Archive for the ‘Current Events’ Category
by Amanda on Jan 24th, 2013
Julian Rademeyer, author of Killing for Profit: Exposing the Illegal Rhino Horn Trade, was recently interviewed on the rhino horn trade by CNN’s Nkepile Mabuse.
Mabuse looks at a video of a pseudo-hunt conducted by rhino horn trafficker Chumlong Lemtongthai, who is currently serving a 40 year jail sentence in South Africa, and then speaks to Rademeyer about rhino poaching and wildlife trafficking. Rademeyer explains that rhino horn is worth more than gold, cocaine or heroin. He also speaks about the disconnect that the people buying rhino horn products have from the pain and destruction that they’re causing.
Please note that this video contains disturbing footage:
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by Amanda on Jan 14th, 2013
The first incidence of rhino poaching this year occurred in the Kruger National Park less than a week into 2013. The park, which lost 425 rhinos to poachers last year, now makes use of a drone and a surveillance plane to monitor its grounds.
Erin Conway-Smith from the Global Post spoke to Julian Rademeyer, author of Killing for Profit: Exposing the Illegal Rhino Horn Trade, who said that syndicates are starting to use Mozambique as their base – which is not good news for the Kruger National Park. Rademeyer said that there is “virtually no enforcement of wildlife crime” in Mozambique and predicted that “it’s going to get substantially worse”, despite the anti-poaching efforts.
Rangers at the Kruger National Park, one of Africa’s best-known safari destinations, didn’t have to wait long for their first battle of the new year.
Less than a week into 2013, field rangers stationed in a section of the vast park near South Africa’s border with Mozambique found themselves in a gunfight with three suspected poachers. The men escaped, leaving behind a high-caliber hunting rifle and a bag full of rhino horns. The carcass of an endangered white rhinoceros was later found nearby.
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by Amanda on Nov 13th, 2012
Thai national Chumlong Lemtongthai was sentenced to 40 years in prison last week for his role in a global rhino horn smuggling ring run by the Xaysavang Trading Export-Import company. Lemtongthai is one of the people that Julian Rademeyer investigated in his book, Killing for Profit: Exposing the Illegal Rhino Horn Trade, and the most senior member of a rhino horn smuggling ring to be convicted in South Africa.
Rademeyer has written an article for the Mail & Guardian about a video of a “legal hunt” carried out on a North West game farm owned by Marnus Steyl. It is legal to hunt rhinos and import their horns as “personal hunting trophies” but they cannot be traded or sold. Lemtongthai, who is visible in the video, admitted to hiring Thai prostitutes to pose as hunters. He claims that the landowners and hunting groups, including Steyl, did not know about the fraud, however emails, invoices and video footage of the hunts seem to indicate otherwise. Charges against the five co-accused were dropped.
Please note that this footage is not for sensitive viewers:
Disturbing video footage of a bloody rhino hunt on a North West game farm raises questions about the National Prosecuting Authority’s controversial decision this week to withdraw criminal charges against game farmer Marnus Steyl and a Thai national, Punpitak Chunchom.
Filmed in January last year, the footage – a copy of which has been obtained by the Mail & Guardian – forms part of a devastating digital trail of evidence that leads from South Africa to Southeast Asia. It shows Steyl, accompanied by a professional hunter, Harry Claassens, repeatedly shooting a rhino in what appears to have been an illegal “pseudo hunt”, carried out at the behest of an international wildlife-trafficking syndicate.
The Mail & Guardian‘s Faranaaz Parker has written about the 40 year conviction and spoke to Rademeyer about the impact that this could have on the syndicate:
It was expected that Chumlong Lemtongthai would receive no more than 10 years in jail. But, days after Environmental Affairs Minister Edna Molewa had called for a strict sentence to be imposed against him, Lemgtongthai was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
His fellow accused did not share his fate though. Professional hunter Harry Claassens turned state’s witness and charges were withdrawn against five other men involved in the poaching operation, including a farmer, two farm workers, and two other Thai men.
