Fiona Macleod
A deal being hammered out with the southern Kalahari Bushmen will entitle them to jointly own and manage more than 1 000km2 of the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park in the Northern Cape. It will also add about 500km2 on to the park.
If the deal goes through – and there are indications it may be ready for signing by March next year – the Bushmen will not only be able to use traditional resources in the park, but will be drawn into commercial decision- making about gate fees, rest camps and 4×4 trails.
Although the deal gives the Kalahari Bushmen access to 1 000km2, a lot less than the 4 000km2 they originally claimed – almost half the 9 600km2 park – the plan is the first to treat the San as players in the modern world, rather than as a quaint, primitive people who need to be protected or assimilated.
The 300-strong community of Kalahari Bushmen lived in what is now the Kalahari Gemsbok Park for generations until it was proclaimed a national park in 1931.
They continued to live there until they were perceived to have acquired modern habits. From 1937, there were several proposals by the old National Parks Board to resettle them on land outside the park, all of which were rejected by the community.
They were eventually reclassified as coloured and resettled in Mier, a coloured reserve south of the park, in 1973.
Mier is now home to two communities: the Bushmen and a large coloured farming community. Both communities launched land claims in the area in the past two years.
The deal being brokered proposes that:
l South African National Parks and the Mier community each put forward about 500 km2 to form a “contract park”.
l The “contract park” will be jointly run by the national parks, the Bushmen and members of the Mier community.
l The Department of Land Affairs will buy 25 000ha of private land outside the park for the Bushmen. Some of this will be used for agricultural and commercial purposes; the rest for a cultural reserve and game farming
Minister of Land Affairs Derek Hanekom was upbeat in a flying visit to the Bushman village of Welkom this week, where he took part in a celebratory gemsbok braai. He said he had promised Oupa Regopstaan, the traditional leader who lodged the original Bushman claim shortly before his death, that he would get their land back.
“For Oupa Regopstaan, this promise was linked to the powers of the gemsbok, and his last wish was for gemsbok meat,” he said. “We’re almost there, we’re months away from making history with this deal.”
Hanekom was also in the area to launch a Land Care project aimed at reducing the destruction of the land by bad farming practices. The arid Kalahari region is vulnerable to desertification.
The department will spend R1,5-million to reclaim land and make it available to the community of Mier, reducing the pressure on the environment by land- hungry farmers.