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At Loggerheads
| Date: |
06 July 2003 12:00 |
| Producer: |
Grant Nelson
Nikki Berryman
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| Show: | Carte Blanche |
Jurgen Potgieter (Sea Safaris Guide): 'If we do see dolphins or anything we will slow down and stop, and you are welcome to take photos.'
It's December 2002 and tourists throng to visit one of Mozambique's newest marine reserves. There's a buzz around that the Bazaruto archipelago is the place to be.
Lee: 'You will see things here that you will struggle to see elsewhere from the diving perspective. You will see things on every dive.'
A plethora of marine life is luring divers from all corners of the globe. For the last five years dive Jurgen Potgieter has been guiding these sea safaris. One of the star attractions is the turtles.
Jurgen: 'A lot of the guests that come diving here request to see turtles if it's possible. We've been quite successful with that. I would say three out of five times you'll see a turtle.'
This loggerhead is probably the only one out of a thousand hatchlings spawned here that has managed to survive to return to this coastline to lay her eggs. She's waited thirty years for this moment.
Other visitors have also returned to the archipelago after a long absence.
Russel Clements (Visitor): 'Going back, it was a great experience to see it again. Pretty much the same to a large degree.'
Many of Russel Clements' childhood holidays were spent on this coastline. But his rekindled memories of this paradise were tainted by a grisly find.
Russel: 'Unfortunately we were exposed to some horrible sights, with a fishing trawler that was operating within the protected waters of Mozambique.'
On New Years Day his son, Mathew, and friend, Stuart, were playing on the beach near the mainland village of Inhassora.
Mathew: 'At first we thought that they were rocks, so then we went to play on the sand dune and when we got there we saw that it really wasn't a rock. It was actually a slaughtered turtle.'
Stuart: 'And then the next thing we saw a few turtles lying around and you could see half their heads off, their flippers off. It wasn't very nice to see though.'
Russel: 'My son had come back and said that he had seen 18 or 19 turtles dead, washed up on the beach. We had still thought that this was a bit of an exaggeration coming from a ten year old. It was only the horror of the next day that we counted 37.'
Travelling up a stretch of just thirty kilometres of coastline, Russel and his wife Carol encountered dozens of mutilated carcasses of endangered loggerhead and of the critically endangered green turtles.
Carol: 'It was sad because you think, 'Well okay that's the end' and then you'd get to a stage where there were three or four, five of them all together. Then you would drive a bit longer and you would get six or seven all together.'
Killing a turtle in Mozambique carries a stiff fine and while the people gleaned the meat from those washed up, this carnage wasn't at the hands of the local fishermen. It had all the signs of being the work of foreign long-line fishing vessels.
Carol: 'Either the throat was just slit or the whole head was cut off; just whatever way they could have killed this turtle, it was killed.'
This slaughter caused an outcry amongst tourists. Letters and photographs poured in to WWF's offices expressing outrage at this violation of conservation.
Antonio Reina (Endangered Wildlife Trust): 'It's a shocking spectacle for anyone. But when it happened we had four here in Bazuaruto that appeared also without heads.'
Antonio Reina of the Endangered Wildlife Trust manages the WWF programme on Bazaruto Island. He's fighting an ongoing battle against illegal long liners abusing this marine sanctuary. Although it was extended full protection as a national park in November last year, six pirate fishing vessels are known to be operating here. For them the turtles caught on their hooks are nothing but a nuisance.
Antonio: 'They put up a long line. The turtles were hooked and when they pulled the long line, because the turtles are very heavy, they just cut the head... and let all the bodies float.'
Exploiting these rich reefs, the long-liners lay up to twenty-five kilometres of baited hooks along the length of the reserve. Jurgen has pulled up his fair share of these lines.
Jurgen: 'At first we started cutting the lines, but what they guys do is they pick the lines up on the sea floor; they go there at night. So they will scrape things along the sea bottom and drag them and they will pick up the line again because they have marked with GPS (Global Positioning Systems) markings when they put them out. So we started pulling them up.'
Together with WWF he's hauled up hundreds of metres of this heavy line and it can be dangerous work.
