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| Bushman children, CKGR, Botswana 2004
© 2004 Stephen Corry/Survival |
Two Bushmen have been arrested and charged with hunting an antelope
illegally in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR). They were
made to spend one night in prison. The following day they were
taken into the CKGR and forced to run in front of the police vehicles
for six hours in the searing midday heat until they reached the place
where they had killed a gemsbok antelope. They are due to appear in
court in October.
One of the men is Loslobe Mooketsi, who appeared as a witness in the
Bushmen's long-running court case. He was also among the large group of
Bushmen arrested last September trying to take food and water to their
relatives still inside the reserve; that case has yet to come to court.
Loslobe's father, Mogetse Kaboikanyo, was one of the last Bushmen to
resist eviction from the reserve in 2002, and died soon after in a
relocation camp. Before his eviction he told a Survival researcher, 'Our
future comes from the lives of our children, our future is rooted in
the hunt, and in the fruits which grow in this place. When we hunt, we
are dancing. And when the rain comes it fills us with joy. This is our
place, and here everything gives us life.
'The government of Botswana calls itself a democracy. But it isn't so
here. We are oppressed until we die, and soon there will be no one
left.'
The Bushmen living in the resettlement camps outside the game reserve
barely survive on meagre government food handouts which do not contain
fresh, nourishing food. Many families say they go hungry as they cannot
supplement the handouts because there is no hunting, or wild fruits and
tubers around the camps. These were already depleted before the camps
were established.
Several dozen Bushmen remain in the CKGR, resisting all attempts to
evict them. They are managing to survive despite the government's ban
on hunting and gathering in the reserve, and constant surveillance by
wildlife scouts.
Next month, the Botswana High Court is due to hear the final
submissions by the lawyers in the Bushmen's long running court case,
where the Bushmen are fighting for their right to return to their land
in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, and to hunt and gather freely.
