The impacts corruption has on rhino conservation

South Africa is home to the majority of the world's rhino population (as far as individuals go, not the number of species) and as such plays a critical role in ensuring the survival of the species. There are many different stakeholders in both the private and government sectors as well as many organisations that contribute to the protection of the rhinos.

With the ever-increasing poaching numbers, the realisation of the extent of the problem becomes larger. From the outside, it looks like a group of poachers, killing a rhino to cut off its horn (or worse cutting it off whilst the animal is left to slowly bleed out) and then smuggling that horn off to some street market in Asia. The problem however lies much deeper than that, unfortunately.

Throughout many governmental sectors in South Africa, there is a lot of corruption. This corruption stems all the way from the new police officer, all the way up the chain to the court officials and Judges. This chain of corruption has been and will continue to entice potential poachers to take the risk for the reward, with the knowledge that bribery and corruption throughout the legal justice system, will hopefully be able to help them if they get caught. And here within, lies the major problem.

It is not just the police and justice officials. There has been a large increase in the number of inside jobs being done by corrupt park rangers, and this isn't just limited to the government reserves and parks. There are more and more cases involving rangers either physically involved in the killing and poaching of rhinos, or alternatively helping provide insightful information to the poachers about how to gain access, avoid anti-poaching teams, or even the location of the rhinos. 

There is no way to stop poaching if there is no deterrent. Physical boundaries are often not enough, as without constant maintenance and perimeter patrols (which in some parks like Kruger, spans hundreds if not thousands of kilometres) is almost impossible to keep everyone out. There needs to be significant punishment put on those caught and prosecuted. The justice system needs to not only impose a more significant sentence to dissuade potential poachers (I must admit there have been increased cases with 20+ year sentences which is a good start) but also needs to hold the corrupt officials to an even greater account instead of trying to protect them. 

According to Jamie Joseph from Saving the Wild, there was a tax-funded investigation back in 2016 which looked into the corruption being faced in the famous Hluhluwe-Imfolozi Parl in KwaZula-Natal. This park was where 307 out of the 499 rhinos poached during 2023 in South Africa were killed.  Despite being tax-funded the ANC government, both back in 2016/17 and during their 2019-2024 term, refused to release this report, thus covering up, and in a way encouraging this corruption that is feeding the poaching of rhinos to continue. 

This has all got to come to an end, and quick, before it is too late. Hundreds of rhinos are dying every year, and very little justice is being done to stop it. I encourage you to help put pressure on the justice system, as well as the new provincial and national governments to release these sorts of reports, flush out the corruption, and help be the change that will ensure that rhinos still exist in 10 years.