On Saturday, 4th October, Mrs Edna Molewa addressed the crowd at the Pretoria GMFER. I was asked to give the opening speech. I noticed Mrs Molewa taking notes during the speeches, and when it was her time to speak, she threw her prepared speech away. My thanks to Earl Oosthuizen of Face2Frame, for providing the original audio clip for me to transcribe into text. Please acknowledge SOR and Earl as your source should you copy this to post elsewhere. Unplugged: Mrs Molewas Speech. 2014-10-04. SPEECH BY MINISTER EDNA MOLEWA, GLOBAL MARCH FOR ELEPHANTS, RHINO AND LION, PRETORIA. First of all, I would like to take this opportunity to very heartily thank all of you for being here. As we are not here for the speeches, but to deliver a message, a very powerful message, I dare say, that to all those who are actually culprits in this area, that we are behind you and we will follow you until you are no longer there, exist. I would also like to thank the organizers of this March, not only this one by the way, those who have organized across the world. In South Africa, we have marches in Bloemfontein, in Cape Town – some of my colleagues are there, working with yourselves – as very concerned people. We do like to have concerned people, like yourselves, because indeed, it is for this reason that we’re saying (?) “Not on our watch, not on my watch.” We’re saying “Not on our watch, not on my watch.” You must leave them alone. I am sure the syndicates can easily run behind and in front and so on. So you all have to be here and that’s what I see here today, that we are here to do that and to say that. We have acknowledged your document, the demands, and I would like to assure you that we will look at these demands very carefully; we will not look at them away from you. We will obviously have to get together, as the previous speaker indicated (opening speech), that there is that distance, and I want to ask that, as the collective that’s here, perhaps it’s necessary that we record our existing organizations also, with the Department of Environmental Affairs. The reason why I’m saying so, is because I do know and I am aware, that my colleagues at various levels, and including myself, do meet with some of the organizations, but there are ongoing meetings, constant, periodic, that are with stakeholders. And therefore, it is necessary that, as we meet with representatives of stakeholders, some of the organizations are not left behind. That’s quite important because there is probably that case existing now, so that we are not meeting. I’m making this plea because we don’t want to have anybody remaining behind. We have to act together, we have to be together, in all our thinking, because some of the ideas that may come out of you, none of us may be remembering or thinking about, as we meet with the current stakeholder forum, that we are utilizing or working with. I just want to, very briefly, share with you some of the measures that we are taking right now and of course, I do know that this may not be quite conclusive, as I may have omitted some of the very minor, or that may be important, but small details, that may be important, in the measures that we are undertaking right now. And the measures that we are undertaking, is on behalf of South Africa and on behalf of the whole world. We are not purporting to be cleverer than all of you, but we think that these measures are very, very important and they need to be taken. Firstly, on the elephants: For the past three days, here in South Africa, we had a meeting of all elephant range states, meeting at the Kruger National Park, and the meeting was convened by South Africa. Even though we do not have a lot of poaching happening, three is too much, by the way. We lost three elephants this year. It’s too much, but those who are like Zimbabwe who are losing 50 at a time from poisoning, - that happened recently - Mozambique, and so on, they have much higher numbers. They were here in South Africa, at the Kruger National Park. What happened there was to put together what we call The Elephant Plan, Management Plan, and this Management Plan takes into cognizance, and very much ahead of every other thing that we are doing as a continent in this arena, the issues of securing and security and also dealing with these poachers who kill our elephants for their ivory. So the plan was also being relooked into, reviewed, and it is a plan that is not being looked at for the first time. It was put in place a few years ago and yesterday, South Africa declared R1-million, made available, to support that African Plan to deal with the management of rhino, including fighting this poaching on the Continent. We previously, as South Africans, and as South Africa, contributed to this Elephant Fund that was agreed to be set up. It’s not a very big amount, but it is something, R250 000 that was donated and contributed by South Africa to these nations, where poaching of elephant is very high. So we are part of the plan, we are working with the Continent and we will continue to work with the Continent. Currently we are chairing that Elephant Fund at the Continental level. We do say that it is important that we work much harder. So anyone of us who is here today with more ideas, any idea is better than nothing. We are prepared to listen, we will evaluate, with you, all the ideas that we are putting on the table. And obviously act upon them with yourselves, as well as with the entire Continent of Africa. The second area I want to get into is this issue, the vexing issue of rhino. I do note that in the memorandum you’re saying: “we are concerned” and I think it is important that maybe we convert this concern to something that says: “we actually spend sleepless nights”. The words “we may be concerned” could sound like a bit of an understatement. We are spending sleepless nights with regards to the level of poaching of rhino in South Africa. We