Zanu PF Linked to Poaching Syndicate


Robert Mugabe's party has been linked to a complex, international syndicate that is specialising in the trafficking and poaching of Zimbabwe's wildlife.

According to a report published on Tuesday by the Daily News newspaper, the ZANU PF officials are part of an "intricate web of international trafficking in wildlife that has raised the hackles of animal lovers and wildlife conservationists."

The party's involvement has been revealed in the ongoing case against a group dubbed the "Musina Mafia," which is believed to be Africa's biggest rhino, elephant and lion poaching syndicate. Eleven members of the group, led by South African national Dawie Groenewald, were arrested last year and are facing charges of poaching, illegal gun possession and other crimes, in the border town Musina. Their case has been remanded until September.

According to the Daily News, Groenewald is the principal director of a hunting group called Out of Africa Adventurous Safaris, which was said to be facilitating the illicit sales of rare animals from Zimbabwe. This included the sale of 250 bateleur eagles to a sheikh in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2003. That sale raised international concerns because it was allegedly handled by ZANU PF linked Ed Kadzombe, whose own safari hunting group E.K. Safaris, was a partner with Groenewald's Out of Africa group.

Kadzombe also used to own the misleadingly named Zimbabwe Wildlife Advisory Council, a company known for its connections with Zimbabwe National Parks and Wildlife Authority officials. It was this company that organised the sale of about 160 sables from a private conservancy to South Africa, and at least another 40 to Saudi Arabia in 2003. The wheels of those sales were allegedly greased by another ZANU PF aligned official, Vitalis Chadenga, who was then the acting director of Parks and Wildlife. He is now the current director of the Authority.

Groenewald's company was then supposedly banned from operating in Zimbabwe in 2003. An investigation has however revealed that the outfit continued its Zim operations well into 2006, through its Zim partners.

The Daily News report goes on to state that in 2003, "animal rights activists started expressing concern that the rhino and elephant poaching crisis was being fueled by unscrupulous foreign safari operators in collusion with government ministers, wildlife management officers, elements of the security forces and ZANU PF henchman who had invaded the farms."

The slaughter of four endangered black rhinos in 2003 was once again linked to Groenewald's hunting group, with the help of his Zim partner, Kadzombe of E.K. Safaris, and a company owned by former Matabeleland North Governor and ZANU PF provincial Chairman Jacob Mudenda.

The Daily News report goes on to detail Groenewald's illicit dealings in Zimbabwe, under the cover of international hunting trips, which has lured hundreds of foreign hunters.

Johnny Rodrigues, the chairman of the Zimbabwe Conservation Taskforce, told SW Radio Africa on Wednesday that he hopes the trial against Groenewald in South Africa will have some kind of impact on the ongoing poaching crisis in Zimbabwe. But he raised concern about the involvement of top level government ministers.

"We have to ask if the law will take part in holding the high up ministers to account. The poachers work hand in hand with top officials and the Groenewald syndicate is not the only one," Rodrigues said.

The Taskforce official added that the impact on tourism in Zimbabwe is huge, because the number of animals in Zimbabwe has declined so steeply in recent years. And he warned that things are not going to improve.

"We are going to see things get worse in the coming months because it is peak poaching season. Unfortunately this little problem in Zimbabwe gets overlooked because there are much bigger issues happening in the world," Rodrigues said.

He added: "But until we get Western involvement in this crisis then we face the real risk of losing all these animals to extinction."

Hunters' footprints of destruction

BULAWAYO - A pending court case in the small South African border town of Musina is set to reveal an intricate web of international trafficking in wildlife that has raised the hackles of animal lovers and wildlife conservationists.

A search around the name of South African national Dawie Groenewald would be incomplete if it does not state that he is a former member of the South African Police Services (Saps) who was dishonourably discharged following an internal probe which found him guilty of selling stolen cars straight out of the recovered vehicle pound to criminals and unsuspecting citizens.

It is also known publicly that Groenewald is the principal director of Out of Africa Adventurous Safaris; a hunting outfit operating out of Old Days, a small outpost located about 100km from the border town of Musina. The company is also registered in the same name at Overland Park, Kansas in the United States.

OAAS, which also operates in Botswana, Kenya and Tanzania has a European business representative, based in Paris, France, trades as Adventurous Safaris on the worldwide web, offering safari hunts in the listed African countries.

But that is all there is to be known without burrowing deeper into the operations of the 43 year-old Groenewald.

