Please Protest NOW!


FALLOW DEERS OF TABLE MOUNTAIN TO BE KILLED.
by
Chris Mercer.
 
Co-author of the books "For the Love of Wildlife" and "Canned Lion
Hunting - A National Disgrace."
Former Director of Friends of the Tahr.
www.cannedlion.co.za
 
If you go to our website, you will see the full story of how South
African National Parks Board (SANParks) slaughtered the few hundred
remaining Himalayan Tahr antelope on Table Mountain, Cape Town.  Go to
www.cannedlion.co.za/tahrs/index.html  then click on 'News.'   
You will see how exotic animals, introduced early in the last century
by Cecil John Rhodes, were cruelly killed for no good reason other
than their alien status.
Now it is the turn of the Fallow deer, which were also introduced by
C.J. Rhodes onto his Groot Schuur estate, which he left in his Will to
the people of South Africa.
 
A heritage expert puts it as follows:
 
The deer are a self-consciously intended characteristic of the sense
of place of the Groote Schuur Estate, which has resulted from the very
deliberate and designed intention of Cecil John Rhodes and Sir Herbert
Baker.  One therefore cannot just remove them.  Every Capetonian has
either regularly, or at some time passed the deer on De Waal Drive en
route to the Cape Flats or the Southern Suburbs and they expect to see
them there.  The deer form an infrangible part of the character of the
Estate and cannot be removed without taking away an important aspect
of the richness of Cape Town.  Furthermore the deer, which have been
here for over 100 years, have a special association with Rhodes and
should be regarded as part of our cultural heritage. 
 
The National Environmental Management Act, no.  107 of 1998, states
under Principles 4(f): "The participation of all interested and
affected parties in environmental governance must be promoted, and all
people must have the opportunity to develop the understanding, skills
and capacity necessary for achieving equitable and effective
participation,"
 
Contrary to its obligation to conduct a proper public participation
process, SANParks decided back in 1999, to kill the deer and to do so
without consulting the public.  In fact, the decision was made by
relatively junior SANParks personnel.  The minutes of a meeting held
on 17th November 1999, in the Newlands Forest Offices of the Cape
Peninsula National Park (one year after NEMA had been
promulgated),record that, in regard to killing exotic animals on Table
Mountain, " The public would be informed via the press, rather than
consulted on the issue.  Will need to draft an information pamphlet
outlining rationale and time frame for the operation without giving
details on removal of (sic) Thar (as well as sambar and fallow deer)
techniques." 
 
 
For those readers who are not familiar with SA Conservation
euphemisms, let us explain what the jargon "humane removal to a game
farm" actually means.  The resident herd including pregnant ewes will
be chased far and wide by yelling ground forces and roaring
helicopters.   Although Fallow deer are famously hard to drive, some
of them will be caught up, separated from their families and driven in
to the boma (capture enclosure), where they will be pushed and shoved
in to containers.  There they will remain, panting and stressed, for
as long as it takes to fill a container - which may be days.
Eventually, survivors will be transported long distances into places
like the Karroo desert, where the hunting farms eagerly await them.
Those not shot immediately find themselves in an alien terrain to
which their digestive bacteria are not adapted.  Their condition will
drop and when that happens, the ticks and other parasites will
multiply, causing slow and agonising deaths for some.  Survivors will
be at the tender mercy of a South African canned hunting industry
which is so cruel and unethical that it has attracted worldwide
condemnation.  Trapped in fenced camps from which there is no escape,
they will be used as living targets for hunters with bows, cross-bows,
handguns and rifles.  Some hunting farms also use packs of dogs.
Case in point.  On 24th July, SANParks attempted to capture 150 deer.
Instead, staff botched the job. They eventually caught nine animals.
Next day they tried again.   Once more, the herd was chased every
which way.  This day the pursuers caught only one solitary animal. The
captured deer, mainly young females, remained for two days and one
night in a container, and have since been sent to a hunting farm.
SANParks has now belatedly realised the futility of its ill-considered
capture method, and has decided to go with a long-term passive capture
strategy.  This does nothing to address animal welfare concerns. 
 
This email is being sent to you in the hope that you can help us to
stop the pending capture and translocation of the Fallow Deer in the
Table Mountain National Park to canned hunting farms. Because of their
cultural heritage status, which has not even been considered, the deer
should remain where they are and their numbers kept stable through
contraception or sterilisation.  Alternatively, Civil Society has come
up with non-lethal solutions, such as capturing the deer and removing
them to places of safety, but these have been dismissed out of hand by
SANParks.
  
To sum up: the removal of the deer is not an ecological necessity;
relocating them to an alien habitat in front of gun muzzles is cruel;
the public has not been properly consulted and our heritage is being
damaged.  We believe that SANParks is acting illegally.
 
Clearly, nothing short of legal proceedings is going to save the deer.
Should you wish to make a pledge of funds towards legal costs, please
notify us at the emails below.  Once sufficient pledges have been
received, the appropriate legal entity and banking facilities will be
set up and you will be asked to pay your pledge money to the trust
account notified.
 
Chris Mercer
chrisandbev@mweb.co.za
 
Cicely Blumberg
riaanb@gmail.com
 
What to do about the Fallow Deer issue: If South African, write to
your MP and the emails below to ask government to hold a public
commission of enquiry to investigate the killing of the Deer and the
infringements of the civil rights of citizens in order to do so, and,
depending on the findings of that commission, to terminate Sanpark's
contract to manage Table Mountain Park. If you are alien like the
Deer, please write to the South African Embassy or Consulate in your
country. 
Email the following:
Table Mountain National Park Staff
 
Communications Manager
JanineW@sanparks.org 
 
BrettM@sanparks.org  
 
Also for info to:
hectorm@sanparks.org  
 
shaund@robben-island.org.za 
 
Chief Director: Communications Mr J P Louw
E-mail: louwjp@iafrica.com
Director: Communications: Ms Phindile Makwakwa
E-mail: pmakwakwa@iafrica.com
Angus Macmillan
www.roots-of-blood.org.uk
www.killhunting.org
www.con-servation.org.uk

All truth passes through three stages:
First, it is ridiculed;
Second, it is violently opposed; and
Third, it is accepted as self-evident. 
-- Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)