PROPOSED Ban on Canned Hunting

PROPOSED Ban on Canned Hunting

PROPOSED Ban on Canned Hunting - some facts

To all those who assisted with the 10 000 signed petitions and written letters of protest calling for the banning of canned hunting, we are calling on your help once again.This is the position of the Global White Lion Protection Trust.

We acknowledge the fact that the Government has expressed its INTENTION to ban canned hunting.

However, in order for this national policy to be enforceable, correct protocol HAS to be followed. A public participation process has to take place in which interested and affected parties get an opportunity to comment on the policy before the norms and standards are effected as regulations within the new Biodiversity Bill. Please note: this correct protocol has not been followed.
If the irregularities in this policy, its drafting, and its implementation are not urgently addressed, it will lead to a public outcry, both nationally and internationally.
Please assist us to take urgent action!!
Your petitions and letters of protest helped bring about this positive turn of events. Now help us to plug the loopholes in the policy and ensure that the prohibition of canned hunting is legally enforceable.
After consulting with envirolawyers, members of parliament, scientific experts, conservation officials and provincial policy makers themselves, as well as Valli Moosa¹s office, we have finally come to appreciate the serious and massive confusion that has been generated.
The attached summary details the irregularities. Read it for your information, if you wish, then please send off the draft letter to Valli Moosa, Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, as well as Ms Sonja Meintjies (Division: Resource Use, DEAT) demanding that due protocol take place.
Email it without delay, or ideally print it out and post it, as posted letters receive greater attention.
As always, heart-felt appreciation from me and the White Lions for your support in protecting our sacred heritage.
Linda Tucker
Founder and CEO
Global White Lion Protection Trust [IT 8575/02]
PO Box 1690 White River 1240 South Africa
C: 072 2500666 e: whitelion@zamail.co.za www.whitelions.co.za

Proposed Policy

LETTERS:

Mr Valli Moosa

Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism

Private Bag X447

PRETORIA

0001

To Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism

NATIONAL PRINCIPLES, NORMS AND STANDARDS FOR THE SUSTAINABLE USE OF LARGE PREDATORS IN SA, APPENDIX 2, GOVT GAZETTE, Gazette 25090, Notice 874

We wish to express our support of your bold initiative to prohibit canned hunting of large predators, a barbarous malpractice which has generated increasing international condemnation of our country. However, a public participation process has not taken place in the drafting of this new policy. The national policy as presently drafted has serious loopholes, which need to be plugged to ensure effectiveness in its implementation.

We, the public, demand that the correct protocol be followed, by which interested and affected parties are invited to advise on the policy and therefore ensure that it is enforceable by law. We await notification of the procedure by which scientific and conservation experts will be given "an opportunity to comment on the document before the norms and standards are effected as regulations within the new Biodiversity Bill."

(www.environment.gov.za/NewsMedia/MedStat/2003Aug6/hunting_06082003.html)

Yours sincerely

---

Ms Sonja Meintjies

Division: Resource Use

Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism

Private Bag X447

PRETORIA

0001

To Ms. Meintjies

NATIONAL PRINCIPLES, NORMS AND STANDARDS FOR THE SUSTAINABLE USE OF LARGE PREDATORS IN SA, APPENDIX 2, GOVT GAZETTE, Gazette 25090, Notice 874

We wish to express our support of the Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism’s initiative to prohibit canned hunting of large predators, a barbarous malpractice which has generated increasing international condemnation of our country. However, a public participation process has not taken place in the drafting of this new policy. The national policy as presently drafted has serious loopholes, which need to be plugged to ensure effectiveness in its implementation.

We, the public, demand that the correct protocol be followed, by which interested and affected parties are invited to advise on the policy and therefore ensure that it is enforceable by law. We await notification of the procedure by which scientific and conservation experts will be given "an opportunity to comment on the document before the norms and standards are effected as regulations within the new Biodiversity Bill."

(www.environment.gov.za/NewsMedia/MedStat/2003Aug6/hunting_06082003.html )

Yours sincerely