He is the man arrested in October last year by the South African Police Hawks special investigations unit on allegations of being the brains behind what has come to be known as the Musina Mafia, an outfit which could turn out to be Africa’s biggest rhino, elephant and lion poaching syndicate.

Eleven members of the “Musina Mafia" led by Groenewald, his 35 year-old American born wife Sariette, professional hunter Tielman Erasmus, veterinarians Karel Toets, Manie du Pleiss and Marissa Toet were arrested last year for running a sophisticated rhino poaching syndicate.

Early this month, they were remanded to September when they appeared in court to face charges of poaching, illegal gun possession and many other associated crimes in the border town of Musina.

Busting the syndicate uplifted the spirits of South African conservation farmers and animal rights activists who have reasons to believe it was behind sophisticated poaching raids that killed even those rhinos deemed to be in the safest of the country's animal sanctuaries.

But an investigation conducted by the Daily News reveals a trail of the Groenewald operations that leads into Zimbabwe and exposes how he used his links with top Zanu PF officials in the murky safari hunting business to take full advantage of the utter chaos created by the often violent fast track land reform to carry out illegal rhino, elephant and lions hunts while earning even more illicit dollars from inflating the number of hunts on his legally acquired quotas.

That was until the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority noticed his activities banned him from operating in the country, first in mid-2003 and finally in September 2004.

On the contrary, evidence gathered by the Daily News shows that the ban did not stop Out of Africa Safaris and its international agents from conducting business in Zimbabwe until 2006, shortly before Groenewald was suspended from the South African Professional Hunters Association for conducting illegal hunts and abusing legally acquired hunting quotas.

From its base in, Kansas US, OAAS has over the years been able to attract scores of American hunters into the five African countries that still have rhino, elephant and lion territory — South Africa, Botswana, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

This suggests that OAAS came to the notice of Zimbabwean animal rights activists in 2003 when 250 bateleur eagles were exported to a falcon-breeder Sheikh in United Arab Emirates, the Middle East’s equivalent of the proverbial island plenty in a sea of grinding poverty.

According to a March 2003 report posted on wildlife website Africa Indaba, the international concern at the sale rose because it was allegedly facilitated by Zanu PF-linked Ed Kadzombe whose safari hunting business, E.K Safaris trades out of Number 30 Golden Stairs Avenue in Avondale, Harare.

At that time, it was known that EK Safaris was the Zimbabwe partner for OAAS and operated in many parts of the Gwayi Valley Conservancy and around the Sinamatela and Matetsi Five concessions near Victoria Falls where the company is also alleged to have facilitated the sale and translocation of 160 sables from a private conservancy in the Chinhoyi area to South Africa, allegedly with the help of Vitalis Chadenga, then acting director in the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority.

The South African Professional Hunters Association suspected that the OAAS, using its proximity to Zimbabwe, of facilitating the illegal deal which latter turned sour and became public when Ed Kadzombe, his South Africa buyer and the legal owner of the sable fought a court battle over the non-payment of money involved in the deal.

Business Day said the average cost of a live sable on the South African market at that time was R4 000, which placed the total cost of the animals involved at R93 000.

At the height of the international outcry over poaching in Zimbabwe in 2003, animal rights activists started expressing concern that the rhino and elephant poaching crisis was being fuelled by unscrupulous foreign safari operators in collusion with government ministers, wildlife management officers, elements of the security forces and Zanu PF henchman who had invaded the farms.

But the identities were to come in January 2003 when “well-organised” poachers slaughtered four black rhinos at Sinamatela camp.

Officially, no one was arrested for the offence but information supplied by national parks investigations sources suggests that a group of American hunters brought illegally into the country by the OAAS and allowed to operate through collusion with EK Safaris had carried out the massacre and left it with the tell-tale signs of a poaching scene.

The investigation also revealed that OAAS, with the help of Zimbabwean partners EK Safaris and Inyathi Hunters, a company jointly-owned by former Matabeleland North governor and Zanu PF provincial chairman Jacob Mudenda and Enio Di Palmer (who owns Bulawayo-based steel-manufacturing firm Steelforce), used their American representative Richard Putman of Seminole Safaris in the US state of Alabama to lure hundreds of American hunters to conduct illegal hunts in the Gwayi Valley Conservancy, Hwange National Park and the Matetsi Five Intensive Conservation Areas between 2003 and 2005.

In Zimbabwe, OAAS used its hunters-co-directors; assisted by EK Safaris and a former pilot with the Parks and Wildlife Authority.