come from very humble beginnings, where here in South Africa, in the 50’s, we had just under 50 rhinos at Hluhluwe-iMfolozi and because of our management practices that are so good, we were able to increase our population to the numbers that our children and our young ones were talking, to 21 000. Now we have about 18 000, from under 50. No country in the world has got these numbers. We are followed by Namibia with just around 3 000. So I am saying, we are the only reason why rhino exist in the world, and we say so with pride. If it wasn’t because of SA, there wouldn’t have been rhino in the whole world, probably in Namibia, but yes, the numbers are here, and I’m sure the statistics are there, out there for you to look at; but as we say this, this is the reason why we must say: “not on our watch.” We are not going to look at anybody, no matter who you are, how wealthy you are, to actually decimate our rhino populations. We’re not going to do that. And therefore, I want to share with you some of the measures that you may, probably, not have been aware of, because I do notice that in the memorandum you’re also referring to some of those issues. There are several categories that I am going to talk to. I start first with the legal front. We deemed it fit, that from a hunting perspective, which is currently a legal operation in South Africa, we look at the laws that regulate that field, and indeed, we found several loopholes and we closed those loopholes. There may be some remaining; I’m talking about the legal operation in front. We closed those loopholes, there may be some remaining. Let us share with you as we meet, those areas where we have identified, as some of the areas that may require the closing of loopholes. One of the loopholes that you may be aware of, that is quite popularly known, is to disallow and eradicate completely, this thing called pseudo hunting. Those people within our own National permitting system: people used to just sit somewhere in Boksberg, in your nice bikinis, in front of a swimming pool; somebody applies for a hunting permit for you and it comes out in your name and a permit is given. You are there, you don’t even know how a rifle looks like in your whole, entire life, and a permit is given under your name. Somebody takes this permit, enters our bushes and goes and kills our animals. In your name, you come back, pose next to our lovely icon, dead, and now saying “I have, I’m the one who actually hunted this.” We found those loopholes, we closed them. We now require every hunt to be followed by a qualified ranger. We actually have said to those who those permits were coming from, and I must say, in this instance, the majority of those permits were coming from Vietnam, as a country, and I am not isolating Vietnam, because there are several countries on the East Asian market, countries that we are working with, East Asian area, which we are working with. We said to Vietnam, we want to have your register of your Outfitters. If we don’t have it, none of your people is going to be permitted to come into South Africa to do any hunting. Guess what happened: the permits that we had, over 400 permits; it was over 300 permit applications, at some station one year, reduced to three. One, two, three, we received only those three applications, which meant that something was not right. Something was happening; probably that’s where those pseudo hunters were applying to. Now that loophole has been closed. Vietnam, and all other countries, all are expected to give us a record of their Outfitters who are qualified. If they are not on that list, none of them comes to South Africa. That’s the other area that we closed. We also said that we need to ensure that all our operators or our game farmers, some of whom are actually in this business; we know that it is not everybody who is a Son of God, properly. Those who are a little bit crooked, who are born, they exist, here; that we need to work hard on ensuring that even that area is dealt with and it is addressed by monitoring, evaluation, and so on and so on. So that’s it, there may be other areas that I may have left out. I now want to come to the security area. We have, after a long time, of pleading and working, got SANDF, South African National Defence Force, back on the borders of Mozambique, after a long time of pleading. They are now there, on the borders of Mozambique, but the biggest problem that we have, is that on the other side of the border of Mozambique, the security is not as tight as it should be, and this is one area that we are working with, in Mozambique, to get them to increase security on their side. So it is not only policing on the South African side that happens, all the security on South African side. We have now ensured that we support SANDF in getting more money from Treasury. Two years ago, they were in danger and had no budget. We went to plead with Treasury and knocked and worked on business cases; they were given additional money, that’s why they’re still operating. We have opened an Ops Centre, Operation Centre, a fully fledged one with all helicopters and whatever that are necessary, as and when they are needed, inside the Kruger National Park, to operate, and that Centre started to operate on the 1st of September this year. It’s to do evidence, if poaching has happened; they’ve got to be on the ground and take samples and all sorts of necessary measures, to actually ensure that we catch those who have been poaching. In (?Early) Centre, as is said by Commissioner Phiyega, that at any time when we call upon them, all sorts of old helicopters and all sorts of armed equipment that needs to be at the Kruger, or at a spot at a time, those are there. We have also been told and informed, that the Centre also deals with issues of, well, let me just put it this way, there actually is a Special Operations Committee, a Special Operations Team that is