Seal Alert-SA Press Release, 14 January
2008
Now Namibia Allows A Premier Hunting Safari Group to
Bow&Arrow-Hunt Cape Fur Seals, along with Baby Seal Clubbing,
Bull 'penis' Seal Shooting, Trophy Rifle Hunting and Live-Seal
Exports, This is besides the tens of thousands of seals illegally
shot, drowned, entangled in Namibia's Fishing Industry, or the mass
die-off's from starvation as a result of
over-fishing.
Bull seal shot in
Namibia
No
sooner has the ink dried on the Damning EU Report on Seal Culling
in Namibia. Seal Alert-SA now discovers that Namibia's premier
hunting safari group, Ozondjahe Hunting
Safaris www.namibianhuntingsafaris.com/hunting_show_trade.htm which
claims on its website clients from several of the most prominent
European Royal Families, a former President of Europe, CEO's and
top executives of the world's largest companies, and has hosted on
numerous occasions His Excellency Sam Nujoma, the former President
of the Republic Of Namibia, is now proudly offering trophy hunting
to bow and arrow hunters to shoot endangered CITES Appendix 11
listed Cape fur seals.
Will the killing of seals ever end in
Namibia?
Over 100 000 tourists pay to view these
seals in Namibia, earnings millions of dollars and as their
numerous photographs show, can virtually approach and touch these
seals. Hell, sealers running around with just a club manage to kill
85 000 seal pups each year.
How on earth are these bow and arrow
hunters killing Cape fur bull seals with their immense blubber? How
many shots are needed for a kill?
Is shooting a bull seal resting on a
beach, approaching it in camouflage gear with either bow and
arrow or rifle, considered hunting, or a fair chase? Where is
Namibia's hunting ethics? South Africa recently banned "canned lion
hunting" because by definition lions in a fenced enclosure offer no
hunt, well what hunt is involved with a bull seal sleeping on a
beach?
This follows Namibian reporter Donna
Collins interview with Dr Moses Maurihungirie, Director of Marine
Resources at the Namibian Ministry of Fisheries, which was
published in the informante on the 31 October 2007. I quote from
the last paragraph published, "When asked (Dr
Moses Maurihungirire) about the trophy hunting of seals and the
exporting live seals to China, he pooh-poohed it as nonsense,
saying (this is quoted) "We cannot take Hugo (Seal Alert-SA)
and his allegations seriously".
The
officially denied trophy hunting of Cape fur seals was again
published with another Namibian reporter Brigitte Weidlich in the
Namibian Newspaper on 3 January 2006.
Seal Alert-SA wants to know exactly what
the hell is going on in Namibia?
First, on 27 June 2007, the Namibian
Marine Resources (Scientific) Advisory Council reports to Cabinet
that surveys have revealed that there are 205 500 pups born
December 2005 and recommends a scientific and sustainable cull of
85 000 pups and 6000 bulls, rolling annually for next three years
(which it would not have been as it would kill all the remaining
pups alive by July). Well aware equally, that in 2006 a major
seal die-off occurred. The Ministry of Fisheries and Marine
Resources slightly reduces its seal quotas for the 2007 seal
killing season to 80 000 pups and 5000 bulls. Fully aware that the
December 2006 seal population survey, was not slightly down, but
had declined a massive 44%, then it reported in an official reply
to Dutch Minister Gerda Verburg on 13 November 2007 that the, and I
quote, "120 000 pups
born December 2006".
205 500
pups to 120 000 pups in a single year, is a massive decline.
How on
earth, questions Seal Alert-SA can you have a country classifying
endangered seals as a resource, then awarding so-called
scientifically determined sustainable harvesting quotas, which even
a 'lay-man scientist' would question, when you subtract the natural
known mortality of first-year seal pups from the December born pup
count (calculated at 32-62%). Leaving the sealers more seal pups to
club then there are alive?
What is even more pathetic (pure disregard for
the conservation of this species), is why does the Minister of
Fisheries reduce the bull seal quota from 6000 to 5000 bulls, and
then another Minister, the Minister of Tourism award trophy hunters
(how many thousands) to hunt bull seals with rifles and bow and
arrows?
It is Namibian government that has
legislated that Cape fur seals are a marine resource, whose
management falls under the Minister of Fisheries and Marine
Resources, whose jurisdiction ends at the high water mark. How then
is it legally possible for another Minister to issue hunting
permits to kill this species of marine mammal?
Has Namibia completely lost it?
For the Seals
Francois Hugo Seal Alert-SA
27-21-790 8774