Conservation
at Any Cost?
LAST
SPRING, Thokozani Kunene, 25, was out walking
with his father near a private game reserve near
eastern Eswatini’s Big Bend, an area known for
its lush forests teeming with wildlife. His
father says they were taking an afternoon stroll
to collect firewood when they were confronted by
rangers patrolling the Mkhaya Game Reserve.
Kunene was shot and killed. The rangers found a
firearm in his possession after shooting him and
allege that he was there poaching, though his
family disputes their claims.
Kunene
is one of many Emaswati who have been killed in
recent years by park rangers. While exact
numbers aren’t available, the Ministry of
Tourism and Environmental Affairs estimates that
several dozen suspected poachers are slain each
year.
Behind
each death lies a tragic truth: The people
killed were never afforded the chance to defend
themselves, never given the benefit of a fair
trial. They were killed as suspected poachers,
and the rangers who killed them were shielded by
a decades’ old law: the 1991 Game Amendment
Act.
“This
is a devastating trend that has left families
broken and communities living in fear,” says
Chief Mvimbi Matse of Mambane in the Matsanjeni
constituency, in the Lubombo region of Eswatini.
Matse says that 17 people in his chiefdom were
killed by rangers between October of 2023 and
October of 2024. “We must find a way to ensure
that conservation efforts do not come at the
expense of human lives.”
Journalist Nokukhanya
Musi-Aimienoho reports on the high human cost of
Eswatini’s war on poaching, and the activists
pushing for
change. | 
