Park Invasion near the Nyaleke Patrol Post
Category: Out on Patrol | Date: Mar 26 2007 | By: admin
If you leave the large town of Beni by heading east, you will shortly enter Virunga National Park. This area is controlled by the Nyaleke Patrol Post, where recently there was a land invasion into the park by the local people.
They had only been in place a couple of days and had already started to put up shelters.
Our Communications Officer was sent in initially to talk to the people, but when they refused to remove the Advance Force had to intervene.
This is another of those times when our job is very difficult as it is so very hard to turn the people away. Extreme poverty is a reality here in Congo and these people, most of them displaced by the war, came with the intention to cultivate the land. But if we are to ensure that the wildlife here are protected, we have to limit the number of villages and towns that are allowed to exist within the park’s boundaries.
Once we had managed to remove all the people by putting them into trucks headed back towards Beni, we then had to set about burning all that was left behind.
It is necessary to do this as we do not want any of our animals here to catch human diseases.
As a fine for entering the park we impounded all of their bicycles, which also acts as a temporary intervention to stop these people from coming back straight away.
These bikes will be taken to the Court of Justice in Beni.
Technorati : Beni, Congo, Conservation, DRC, Virunga, WildlifeDirect
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4 Responses to “Park Invasion near the Nyaleke Patrol Post”
Chris, on 26 Mar 2007
As hard as it is to do, this was the right thing. There is so precious little land and habitat left for these animals that it must be protected at any cost. Thank you for protecting it against very difficult circumstances.
Ken, on 28 Mar 2007
Is the goverment doing anything to settle these squatters? Am sure DR Congo has large tracts of land outside protected areas. Unless this is done, the problem will keep reccuring.
Elie, on 29 Mar 2007
Thank you Chris for your support.
You are right, we must work to protect the animals. It is hard when our struggle is not against those with bad intentions, just those looking for somewhere to live. But this is the situation and we must stand strong.
Elie
Elie, on 29 Mar 2007
Hello Ken
I’m afraid our just newly elected government has many other matters to deal with for the time being.
Even though we are a large country, here in the East we are in a heavily populated area, which increased dramatically during the wars here and in our neighboring countries.
We will only be able to stop this problem from recurring once we have expanded the size of the Advance Force so that we can better protect the park.
Elie
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