Fiona Macleod
Ten elephants that have been specially trained to carry tourists on their backs for bush safaris are the latest victims of land invasions by war veterans in Zimbabwe.
South African game rancher Alan Selkinder has asked local conservation authorities for permission to give the elephants asylum on his farm in the Northern Province. He says war veterans are threatening their lives as well as the profitable business in northern Zimbabwe that has been built up on their backs.
But his application has run into opposition from animal welfare organisations, who are calling on the South African government to put in place a national policy on training elephants before the move is sanctioned.
This would be the first elephant-back safari outfit in South Africa, though a couple of wildlife sanctuaries offer visitors meet-and-greet interactive experiences with elephants that have been orphaned and raised by humans.
In Zimbabwe there are about 100 domesticated elephants, most of whom have been trained to carry people on their backs for tourist ventures as well as bush-clearing, tracking poachers and transporting heavy goods.
“Elephant-back safaris have become the in-thing since everybody with domesticated elephants decided it would be a good way to make money,” says Meryl Harrison, co- ordinator of the Zimbabwean National Council of SPCAs (NSPCA).
The Tuli elephant scandal of 1998 has made South African conservationists wary of any association with elephant training. Brits- based wildlife dealer Riccardo Ghiazza still faces charges of cruelty in the Pretoria High Court after he imported 30 young elephants from Botswana’s Tuli Block and subjected them to a six-week crash training course.
Elephant experts who know the Zimbabwean farmer who wants to sell his 10 elephants to Selkinder say he has developed a humane training method that bears no resemblance to the training of the Tuli elephants.
Selkinder and the farmer refuse to discuss these methods, because they fear publicity could endanger the elephants, and perhaps even the lives of the farmer and his family. Selkinder says at least 100 “squatters” have already staked out claims on the farmer’s land.
Vitalis Chidenga, deputy director of research at the Zimbabwean National Parks, is not buying into the supposed threat by the war veterans, however. “My understanding is they want to move the elephants as part of a business transaction. The security of wildlife is guaranteed by the government, so there is no danger to these elephants from the war veterans.”
While officials in the South African Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism were busy processing Selkinder’s application this week, elephant fundis said national guidelines on training methods are impera- tive. At least two other projects involving domesticated elephants have launched applications for permits in recent weeks.
The South African NSPCA opposes Selkinder’s application because it could open the floodgates for unscrupulous tourism operators out to make a quick buck.
“Everybody wants some novelty item to attract tourists,” says the manager of the NSPCA’s wildlife unit, Rick Allan. “We’ve got people trying out genetic engineering to develop longer horns on buck, and others importing all kinds of exotic species.
“If we start with elephant-back safaris, what’s to stop somebody trying to develop carts for tourists that will be pulled along by zebras?”