led by one of the most famous and very important Security Persons, who are able, in this country, to follow some of the crimes and actually bring those criminals to book. That person is General (Mung), I think (Mung), he is heading that team that is working at the Kruger National Park. So there is a Special Force operating in Kruger National Park, deployed by the Security cluster. We have also, from our own side, increased the rangers, numbers of rangers, and I am sure some of you are wondering, why am I talking about rangers when I talk about security? Because the ranger community is not to be about security. The rangers are there to deal with conservation functions, but it is such a pity that here, now, as we are facing this big battle, we are now compromising and getting our rangers now, to be on the battle lines and actually help on that front, and we have increased the numbers; we have trained them, they have been trained by the School of Rangers International. We have now deployed them; we have given them a new uniform. They are working under supervision of General Jooste, a retired army person, who’s there to guide them and they have really put a plan that is very impressive, in the Kruger National Park. It is just that sometimes, some of these things take quite a while for us to realize some desired results. But for me, there is something that I see beginning to happen in the Kruger National Park. Since, General Jooste has actually dissected that Kruger National Park, because that is where we have the highest poachers; dissected it into segments, and ensured that for every portion, there is a special kind of suitable operation that happens in those. This Centre I am talking about is going to make an area, especially the Southern part, a no-go zone for any poachers who have ambitions, because that area is where the poachers go in their numbers. I also just want to indicate that the Intelligence Services is being increased, and has been increased of late. There are technologies that we are examining. We are engaging the Department of Transport, because what I saw here, it was an unmanned vehicle, a little one. We want to introduce those, but the Department of Transport has said this to us: we need to maintain certain heights for the unmanned vehicles, because that area is where the aeroplanes go towards landing and there might be accidents if we are not careful. So we are working with them to finalize the heights at which the unmanned vehicles may be operating and others may not, the aeroplanes operating. And of course, these are very important technology issues for us, to be able to see and to look over, what is happening there. Of course there are concerns, I have to say this as well, that some of the technologies that are not really, quite properly, vetted, may bring about other unintended consequences of looking into your areas. I was in London just recently, coming from the UNGA, the United Nations General Assembly, and I read a paper wherein people in London, their nationals there, are saying technology has advanced so much, that people are actually looking at you inside your bedroom; I’m sure you have read about it. Where the poisoning of the horn was being investigated, that experiment, unfortunately didn’t go too well, because, I think it wasn’t really working to an extent that people can be deterred by the poisoned horn. We were funded by the National Lotteries, which we are very grateful for, for that experiment to be done but unfortunately it didn’t. If it had worked, I’m telling you, we would have poisoned every horn of every rhino in this country the next day. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Now we are also doing the DNA sampling for all prosecutions, but also for being able to detect whatever needs to be detected, from a security point of view. We are looking at many other technologies that are currently being vetted. We are, at an International level, working with the International community. We have signed a MoU with Mozambique and this is what allows us to go to Mozambique and say: “Bring security on your side, Mozambique. If you don’t, we will actually lift our fence that used to be there between us and Mozambique.” So we are being led there, as the speaker before me said, that we will be led by the Defence Department. We are waiting for them to be ready to take us again there, to go and engage Mozambicans. I wish some of you could have been there in the last meeting that we had with Mozambicans. It was real gloves off, if you understand what gloves off means, because they were saying to us that “you are shooting our people.” We said to them, we don’t see people, we see criminals in front of us and if it is a criminal, we shoot. We also are doing issues of awareness in various countries; in Mozambique, in wherever we have got a MoU with those people. In Vietnam, the Vietnamese were already here three times. They are doing what you did here, working with social media, to bring awareness to the people in Vietnam; that this thing that they say, that the rhino horn does, it doesn’t really do it. Whatever it is what they call it. So the people, young generation, are going through social media to educate their people. We don’t know the language of Vietnam, that’s why we have to work with them, so that they work in their own country. We also have, to me, to tighten security. In our MoUs we have, we are saying, we have detected in some countries, their laws are very weak and therefore we can’t make our laws strong and hope we will win if their laws are very weak. So in Mozambique, for instance, people had a slap on the wrist when they were caught with a whole neck of a rhino. And now, they have tightened their laws, they have heavy sentences in there as well, amongst other things. We are also ensuring that this is people centred; we are doing research jointly with those other countries that are