Poaching, poker and press

Yesterday we had our Swedish friends from the wild reserve who were on a foraging trip to the capital over for lunch.

We had a good laugh as they told us about a priest in one provincial town who had managed to build a beautiful church. He had raised the money by …. playing poker in the capital, something which he apparently did with great skill. I am not sure how this fits into Vatican orthodoxy, but this country does not seem one to make priests - nor anybody else for that matter - stick to orthodoxy anyway.

Much less funny was their account of how they see wildlife vanishing under their very eyes. Sudanese poachers have recently (after our departure a couple of weeks ago) ventured into the park itself, and of the two elephants we saw close to the base camp, one has already been killed, leaving the other very restless and aggressive, traumatised I guess. Elephants are apparently not only social, but quite emotional animals. High up in the air from their ultra light airplane they had seen camels carrying large amounts of freshly (red) smoked meat of poached game. I don’t see how this country will be able to preserve its wildlife. Pressures are enormous, and the way things are now, the country doesn’t have sufficient appeal for tourists to generate the kind of income you need to finance permanent anti-poaching brigades. Donors do not seem particularly interested in the issue. This country is so invisible internationally...

Last Friday the boss went to sign a financing agreement with our favourite Minister for a budgetary aid of 4 million euros, to be disbursed very soon after a long long wait (procedures, procedures ....). He was interviewed afterwards by, get this, a hostile press, who asked him why we gave so little, and why we bothered the country with all sorts of conditionality for our budgetary aid, etc. Not very much unlike government ministers sometimes by the way, I refer to that recent meeting that triggered my finest diplomatic instincts. It often bothers me how it’s all just taken for granted and as an entitlement.