S. African gov’t welcomes heavy sentences against 3 rhino poachers

CAPE TOWN, April 5 — The South African government on Friday welcomed a court ruling that handed down heavy sentences to a trio of rhino poachers.
The three men were each sentenced to an effective 25 years in prison by the Eastern Cape High Court in Makhanda on Wednesday.
“The sentencing of all the three men to 25 years imprisonment each for 13 rhino poaching incidents, in which 22 rhino were killed, in the Eastern Cape over a period of five years is welcomed, particularly after the lengthy trial,” the Ministry of Environmental Affairs said.
These sentences send a strong message to would-be poachers and poaching gangs that the South African government is taking all the necessary and correct steps to protect rhinos, ministry spokespern Albi Modise said.
The three men, who belong to the notorious Ndlovu Gang that is behind a series of rhino poaching in the country, were found in possession of 10.27 kilograms of a freshly harvested rhino horn, a tranquilizer, a dart gun, a saw and a knife when they were arrested red-handed in June 2016.
No incidents of darting rhino had been reported since the arrest of the poaching gang members in 2016, according to police.
The recent decline in the number of attacks on rhinos may demonstrate that the anti-poaching initiatives are effective, Eastern Cape provincial police commissioner Liziwe Ntshinga said.
The initiatives are being implemented through a collaborative approach among the Ministry of Environmental Affairs, police and the defence force, to combat rhino poaching.
It is an approach that is now being implemented in all provinces where rhino poaching has increased in recent years and is delivering the required results, Minister of Environmental Affairs Nomvula Mokonyane said.
This approach is constantly being reviewed, amended and updated to meet changing needs as poachers amend their modus operandi in an effort to escape capture, the minister said.
“We are elated that the arrest of this gang, in particular, has yielded the outcome we wanted,” she said.
South Africa, home to about 85 percent of the world’s rhino population, had seen a huge increase in rhino poaching since 2008, driven by syndicates like the Ndlovu Gang.
Between 2013 and 2017, some 1,000 rhinos were killed each year, according to official figures.

Xinhua