Between 2003 and 2005, conservationists records on the tracking of vehicles which were seen driving into and out of poaching hot-spots created a consistent log on nine vehicles registered in the Northern Province.

“These companies, professional hunters and motor vehicles were hunting within the Gwayi Valley Conservancy where they were mainly concentrating their illegal operations on Goodluck Ranch, Chimwara Ranch , Railway Farm 35 and Sekumi Estates and Railway Farm 31,” reads part of the summary of the 2003 Gwayi Valley Conservancy Hunting Report.

The report also notes the illegal operations of professional hunters, in the black rhino zones of the Gwayi Valley Conservancy and Woodlands Estate in the Matetsi Five concession area.

The report also reveals that the intricate chain of American hunters, who were guests of Nyati Hunters, came through the OAAS assisted by Nyati Safaris American agents listed as operating from Nebraska, USA.

Investigations reveal OAAS moved out of the Gwayi Conservancy in early 2003 after being banned for carrying out illegal hunts but still used their Zimbabwean connections to set up other operations based in the resort town of Victoria Falls to continue operations until the final ban in September 2004.

The trail began again in June 2003 when a tracking collar taken off a lioness that was shot illegally was found in the homestead of Lot 2 Dete Valley Farm during the stay of a group of hunters from Hwange Safari Lodge, some of whom were from OAAS.

A 2003 national parks investigations surveillance log obtained by Daily News from parks intelligence details how South African vehicles which had their number plates removed arrived in the Gwayi Conservancy areas and an occupant of one the vehicles was reportedly seen bribing officials at the veterinary road block before driving into Goodluck Farm where illegal hunting blinds were later discovered to have been built around animal watering points.

“Four Americans were seen arriving in Victoria Falls. They were met by a South African operator who turned out to be OAAS and were overheard saying they wanted to shoot as much as possible.” reads part of the parks investigations report.

As the watch on OAAS operations continued, undercover investigators witnessed the arrival ofmore hunters arriving for illegal poaching. The investigators lost track of the hunters so some time but later located them and discovered they were foreigners on hunting expeditions under OAAS.

Based on these and other surveillance findings, the Parks and Wildlife Management Authority wrote OAAS the final notice of expulsion from Zimbabwe in early 2005.

Zimbabwe Conservation Taskforce chairman Johnny Rodrigues told the Daily News that the trial of the Musina Mafia remains an issue of interest to Zimbabwean conservationists who believe it will help lift the heavy lid on the politically connected rhino and elephant poaching syndicates which are still ravaging the parks.

OAAS left a big footprint of their illegal operations in Zimbabwe. They were very much behind the decimation of not just elephant and rhino, but the zebra population in the sanctuaries around West Nicholson in Gwanda for hides.

Our understanding is that most of these poachers take the skins to the OAAS taxidermist factory in Old Days where they are tanned and prepared for export to Europe while elephant and rhino products are sent on to the Vietnamese and Chinese syndicates which finance this carnage.

“We will be very happy to meet the Hawks and tell them what we know about OAAS and many other unscrupulous South Africans who got their riches from plundering the wildlife heritage of this country,” Rodrigues said.

surprise surprise

What is the reference for the first article??

Matt:

IIRC, it was recently posted on www.zimbabwesituation.com

SCI should be proud of themselves

Whould be interesting to know who those 4 american hunters are?

quote:

Originally posted by Matt Graham:
What is the reference for the first article??

Fixed it.

Certainly don't want to disappoint their allies.

So tell me something I havent known for 10 years. It is about time these guys stopped talking and put the hammer down. Oh wait, I forgot, innocent until proven guilty. Sorry but I have seen enough and heard enough even if only circumstantial to have made my mind up long ago. Crossed paths more than once with these people. Nothing good to say period.

One little bit I noticed in the article was the mention of Nyati Safaris based in Nebraska. I remember calling the outdoor adventures department of large sporting goods company based in Neb. about a hunt, and I think they mentioned this Nyati outfit hunting out of Matesi 5; the next year that hunt wasn't mentioned in their adventures catalog. Hmmm

quote:

Originally posted by donner:
Would be interesting to know who those 4 American hunters are?

donner,

Yes, I expect that would answer a lot of questions about the extraordinary measures SCI took to protect and promote Out of Africa.

Cable 68 - you are correct. There was a very close tie up betweeen a large US outdoor company and Nyati safaris co-owned by Di Palmer and Jacob Mudenda. Only when the US embassy began asking questions about what properties were the hunts taking place on did the US company stop booking clients to hunt on occupied farms.

