FRIDAY, 4.00PM
FOUR people were arrested on Friday after police and Mpumalanga Parks Board investigators raided two Johannesburg houses and seized 45 endangered cycads stolen from nature reserves near the Swazi border.
Seven of the stolen lebomboensis cycads were implanted with microchips, allowing investigators to track their movement from the Mananga cycad reserve to Johannesburg. Three alleged syndicate members removed the last seven cycads from the reserve on Thursday morning and drove them straight to the two houses in Johannesburg, where another 38 cycads were found in the raid.
A parks board representative said the owner of one of the houses, Audrey Gabbin, was arrested on the scene and appeared briefly in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Thursday before being granted R4 000 bail. The owner of the second house is believed to be hunting in Northern Province and will be charged when he returns home later this month. The three alleged syndicate members also appeared in court briefly on Thursday. Two were released on warning recognicanses and the third is in custody.
The cycads will be rehabilitated at the MPB’s nursery in Lydenburg before being replanted into the wild.
Parks board special investigation head Herman Erasmus called on wealthy cycad collectors to buy their plants from reserves or the authorities. He said anyone caught buying cycads illegally will be prosecuted.