Jurgen: 'We have been threatened a few times. It is evident that they have guns on the ships and stuff like that.'
It's little wonder they're so protective over their catch: They're targeting sharks for the lucrative trade in fins. Last year on Carte Blanche we exposed the shark fin industry in South Africa, and in Mozambique, as in most of the world, the cruel practice of finning continues unchecked.
Jurgen: 'This is one that we have found. This comes from this line over here. This is basically rigged out for sharks. It is quite a big hook. And then they have a nylon coated steel trace over here, which is quite strong. And what will happen is the shark will come take the bait off and it will eventually drown.'
While the Mozambican navy doesn't have boats to patrol its waters, these long-liners go unchallenged. And although they usually sneak in at night to set their lines, they have been seen during the day within spitting distance of the islands.
Russel: 'You look at the ship out there and you would like to get hold of it or whatever, but you are unable to. We tried to get hold of WWF and notify them that this boat was there. They always have somebody monitoring the airways because as soon as you make communication to anyone, back to mainland or anywhere, they block the airways by making a whistling sound, jamming the airways and you can see the boat actually turning around and going back out to sea.'
Antonio: 'We try to approach them. We try to talk with them. We try to raid them. We confiscated the long-lines. Once they even left a long-line and went. But it's not solving the problem. They are not listening they do not want to go. The reason of their work is actually a rip of what they can get.'
And the decimation of the turtle population was repeated in February when again dozens of turtles washed up on the beaches. But this slaughter isn't isolated to the reserve. The whole coastline of Mozambique is affected.
Antonio: 'There is an example of 120 rays killed in Manta reef, down south in Inhambane. So they really are destroying everything.'
And in December last year a drowned sperm whale calf was found on Inhaca Island off the coast of the capital, Maputo. Businessman and diver, Nick Raba, had been monitoring its progress since it's birth near the island.
Nick Raba (Businessman): 'I haven't got words that I can put into how you feel when you find a dead whale on the beach; that you have been watching for the first three months and you have been seeing that thing growing. You have no words, words cannot explain it.'
But what he can't put into words Nick's put into action. Forming the Association of Inhaca Island, he's helping to protect the coastline, all the way down south to the border of South Africa.
Nick: 'On Inhaca Island we have seen over the years a definite reduction of turtles coming to nest on the beach -from loggerheads to leatherbacks to green turtles that came up on the beach. It is dwindling and it is a major concern. We are in the water often and the reduction of shark life has been horrific.'
And worldwide trawlers and long-liners leave a trail of horror in their wake, killing around twenty six million sharks every year. Long-liners set an estimated two billion hooks annually, wiping out some forty thousand sea turtles and three hundred thousand sea birds. Along the entire east coast of Africa these vessels take advantage of lax enforcement and violate laws with impunity.
Francisco Bomba (Deputy Director Mozambique Fisheries): 'We are not patrolling our waters, so it is not easy to say how many vessels are moving in our waters. But we have information only from newspapers.'
Not surprisingly Francisco Bomba, Deputy Director of Mozambican Ministry of Fisheries, blames this situation on a lack of resources.
Bomba: 'Some of our stocks are in process of decrease. We don't know very well what is going on, but we are trying to access everything.'
But the situation on the ground is all too clear for the people who live off the sea. While the long-liners and trawlers plunder the fish within sight of the shore, the Mazemba family find their nets lighter than ever.
David Mazemba: 'The problem with long-lines is that they are killing the fish. Big fish which we need. They are killing sharks and everything. So that is why sometimes we don't get a lot of fish here on the bay.'
And after hauling in their net for most of the day the catch is barely enough to sustain David and his extended family.
David: 'We get hungry because we can't catch a lot of fish and everyone is worrying for fishing because we cannot catch anything.'
And while the authorities crack down on the local boats fishing in the reserve, these fishermen see little action against the long-liners.
Antonio: 'One of their arguments is that, 'You just confiscate the poor small guys'. The Chinese do whatever they want and you don't do anything. Of course we try to do whatever we can. It's frustrating for everyone.'
A frustration also felt by the local lodge owners. Chairman of Inhambane Tourism Association and general manager of Beach Lodge, Ed Brits, believes the impact could be devastating.
