservancy and non-conservancy areas that are on State land and on resettlement farms, but not on land that is privately owned.

Among the livestock covered under this scheme are cattle, goats, sheep, donkeys, horses and sheep, while crops include maize, millet, sorghum and vegetables.

At the same event, the minister advised conservancies to utilise the services of the Government Attorney through the ministry, revealing that some of the tourism operators that conservancies engage as partners tend to renege on contracts – and cheating conservancies out of monetary benefits. She warned that such uncouth operators would be exposed.

The two conservancies of Balyerwa and Dzoti are located between Mudumu and Mamili national parks, also known as Nkasa Lupala. Both are endowed with diverse wildlife.