When Africa's stolen bounty burns

Is this the evidence of Kenya’s zero-tolerance approach towards poaching and illegal wildlife trade or a government going mad?

Kenyans had mixed reactions to government’s plans to burn the world’s largest stockpile of ivory tusks and rhino horn, worth millions of dollars, in Nairobi this past week.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta is convening the inaugural Giants Club Summit to address the elephant-poaching crisis in Africa and work towards a lasting solution for the conservation of the continent’s wildlife.

The Giants Club was founded by the presidents of Botswana, Gabon, Kenya and Uganda, with support from Space for Giants and its patron, Evgeny Lebedev, the London-based Russian owner of The Independent and Evening Standard newspapers.

The summit is punted as the largest gathering of African presidents to solely focus on protecting the continent’s natural heritage.

Kenyatta has maintained that the burning of 105 tons of ivory and one ton of rhino horn will serve as “proof of Kenya’s zero-tolerance approach” to poaching and dealing in ivory.

Kenya’s environment secretary, Professor Judi Wakhungu, described the plan as being part of Kenya’s efforts to highlight the continuing threat of poaching to Africa’s wildlife.

“Kenya is once again boldly leading the way by demonstrating that ivory must be put beyond economic use by burning our entire stockpile,” she told The Telegraph.

THE TOOTH FAIRY WON’T PAY Kenya Wildlife Service rangers stack the elephant tusks. The message from Kenya’s president was clear last year: ‘Poachers and their enablers will not have the last word in Kenya’ PHOTO: REUTERS

all hands on deck Kenya Wildlife Service director-general Kitili Mbathi and Winnie Kiiru, country director of Stop Ivory, stack an elephant tusk on the pyre PHOTO: REUTERS

helping hand A contractor carries an elephant tusk to the pyre in Kenya. A tusk from an adult male elephant can weigh between 45kg and 80kg PHOTO: REUTERS

SPEAKING TOOTH TO POWER The ivory was confiscated from poachers. In March last year, Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta pledged to destroy all the nation’s ivory PHOTO: AP Photo/Ben Curtis

in sync US ambassador to the UN Samantha Power and Cameroonian Wildlife Minister Philip Ngole Ngwese place elephant tusks on a pyre in Cameroon this week PHOTO: AP Photo/Andrew Harnik

SACRIFICE TO NATURE On Tuesday, a stack of ivory tusks and other ivory objects were burnt in Yaounde, the capital of Cameroon. Six tons of ivory that were confiscated from poachers were incinerated as a result of a trans-border agreement with neighbouring countries to step up efforts to stop the poaching of elephants PHOTO: afp