The response and tribute from Nigerians to the unfortunate killing of “Elephant Ondo” published on this page last week was incredible. I was shocked at the kind thoughts and pains shown by many readers who called or sent SMS. In fact, at some point, I stopped picking calls to avoid being worked up over our nation’s poor conservation attitude and (dis)respect for nature.
It was painful to know from the lines of enquires and conversation with most callers that conservation education in Nigeria is at its most primitive level and one wonders at who will bell the proverbial cat. A cursory look at our conservation map shows that the federal, state and local governments’ constitutional mandates on this issue have been thrown to the dogs. Sad! The state and local governments cannot even be found on the map.
At the federal level, our protected environment has been left to fallow and struggle due to lack of funding for over a decade. The well-trained managers and conservators at our national parks have become beggars overnight and their call to duty to protect our flora and fauna resources stiffled in absolute frustration and despondency.
It is no news that the protective cover at this realm of global conservation best practices is threatened by funding neglect, lack of judicial understanding and poor education on the importance of the conservation value chain to the economy and our social wellbeing.
To those who might think that we do not need to weep and spare a thought for how Nigerians crudely woke up one morning to brazenly slaughter “Elephant Ondo” in broad daylight and stood over the carcass like David over Goliath, they should contrast this barbaric posture with the sound judicial intervention in India last week, which sent a Bollywood star, Salman Khan, to prison for illegal poaching of two black bucks, a type of antelope found in Rajasthan state in North West India.
Even though Khan has appealed the five-year prison term, the sensitivity and clear-cut understanding on the part of the Indian judiciary to the nation’s conservation expectations and value chain reverberated across the world and stands India as a trusted ally in global conservation ethics, a promoter of eco-tourism values.
Our judicial history on conservation education and pronouncements are not only obsolete and out of sync with 21st century over rive on matters of protected areas management, our National Assembly members are not known collaborators and sympathizers of flora and fauna conservation and protection. Between these two critical arms of government expected to strengthen our conservation values, there can be found possible looters of our forest ecosystem and godfathers of entrenched conservation ignorance and neglect.
I, therefore, submit and canvass that Nigeria should be delisted from all United Nations conservation activities, until we show some measure of respect for nature and environmental ethics. We are, however, not unmindful of the activities of rogue elements, companies and nations determined to paint Nigeria’s modest conservation efforts black in order to justify certain international conspiracies to deny Nigeria international funding for the protection of nature.
On this score, the truth is that we are our own enemies. Our leaders and governors make ignorant conservation pronouncements that tend to fuel the denial of necessary funding support from outside our shores.
There is nothing stopping Ondo State governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, for instance, from calling for help from Shell, Mobil, Dangote, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and other global conservation funding and supporting NGOs to come over to Ondo to support and help create the needed enabling environment that could secure Ondo elephants and other fauna resources.
That Nigeria is rooted at one spot on conservation education practice is sad. Even the intervention templates of our foremost conservation NGO, Nigeria Conservation Foundation (NCF), is on the decline. Up north, savannah conservation is dead; ditto almost all activist conservation groups.
It is, therefore, not a wonder to hear Kaduna State governor, Nasir El-Rufai, calling for the return of Kamuku National Park to a fancy farmland in the state, which has over-thirsty forest reserve areas left to fallow. In Kano, Governor Ganduje wants herdsmen to come and graze at Falgore Forest Reserve, and others that showcases Nigeria to the world as a failed state.
To end this piece, let me thank Gerald Oputa who wrote to condemn the killing of “Elephant Ondo” and “the disheartening display of animals slaughtered by poachers on our highways.” Barr. Ngozi Ogbomor canvasses for a federal legislation criminalising killing of fauna resources, in order to mitigate the alarming rate of their poaching, while Ike Okija stated that he was better informed on how Nigerians should join hands to protect animals and not give honour to hunters who kill elephants.
There were many reactions from readers, which I cannot publish here due to space constraints, but the truth remains that the time has come for all of us to spare a kobo and thought for Nigeria’s conservation tomorrow. I am heading to Ondo soon and also going back to our protected areas across Nigeria to bring you that information that tells how we need to relate with Mother Earth.