Rademeyer shared a page from the book, featuring photographs of Lemgtongthai wielding a gun:
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by Amanda on Jul 29th, 2011
Max du Preez says he was cynical about attending “ensemble building” workshops in America, but found that the acting workshops work well as a metaphor for building peace and stability in a society. The actors are guided through a variety of exercises that aim to engender trust, understanding and empathy. Du Preez says the Truth and Reconiliation Commission was an exercise that managed to create this trust and empathy, but that somehow we have forgotten that empathy and forgiveness are part of an ongoing process, not a singular event:
Here I am, a shallow, cynical hack attending “ensemble building” workshops in America. But an old dog can learn new tricks.
The idea is to get a cast of actors to act like an organic unit; to interact, support and complement one another. After the second workshop it struck me that ensemble building is a metaphor for building peace, stability and harmony in society. Or conflict resolution. And this was what I was doing here: attending a summer institute on alternative conflict resolution hosted by the new Global Arts Corps, a body with strong South African roots.
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by Amanda on Jul 22nd, 2011
According to an article in the Cape Times, David Klatzow, author of Steeped in Blood: The Life and Times of a Forensic Scientist, has discovered new evidence which may just hold the key to unlocking the mysterious 24-year-old Helderberg case.
Press release:
Dr David Klatzow, forensic expert and bestselling author of Steeped in Blood, claims he has new evidence that could clear up the 24-year-old mystery about the fatal Helderberg crash and wants President Jacob Zuma to reopen the investigation.
Klatzow told the Cape Times yesterday that he had in his possession an affidavit from a former South African Airways pilot, Clair Fichardt, about what had happened to recordings of the pilots’ conversation, and that this was the “missing piece to the puzzle” in the investigation. Fichardt said: “I do believe [Klatzow] is on the right track, and in memory and honour of those who died, the truth must come out.”
The 28 November 1987 airline disaster came about when the Boeing 747 crashed into the sea just off Mauritius after a fire had allegedly started on board, and the cause of the crash remains shrouded in mystery and mired in controversy. All 159 passengers and crew were killed.
Presidency spokeswoman Zanele Mngadi said the department was not aware of Klatzow’s call for Zuma to reopen the probe. They would study the information and respond at a later stage.
Ends
City forensic expert David Klatzow claims he has new evidence which could clear up the 24-year-old mystery about the fatal Helderberg crash and wants President Jacob Zuma to reopen the investigation.
Klatzow told the Cape Times yesterday that he had an affidavit from a former South African Airways pilot, Clair Fichardt, about what had happened to tapes of the pilot’s conversation, and that this was the “missing piece to the puzzle” in the Helderberg investigation.
The affidavit quoted a former SAA pilot, now dead, who said the tapes had been given to then SAA CEO Gert van der Veer. Van der Veer testified to the Margo Commission of Inquiry into the Helderberg crash and to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that he had no knowledge of the tapes.
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by Amanda on Jul 7th, 2011
Max du Preez has caught a whiff of revolt in the air and concluded that South Africa is ripe for a revolution, nay, deserving of one. However, du Preez worries that a South African upheaval will happen for the wrong reasons, and that what he is really smelling is “the smell of hatred, greed and revenge”, “the smell of rot”.
In the following column at News24, du Preez responds to a tweet by Sunday Times editor, Ray Hartley, and here it is:
Du Preez’s column:
South Africa hasn’t had its revolution yet. It is coming, a newspaper editor declared on Twitter this week, echoing the earlier stark warning by writer Peter Godwin.
I’m beginning to smell revolution too. Just a whiff, for now, but still.
But it isn’t the exciting, promising smell of the 1980s. The smell of freedom and possibility.
