/ 23 April 2010

Limpopo Parks in dire straits

Limpopo Parks In Dire Straits

An Afrikaans conservation programme on KykNet is to lay bare the implosion of many Limpopo game reserves as a result of mismanagement and pitifully inadequate budgets.

“We’d heard about the sad state of the parks for many years,” said programme director Johan Botha. “But we were shocked to uncover the true state of some facilities.”

Projek Aardwolf will flight its disclosures on KykNet on Sunday evening. It will show:

  • Footage of prime facilities, built with millions of taxpayers’ rands, vacant and falling apart;
  • Reserves being stripped of resources, including the felling of large trees by poachers who truck them out past rangers;
  • That squatters have moved into one park, where their cattle roam freely; and
  • That almost half of the provincial parks staff have left since 1994.

Projek Aardwolf reporters uncovered the conditions while filming vultures in Limpopo. Their disclosures were backed by a parks board source who has visited a wide range of provincial reserves.

The senior general manager of the Limpopo economic development, environment and tourism department, Charles Maluleke, denied all knowledge of the problems raised. He refused Project Aardwolf‘s request for an interview.

Greg Knill, Limpopo’s chief director of biodiversity and natural resource management, denied that the situation was as critical as alleged. But he conceded that there were problems, many of them traceable to a lack of funds.

“As with all reserves it is a challenge to patrol the fences with limited staff,” he said.

Forty-seven game reserves are managed by the department and Limpopo Tourism and Parks.

They share a budget of R4,2-million, which includes R1,2-million for transport and R1,1-million for uniforms. A smaller reserve, Blouberg, has a budget of just R15 000.

Yet financial statements of the department seen by the Mail & Guardian show that one senior manager’s budget for catering, hotel accommodation and overseas trips was almost R230 000. Knill said that this is standard for such a manager.

In the five parks that they visited, the Aardwolf crew found that most of the tractors — responsible for road maintenance, grass cutting and other key functions — are not operational. Knill admitted this.

The M&G understands that the average age of staffers in the parks’ directorate, responsible for the protection of the parks, is 55. “People are too slow and old to catch poachers,” said a manager.

Rangers allegedly last received uniforms in 1994, though they have been promised new gear this year. Knill admitted that the uniform budget has been an “ongoing challenge for many years”.

Half of the posts in the department are vacant, and no new appointments have been made in recent years.

Many of the reserves have no rangers to combat poaching and illegal firewood gathering. Parks such as Maleboch, Bewaarkloof, Moletji, Turfloop and Makuya have limited or no staff accommodation.

Asked about the collapse of infrastructure at Moletji and the fact that the reserve manager is almost always absent, Knill said this was “not acceptable”.

He agreed that it was “not a desirable situation” that Witvinger Nature Reserve, hard hit by poaching, has had no manager for 10 years.

The Aardwolf team stayed at the Masebe Game Reserve lodge, which was revamped for R40-million. Their footage shows that the luxury chalets are falling apart, little or no furniture and no maintenance is being done. Other luxury tented camps in Limpopo’s portfolio have been abandoned because they have no zips.

“Where an income could have been generated, there’s nothing,” the official said.

Most shocking for the Project Aardwolf team was Bewaarkloof, which suffers from illegal squatting and has no fencing, water or electricity. No entrance or other fees are charged.

Botha said the only animals his team encountered in Bewaarkloof were cattle. Illegal woodcutters told them that a truckload of poached timber sold for R1 500.

Knill conceded that the Bewaarkloof situation was “unacceptable and has been referred to the parks department’s legal services and investigations on numerous occasions”.

In Langjan Nature Reserve, once a prime “hunting reserve” with a controlled ecological programme, fences are broken and bomas dilapidated. It is closed to all tourists.

Questioned about the reserve’s condition, game ranger David Moete said: “The shiny government people took all the money for their grand cars. Now we’ve got nothing.”