Special directorate in offing to boost anti-poaching crusade

ANTI-poaching campaign in Tanzania is set for a new boost with formation of a special directorate on poaching in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism.

The Minister, Mohamed Mchengerwa has directed the Permanent Secretary in his ministry to establish the directorate on poaching that will be reporting to him in efforts to boost anti-poaching campaign.

The minister has already appointed Deputy Commissioner, John Nyamhanga as Acting Director of the envisaged directorate.

Speaking  here during the official launching of a special national strategy for fighting poaching and another strategy for management of  community wildlife areas, Mr Mchengerwa said that he  purposely decided that the directorate be introduced so that all poaching incidents were directly being reported to him.

“Poaching business is involving a large curtail of bigwigs including popular figures,” he added.

He directed that the acting boss of the expected directorate should report immediately in his office, so that he and the minister can fine-tune the immediate strategies to combat poaching.

“I have made this decision because this business is being done by popular figures, therefore, for me to have clear information on this, the director should report direct to my office to avoid challenges in getting proper information,” said Mr Mchengerwa.

He elaborated that the target was to make sure that not even a single government trophy was being seized at border points or outside the country, adding that the ministry was well prepared to intensifying intelligence information regarding poachers.

Apart from that, the minister asked all Tanzanians or any person dealing with the illegal business to shun it immediately, insisting that stern legal actions would be instituted to all regardless of their titles in the country.

Earlier in his remarks to welcome the minister, Permanent Secretary (PS) in the ministry, Dr Hassan Abbasi said that poachers were not brave enough to win efforts by the government, insisting that they were weak to be well confronted.

“As the government continues to intensify efforts to curb the vice, I wish to ask the entire community to collaborate with us so that we can totally end poaching.”

At the event, the Director of Wildlife in the ministry, Dr Maurus Msuha said the two launched strategies would intensify war against poachers.

According to him, the strategies would cost a total of 196,454, US dollars, insisting that they would equally help to solve existing challenges in community close to wildlife areas in the country.