Ed Brits (Chairman of Inhambane Tourism): 'If the reefs start getting stripped, turtles go, the dugongs go, the dolphins go; there is going to be no tourism left in Mozambique. There is going to be nothing here if it's all stripped. And that's going to be a disaster.'
With tourism on the upsurge, the local operators aren't taking this lying down. But while the lodges and fishing boat charters are rallying together with WWF to rid the sanctuary of this scourge, the long-liners have the upper hand.
Ed: 'They have excellent radar, their boats are fast. Even our little ski boats from the hotel trying to go investigate, they can outrun them. It's so easy for them.'
Antonio: 'I think it's out of control because we don't have enough resources to take care of them. We need the big boys with the big guns.'
And in May, the big guns finally arrived. After months of negotiations with the government, a contingent of marines from the Mozambican navy was sent to the WWF base camp on Bazaruto.
On the 10th of May the alert came: A long-liner was spotted off the northern point of the island. One of the managers of Bazaruto Lodge, Louis Erasmus, was the first to sound the alarm.
Louis Erasmus (Manager Bazaruto Lodge): 'One of the game guards came up to me and said that they thought that a long-line was out at sea. So I went around the corner and then I started phoning the park here. We decided that we are not going to use radios.'
Without boats, the marines called on a nearby resort hotel for help. Kim Rossi, activities manager at Indigo Bay, has been working with WWF in monitoring the long-liners.
Kim Rossi (Manager Indigo Bay): 'We were just basically the mode of transport to get them there and they took it from there and they took control of the situation completely.'
With two ski boats Kim and her skippers went to the WWF base to pick up the troops.
Kim: 'As they came out ... we got a bit of a gulp in our stomachs as they came out in their full gear and all their weapons and whatever. We hoisted the Mozambique flag, put it on the boat and then we went off.'
Half an hour later they sighted the long-liner over reefs just north of the island of Santa Carolina, well within the marine reserve.
Kim: 'We tried to make radio contact, the army did actually stand forth and show their presence and show their arms, but still they didn't pay any attention to us.'
Navy: 'Hey stop, stop!'
Kim: 'And then they fired off some warning shots, but then the trawler proceeded to start its engines and head for the deeper seas.'
With the long-liner making a dash for it, the boats came together for a quick plan of action.
Kim: 'We decided that we were going to go and open fire.'
As the skipper began turning the ski-boat around the long-liner retaliated with a volley of fire.
Kim: 'They went in, they shot and then we came back and regrouped again.'
Clearly the pirate vessel had no intention of heaving to and it was decided that nothing short of a rocket propelled grenade would stop them.
Kim: 'We then approached the trawler again and they let off one rocket which took out their fly bridge or their cross tower. There was a lot of excitement, especially after the RPG hit the boat. It was a seriously joyous occasion and kind of a relief in a way. It was a very proud moment to say that, 'We're not going to take it anymore'. The army fully understood that. They knew that they had a mission to do and they were going to do it.'
Reports came back that, although there were no injuries, the long-liner had to be towed away. The message sent out was loud and clear.
Louis: 'It's made a huge impact obviously. There is nothing. You don't see any activities. They must either be 50 miles off shore now or they are just gone because, since then, we haven't seen anything.'
But while this was a battle won, the war carries on.
Nick: 'Those long liners that have been attacked up there were just pushed down the coastline where the fishing is easier. Now if we don't have the same response at Inhaca they are going to fish our coast and they are going to fish Ponta and they are going to move up the coast again. So we need to be prepared all the way down the coast.'
While the marines are now permanently based on Bazaruto, Nick is negotiating to establish similar bases further down south, with the tourist operators as their eyes and ears.
Nick: 'It's essential that we get together and protect and get rid of these vermin that are attacking our coastline because that is what they are, they are vermin.'
IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER:While every attempt has been made to ensure this transcript or summary is accurate, Carte Blanche or its agents cannot be held liable for any claims arising out of inaccuracies caused by human error or electronic fault. This transcript was typed from a transcription recording unit and not from an original script, so due to the possibility of mishearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, errors cannot be ruled out.
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