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by Amanda on Jul 6th, 2011
Max du Preez kritiseer in sy jongste rubriek in Rapport die filosoof Samantha Vice se stelling in die nuutste Journal of Social Philosophy dat wit mense hul aan die openbare lewe in Suid-Afrika moet onttrek. “Ek dink Vice ruk die dam onder die eend uit,” sê hy:
Suid-Afrika het ’n wit probleem. Die oplossing is dat bleekvellige burgers hulle moet onttrek aan die openbare lewe en hulself in skaamte en nederigheid probeer rehabiliteer.
Met die eerste oogopslag is dié stelling deur die Suid-Afrikaanse filosoof Samantha Vice genoeg om enige Afrikaner in sy pap te laat stik.
Nou ja. Kom ons almal haal diep asem, tel tot 100 en oorweeg dan wat sy sê.
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by Amanda on Apr 14th, 2011
Terwyl ‘n man gister in ‘n protesoptog oor dienslewerings in Ficksburg gedood is, vra Max du Preez dat mense die “gom van ras, etnisiteit en geskiedenis” tydens die komende plaaslike verkiesing moet afskud.
Du Preez het in ‘n rubriek in Rapport geskryf dat die “vetkatte” sal voortgaan om rustig te slaap, indien die gom bly kleef en mense aanhou om te stem vir die party wat hul plaaslike owerheid swak bestuur.
Hy is duidelik ten gunste van ‘n opskudding tydens hierdie verkiesing wat die ANC in sommige gebiede uit die kussings sal lig:
Niemand wil dit eintlik hardop sê nie, maar die komende plaaslike verkiesing is dalk die belangrikste verkiesing in Suid-Afrika sedert 1994.
Voor al die vorige verkiesings, plaaslik sowel as nasionaal, was die uitslag eintlik maar ’n voldonge feit.
Dié keer is dit beslis nié.
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by Amanda on Mar 3rd, 2011
Max du Preez, author of Pale Native, says that the South African government has revealed its own form of post-liberation discrimination.
Based on a “hierarchy of suffering”, coloureds and Indians are viewed as having a “second-class” citizenship by the ruling government, du Preez says, adding that this “ethnic chauvism” is often revealed in the words of ANC officials – like Jimmy Manyi, who declared that there is an “over-concentration” of coloureds in the Western Cape, which lead to a strongly-worded response to the ANC spokesman by Trevor Manuel.
Du Preez recalls the words of the former wife of ex-president FW de Klerk, who referred to coloured people as “uitskot-mense” (rejects), saying this mindset has prevailed in the post-apartheid era:
During the apartheid era, I was classified as a white male. I’m still pretty much regarded as one. One might actually say I’m a whitey in general and an Afrikaner in particular, although most Afrikaners would say I’m not a very good one. I therefore have no place writing on behalf of any population group, not even white Afrikaners.
But perhaps, with a bit of leniency from readers, I should be allowed to express an opinion about other population groups in this so-called rainbow nation and about how they are viewed and treated. The group in question used to have many names: Cape Coloured, Cape Malay, Griqua, Other Coloured, etc. Many nowadays prefer to be called So-called Coloureds. I personally like that, because, as all informed people must know, we are all “coloureds”, but not all So-called Coloureds.
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by Amanda on Feb 11th, 2011
Max du Preez, who authored Of Tricksters, Tyrants and Turncoats, takes a look at some of the more absurd stories that have been making the news lately:
In Buffalo in the United States a Muslim man who started a television station to promote cultural understanding and to counter negative perceptions of Islam was found guilty of beheading his wife.
In South Africa the president had his widely respected Cabinet spokesperson, Themba Maseko, removed and replaced him with one of the most controversial public figures in the country, a man who was fired from his job as director-general of Labour, accused of serious misconduct and perceived as someone who deeply dislikes South Africans with a lighter skin tone than his own, Jimmy Manyi.
The tests given to tens of thousands of pupils this week to assess their literacy and numeracy skills are riddled with very basic mistakes.
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