While the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism is planning to host the International Conference on Poaching involving East African countries as part of the Tanzanian government efforts to control poaching, trafficking and illegal export of ivory, top brass in the ruling party have been accused of mastermind elephant poaching in this country. It has revealed.
In his strongly worded speech, shadow minister for
Natural Resources and Tourism, Peter Msigwa (Iringa Urban-Chadema) told the
parliament that Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) Secretary General Abdulrahman Kinana
and other party leaders have been involved in dirty deals in sabotaging natural
resources and the tourism sector.
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| Abdulraham Kinana, Secretary General Chama cha Mapinduzi (CCM). |
Msigwa said Kinana has been cited in connection with
a consignment of elephant tusks impounded in 2009 in Vietnam.
He said records from the Business Registration and
Licensing Agency (Brela) indicated that the consignment was exported by Sharaf
Shipping, a company owned by Kinana and his wife Rahma Hussein.
“The official opposition in Parliament believes that
illicit political and economic interests of a few individuals in the hunting
sector is dominant in CCM and its government and it involves top ranking
leaders in the party,” Msigwa said.
He further told the parliament that the company in
question is also said to have employed a foreigner whose residence documents
have expired, adding: “The certificate to transport the cargo was signed by
Samir Hemani on November 13, 2008. Hemani was then the finance and
administration manager but records from the Immigration Department show that
his residence permit had expired when he was signing the documents.”
The opposition shadow minister also accused CCM and
its government of embracing businessmen with records that were not clean. He named Mohsin Abdallah, who was recently cited as
a major dealer in the illegal ivory trade by the Environmental Investigations
Agency during a Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild
Flora and Fauna (CITES) meeting in Bangkok in Thailand. “Abdallah is a former
member of the CCM National Executive Committee,” he said.” This tarnishes the
image of Tanzanians before the international community.”Msigwa also hit out at the government for allegedly
failing to resolve the land crisis in Loliondo in Ngorongoro District for more
than 23 years. He accused the government of subjecting Maasai pastoralists in
the division to “untold suffering” for lack of recognition as legal residents.
He also accused the government of siding with Ortelo
Business Company, which has been granted a professional hunting licence to
operate in the area.
But Minister for Home Affairs Emmanuel Nchimbi swiftly
came to the defence of Kinana, telling the House that investigations had proved
that he had nothing to do with the consignment. According to Dr Nchimbi,
several people were arrested and charged in the case of a four-tonne
consignment that originated in Kenya and Tanzania, but Kinana was not one of
them.
The case has since been withdrawn after the
prosecution failed to secure important information from Vietnam. The Far East
country has refused to co-operate because it does not have an exchange
arrangement on such matters with Tanzania.
Msigwa requested the government to provide a
detailed explanation on the involvement of Kinana in the illegal export of the
elephant tusks. But Dr Nchimbi objected, noting that the opposition was aware
of the developments in the case. “I am amazed at what the opposition
spokesperson has said here because I am aware that they know each and
everything involving this case,” the minister said. “I think Chadema is going
wayward.”
Tabling his budget earlier, the minister for Natural
Resources and Tourism, Ambassador Khamis Kagasheki, told Parliament that plans
to establish a Wildlife Authority were in top gear. The authority is expected
to boost efforts to safeguard natural resources, mainly wildlife.
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| Khamis Kagasheki, The Minister for Natural Resources and Tourism |
In the meantime, the ministry has been engaging
stakeholders in a bid to amend the Wildlife Act No 5 of 2009 with the intention
of charting out supervision and control responsibilities. The draft amendments
are ready and consultations with stakeholders are set to begin. If all goes
well, the Bill should be tabled in Parliament in November.
The government is, meanwhile, still following up the
illegal export of live animals to Qatar on November 26, 2010. Six people have
already been arrested and charged over the saga.
But despite his ministry’s achievements, Ambassador
Kagasheki said, there were still challenges to be tackled, including shortage
of funds, equipment and manpower and low awareness among Tanzanians of the
importance of tourism.
Nevertheless, the ministry has come up with
strategic planning for the period 2013-2016, which will see employment of
enough personnel and improvement of stakeholder participation.
The ministry intends to improve patrols in national
parks and game reserves in 2013/14 to safeguard the tourism sector.
Speaking to the Express in an exclusive interview
recently, Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism Head of Communication Unit George
Matiko said that the Minister for Natural Resources and Tourism Hon Khamis
Kagasheki has replied a call from the UN security council for an investigation
into the alleged involvement of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in the
poaching of African elephants and smuggling of their ivory.
He said that the government through the ministry of
Natural Resources and Tourism is trying to mobilize international community to
curb illegal export of ivory from African countries and the link between
illicit wildlife poaching and trafficking with regional insecurity.
Matiko added that the slaughter of elephants and the
seizure of illegal ivory from Tanzania and Kenya have soared to their highest
levels in decades.
He said that the government with its security
authorities is unable to control poaching and trafficking because it’s involved
unscrupulous police officers in the trade within the sector.
“This trend of poaching and trafficking of ivory has
been involved some of the dishonest police officers in the country that is why
it is very difficult to deal with it,” He said the government is aware of the poaching
problems in the wildlife sector and insisted that reforms are underway.Matiko added that although the conference is
premature but Kagasheki wants such conference to involve a range number of
stakeholders from the East Africa, Southern and development partners.
Furthermore, Kagasheki was quoted in the media
recently that the government was seeking to sell to China and Japan over 100
tonnes of ivory valued at over USD 55.5million (about Tsh 88.8billion) in order
to increase the government revenue in the fight against illegal trade of ivory
and poaching.
He further said that due to limited resource the
government cannot control and curb illegal trade of ivory and poaching in the
various national parks across the country.
The request submitted in early October was due to be
discussed at the next Convention on the International Trade in Endangered
Species (Cites) meeting in March in Bangkok. It had already frawn strong
criticism from conservation groups and some so-called “elephant range” states.
Tanzania said in the application that the ivory to
be sold would exclude that which was seized from poachers and any whose origin
is questionable.
Cites has not yet confirmed Tanzania’s U-turn, but
international news agency reports yesterday said the country had withdrawn its
application to sell the ivory stockpile because it had failed to curb the
poaching of elephants.
Hundreds of elephants have been killed this year
alone, and hundreds of tonnes of ivory seized from poachers. Just a week after
Tanzania announced that it had submitted its latest proposal to Cites, Hong
Kong authorities confiscated two shipping containers from Tanzania and Kenya
loaded with 3,628kg of elephant tusks worth USD 3.4 million.
Last month the same Hong Kong authorities
confiscated some 1,330kg of ivory worth $1.4 million believed to have been
obtained after at least 150 elephants were slaughtered. Natural Resources and
Tourism minister Khamis Kagasheki confirmed that the ivory came from Tanzania.
"There's an enormous slaughter of elephants
going on in Tanzania right now. Things are out of hand," says one of the Wildlife
stakeholders in Tanzania. "There's no protection in numbers for elephants
any more than there was for bison in the last century when they were all wiped
out in America. So people shouldn't kid themselves."
Story by Erastus Malilo.
Ends.
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