Minister lays down law on corruption

PEOPLE who misuse conservancy property and misappropriate money will be brought to book and be punished, says Environment and Tourism Minister Willem Konjore.

Konjore said in recent months his office had received numerous complaints about people misusing and misappropriating conservancies’ property and money at the expense of conservancy members. He said a conservancy was not a tool to divide the community members along political, racial or ethnic lines but a tool for rural economic emancipation.”This should be very clear to everyone concerned,” said Konjore.He made these remarks when he launched four conservancies and a campsite in the Kavango Region on Thursday.The Minister said if there were people in the four conservancies with ambitions of corruption and mismanagement, they were already on the wrong side of the law and the Ministry will leave no stone unturned to expose them.”You should commit yourself to nation building and not indulge yourselves in creating conflicts amongst the community members and yourselves as conservancy members,” said Konjore.He said his Ministry was also concerned about conflict between people and wildlife in conservancies and a policy on this was being formulated.Four critical areas that would be covered were the devolution of human-wildlife conflict management authorities, insurance schemes, alternative mitigation measures and a standardised monitoring and reporting system.David Hamutenya, Councillor for the Mpungu constituency, who spoke on behalf of Kavango Governor John Thiguru, said they were very concerned about problem animals that destroyed crops and attacked people.He proposed that a compensation scheme should be set upt to help people who lost crops, property and family members to such animals.Hamutenya said a woman was killed recently by a hippo while fetching water from the river at Nyangana.On November 17, Morrison Mashwahu Simpaya (60) was killed by an elephant while looking for his cattle at Muyako.According to the Nature Conservation Ordinance of 1975, people have the right to defend themselves against aggressive wild animals threatening their lives.He said a conservancy was not a tool to divide the community members along political, racial or ethnic lines but a tool for rural economic emancipation.”This should be very clear to everyone concerned,” said Konjore.He made these remarks when he launched four conservancies and a campsite in the Kavango Region on Thursday.The Minister said if there were people in the four conservancies with ambitions of corruption and mismanagement, they were already on the wrong side of the law and the Ministry will leave no stone unturned to expose them.”You should commit yourself to nation building and not indulge yourselves in creating conflicts amongst the community members and yourselves as conservancy members,” said Konjore.He said his Ministry was also concerned about conflict between people and wildlife in conservancies and a policy on this was being formulated.Four critical areas that would be covered were the devolution of human-wildlife conflict management authorities, insurance schemes, alternative mitigation measures and a standardised monitoring and reporting system.David Hamutenya, Councillor for the Mpungu constituency, who spoke on behalf of Kavango Governor John Thiguru, said they were very concerned about problem animals that destroyed crops and attacked people.He proposed that a compensation scheme should be set upt to help people who lost crops, property and family members to such animals.Hamutenya said a woman was killed recently by a hippo while fetching water from the river at Nyangana.On November 17, Morrison Mashwahu Simpaya (60) was killed by an elephant while looking for his cattle at Muyako.According to the Nature Conservation Ordinance of 1975, people have the right to defend themselves against aggressive wild animals threatening their lives.