In an unfathomable move late last week, the government of Botswana, which is home to an estimated 135,000 elephants, the largest elephant population on the continent, confirmed that it is considering lifting a ban on hunting wildlife.
This comes after President Mokgweetsi Masisi formed a special committee in June of last year to review and reconsider a hunting ban, which went into effect in January of 2014.
As per a post on the government’s Facebook page, at the time, the decision to temporarily ban hunting was reportedly “necessitated by available information which indicated several species in the country were on the decline” due to factors such as “anthropogenic impacts, including illegal offtake and habitat fragmentation or loss.’’
The report was presented by chairperson of the committee, Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Frans van der Westhuizen, who explained the committee was tasked to carry out consultations and then come up with recommendations on the hunting ban.
According to numerous reports, the committee recommended that the hunting ban should be lifted and that a legal framework should be developed that will “create an enabling environment for growth of safari hunting industry and manage Botswana elephant population within its historic range.” Ridiculous!
The controversial report also called for “regular but limited” elephant culling.
It is unfathomable to think that Botswana wants create an environment for killing innocent animals whose population continues to decline due to increased threats such as poaching and the illegal ivory trade.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) estimates that approximately 30,000 elephants are killed in Africa each year to supply the deplorable demand for ivory in Asian markets.
President Masisi is planning to review the report and take its recommendations into consideration.
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