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| Bushman boys, Namibia
© Mark Håkansson/Survival |
Five days after their leaders were arrested and beaten, there was a dramatic turnaround today in the fortunes of the Kalahari Bushmen as they learnt they have won the Alternative Nobel Prize'.
First People of the Kalahari (FPK), the grass-roots organization of the
Gana and Gwi Bushmen of Botswana, who are fighting for their right to
return to their ancestral homeland, today won Sweden's Right Livelihood
Award, known as the Alternative Nobel Prize'.
The award has been given for the Bushmen's resolute resistance against
eviction from their ancestral lands, and for upholding the right to
their traditional way of life.'
Five days ago the FPK leaders were amongst a group of 28 Bushmen who
were arrested by police firing tear gas and rubber bullets. The Bushmen
were attempting to take food and water to their relatives still inside
the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, from which most of the Bushmen have
been evicted. The Bushmen leaders were badly beaten after being
handcuffed.
FPK has been fighting a long battle for the right of the Gana and Gwi
Bushmen to live peacefully inside the reserve, which is their ancestral
homeland. The reserve's rich diamond deposits have been widely blamed
for the government's expulsion of the Bushmen. De Beers, which runs all
Botswana's diamond mines, is now the subject of a global boycott.
For more information about the award go to: http://www.rightlivelihood.org/news/event05.htm
For more information about the Bushmen please contact Miriam Ross on +44 20 7687 8731 or email mr@survival-international.org
Notes to Editors:
Past winners of the Prize include Kenyan environmentalist Wangari
Maathai (who went on to win the Nobel Prize), and Nigerian Ken
Saro-Wiwa.
The FPK's leader Roy Sesana is the first Botswana-born winner of the prize.