willing to work with us. And of course China is one of those. Those countries that we have identified: China, Vietnam, Laos Republic, which we are signing with and beginning to work with this year, Thailand; now we learn that Czech Republic is also another problem that has started; we will go to them, obviously and we will leave no stone unturned; to do our work, we need to work with those countries. We are also at another front, working with the communities. We have detected that we have had some weaknesses here in South Africa indeed, because our members of a community, ordinary poor people, are being lured to come and kill our rhinos, whether it is in a Park, that’s National Park, or elsewhere. They are being lured, and there are some of them have been paid up to, they say a rhino horn costs something like R10 000/R80 000 per kg. So we need to really deal with this issue. We do think that our people must begin to have alternative economic activities: their ownership of a rhino, for instance, which we did this year, when we contributed 2 rhinos to the community of the Nduli’s. We should also identify other communities that must have ownership of the rhino and see value in a living rhino, than in a dead rhino, which they take a horn away from. So those are some of the things that we are dealing with; so creation of strongholds in areas where there are community members, creation of new strongholds in other Parks, creation of new strongholds in areas where there are no unscrupulous operators in a game farm. Those are the areas where we are beginning to translocate some of the rhinos from Kruger National Park, because they are also a little bit over populated, particularly on the Southern side, which we want to make a no go area. So, as soon as those who understand management over animals of a park, in the park, and in the wild like this. We understand that there is a need to be, to have a balance, between male and female but also to have adequate food for them. This translocation will help us to replicate their numbers, as we did in the sixties, when we took 50 away from iMfolozi-Hluhluwe into the Kruger National Park: that doubled and replicated. So by replicating them in other areas not only in South Africa, but also on the SADAC continent. We have already begun translocation to Botswana, we are translocating to Zambia and to Tanzania, and so on, so we are replicating the rhino. That’s it, we are not running away but we are taking measures that are quite interlinked, so that we can actually do better. And then we are... (interruption). We have detected that indeed, there is a need to deal with issues of human resources. Our own humans, human beings; I am sure you must have heard that there are people in the Park, who have been arrested also for poaching - our own rangers, some of them. They are not all bad, maybe even the majority of them are quite good, because they really do a lot of good work, good work in that bush. They are alone in the Kruger National Park, that big space, which is bigger than other countries. It is bigger than Israel, certainly, as a Park. So, we know that there are rotten potatoes sometimes in the bag, and those rotten potatoes need to be eliminated. So we are, indeed, doing this issue of vetting. It is currently happening, we are vetting those, and we will vet until we come to the last person in our operations. At Justice level, we have actually followed the justice system. We have had several meetings with them so say, hello, we need to wake up. We need heavy sentences for these people; you have seen the 77 years of a sentencing; that was done now, recently, by giving in to somebody else. There is a 40 years of sentence, heavy sentencing that was given to somebody else, a Thai National, recently. I’m very worried and I was saying to the colleagues in the department, that we need to work with the justice system now, because we have seen the reduction from the 40 years of that person, to 30 years, and another reduction now last week to 20 years. It can’t be; it shouldn’t really happen that once a person is sentenced like this there must be, and the reason is that there is no predetermined sentence. That ventures that we must have predetermined sentence, even on these kinds of operations. So, the list is long, the list is endless. All I’m saying to you is that we appreciate your presence, we appreciate your everyday work, we can see what you are doing on a daily basis, with your rhino horns on those “Amabokkebokke”, the Springbok cars; we can see what you are doing on radio and everywhere else. It is a necessary thing to join hands and work together and fight the scourge because one thing that has to happen, is that we must break the back of these criminals. They must be gone and indeed, I am not going to be disclosing some of the security features of what we are doing to break the neck of these criminals, but you can see already that there is a mini syndicate that has been wiped in South Africa, just this one and a half weeks ago: with money launderers, with lawyers, with people owning helicopters and what, what. They are working with the international ones; they will give those people to us in our hands, those who are operating with them on an international level. They must bring them; there is no way that we are going to leave even those who are outside this country. On that note, ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you and say, yes, we have received your memorandum. Let’s work together. We are going to be asking you to meetings; please do so, please register your various organizations that are there, so that we are together in this. Eendrag maak mag. Unity is strength. Kom ons baklei saam; ons sal veg totdat ons vyande wegloop, totdat hulle nou heeltemal nie bestaan nie. Baie, baie dankie.
Posted on: Tue, 14 Oct 2014 20:48:42 +0000
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