That same Nebraska based company must not have been doing it's homework on outfitters; they are now being mentioned as booking agents for a company that had some shady dealings in Namibia and RSA.

quote:

Originally posted by Cable 68:

One little bit I noticed in the article was the mention of Nyati Safaris based in Nebraska. I remember calling the outdoor adventures department of large sporting goods company based in Neb. about a hunt, and I think they mentioned this Nyati outfit hunting out of Matesi 5; the next year that hunt wasn't mentioned in their adventures catalog. Hmmm

Originally posted by Ganyana:

Cable 68 - you are correct. There was a very close tie up between a large US outdoor company and Nyati safaris co-owned by Di Palmer and Jacob Mudenda. Only when the US embassy began asking questions about what properties were the hunts taking place on did the US company stop booking clients to hunt on occupied farms.

Gentlemen, you don't have to beat around the bush. Everyone knows the only big sporting goods company in Nebraska is Cabela's.

Their booking agency, Cabela's Outdoor Adventures, seems to have a reoccurring history of problems along these lines... Out of Africa, Nyati Safaris, Barry Burchell. Who else???

The president of Cabela's should be firing the idiot(s) responsible for getting Cabela's involved with these companies. If it were me, I would be very concerned about having the company's reputation drug through the mud because of these associations with these alleged poachers.

I find it surprising they don't seem to do much investigating of the people they are representing, or they wouldn't have these repeated incidents. With a reputable company such as Cabela's, just the hint of impropriety should not be tolerated with their hunting operators. Obviously, they can't have foresight into the future, but a policy of in-depth investigation would go far in heading off potential problems.

The Barry Burchell case is just the latest of these PR disasters:


Barry Burchell of Frontier Safaris: Namibian Linked to SA Wildlife Scam


Tracks leading to what is being described as the biggest case of wildlife violations in South Africa's history may be traced back to Namibia.

At the centre of the alleged wildlife scam is Barry Burchell, owner of the Eastern Cape hunting outfit Frontier Safaris.

Burchell, who is alleged to have regularly brought hunting clients to two farms he owns in Namibia, has been at the centre of a major international investigation into cross-border trophy smuggling since 2009.

According to sources, the investigation has been closed and a docket has been sent to South Africa's Prosecutor General for a decision on whether to prosecute Burchell.

Yesterday, an official at the South African Department of Economic Affairs and Environmental Affairs (Dedea) confirmed that the investigation is done.

"The docket will be sent to the Prosecutor General in the next week. We will see what they decide then," the source said.

The investigation into Frontier Safaris and Burchell focused on animal trophies hunted in Namibia and in South Africa and shipped to hunting clients in the United States.

Questions were initially raised in 2009 about the transport of the raw animal trophies to South Africa, the processing and the way in which Burchell shipped them back to clients.

The details of the wildlife violations are unclear, but claims have been made by former business partners that Burchell doctored labels and documentation related to the transportation of trophies.

Ben Bytell, Director of Parks and Wildlife Management in the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, last week confirmed that Namibian authorities assisted investigators to determine if Burchell was guilty of irregularities on Namibian soil.

"He has two hunting farms here where he hunted with clients. Then he would transport the trophies to South Africa to his taxidermist business. The trophies were processed there". Beytell said that the hunting done by professional hunters on behalf of Burchell in Namibia was done with "valid permits ... our investigation could not uncover any evidence of fraud on this side", he said.

Since 2009, several trophies have been confiscated by United States Fish and Wildlife authorities in a bid to uncover Burchell's alleged fraud.

According to several hunters in the US, their trophies were confiscated by the US Fish and Wildlife Service due to incorrect labelling that were allegedly intended to disguise the fact that many of the animals were shot in Namibia and not in SA, as claimed by Burchell.

In Namibia, Burchell's reputation has taken a beating in the past year, especially in view of the fact that his alleged criminal activities are "bad for Namibia's reputation as a hunting destination", according to a Namibian hunter.

The investigation is independent of an ongoing N$12 million defamation lawsuit Burchell has brought against a former business partner, Scott Anglin, a Texan.

Anglin retaliated towards the end of last year however, when he filed a lawsuit against Burchell and Cabela's Outdoor Adventures (COA), a major booking agent that worked closely with Burchell for almost ten years.

In his affidavit, filed in December 2010, Anglin accused Burchell of breaking hunting, conservation and export-import laws of Namibia, South Africa and the United States. Anglin stated that Burchell "knowingly, continuously and regularly" violated game regulatory laws of South Africa, and he alleged, of Namibia.