EPISODE FIVE
ZAMBIA
John Coleman, a Rhodesian game ranger turned professional hunting guide, who operated throughout south-central Africa for most of his adult life, had this to say (verbatim) about commercial poaching in Zambia, in an open letter to American Dr Andre Degeorges:
“I have been a game ranger in Rhodesia and then a professional hunter (hunting guide) for most of my life. Therefore, I have been directly and/or indirectly involved in anti-poaching work in Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Zambia.
“I agree with you” (Degeorges), Coleman said, “that under present conditions and over-population of humans, the only way to curb poaching to any extent, locally, is to police very effectively and diligently. The problem is that politicians are involved and members of National Parks and Game Departments are in peril of dismissal or worse, if they persist in anti-poaching operations, particularly if it affects those politicians. Politicians must be held accountable and actively pursued and punished. The only people who can do this, however, are world leaders”
Now… to deal with dwindling elephant populations due to poaching!
“In many of the areas that were and are heavily poached, Coleman explains, the elephants were, to a great degree, heavily over-populated. A certain amount of culling, therefore, should have been done, despite rabid opposition from anti-hunters and ‘greens’. These people managed to persuade leading politicians to get all legal hunting banned, thus clearing the way for poachers to take over.