By PERDITA CHENJELA –
HUMANS have human rights but animals do not.
Their rights have to be determined by humanity, meaning animal rights have to be made and adhered to by animal rights makers.
In Zambia and many parts of the world, people have, since time immemorial, lived side by side with animals, knowing not when to provoke the beasts and the beasts knowing where not to go unless in desperate situations where the animals need to look for food as has been the case during floods, drought seasons or when their natural habitats are threatened.
However, as world populations increase, struggles for space and food start to arise, with humans who have an upper hand terminating whatever comes their way to occupy space.
This need has led to indiscriminate cutting of trees, killing and, to some extents, extinction of certain species of flora and fauna.
This, however, has had its effects on the environment which, to some extent, is threatening the very existence of all forms of life on Planet Earth.
Human-wildlife conflict happens when animals and people encounter each other, leading to negative outcomes like loss of life, livelihood, property or habitat.
In recent years, population expansion and shrinking of natural habitats are causing people and animals to come into conflict with each other in order to share, food, space and, sometimes, water.
In 2024, places like Feira, Chiawa, Chikankata, Luano and Chirundu have recorded a number of these conflicts, with people being maimed or killed.
Such reports would usually end by Department of National Parks and Wildlife (DNPW) going to get a report and, sometimes, tracking an animal that has killed a person and warnings issued for people to stay out of the animal’s way.
According to a 2023 ministerial statement, Zambia recorded 4, 206 reports of animal human conflict in the second quarter of the year.
During the 2023/2024 season, Zambia and many other countries in southern Africa received below average rainfall, leading to many obvious conflicts as people and animals learned to share the little food resources, water and conducive habitats in a survival-of-the-fittest situation.
In Chilindi ward in Chirundu under Chief Chipepo, the area which is naturally disadvantaged in that its underground water is salty and probably only good for animals, the water table has gone further down, leading to taps piped from the Zambezi River not pumping out any water resulting in the villagers receiving the little water (for drinking only) through water browsers from the Chirundu City Council on a weekly basis.
The only available source of water is a muddy dam where domestic and wild animals, including birds, flock to quench their thirst.
In another ward in Kapilurila, which has an irrigation pump that predates Zambia’s political independence in 1964, the people’s challenge is hippos and elephants on the banks of the Zambezi River which have been going upland in search of food.
One of the victims is farmer Dickson Majere whose crops and those of a friend where in August 2024 destroyed by hippos which like eating maize while it is still small.
Being a season for a common wild fruit called masau, elephants too cross into villages in search of the fruits; the very fruits humans yearn to rely on for food.
Villages attest to the fact that the best way to stay alive is to stay away from the elephants’ way, even when they enter one’s house in search of masau which have a strong smell, stay away and, after they have eaten, leave with minimal destruction.
“The elephants usually come to look for food in the mornings and evenings and the best medicine is to give them way. For hippos, we can scare them using noisy gongs which we have used since time immemorial whenever they start straying,”Mr Majere said.
He said this year, and a few other years when there have been droughts, are exceptional.
Mr Majere added that the populations of hippos and elephants seem to have increased and called on the DNPW to, this year, consider cropping hippos and elephants which are destroying their crops as the food diminishes in their natural habitat.
The villagers as well, due to dry taps, have now started going to the crocodile-infested Zambezi River to draw water for their daily use.
This trend has led to a number of people being attacked, with the lucky ones surviving with broken limbs while, in worst cases, dying.
In trying to take advantage of low water levels, meaning fish becoming easy to catch, some people risk their lives to fearlessly enter even areas which are known to have huge numbers of crocodiles.
Kapilurila ward councilor Chirundu Albert Muzumba echoed the people’s complaints and said the animals had found consolation in the crops farmed by the banks of the Zambezi.
Mr Muzumba said Kapilurila ward was not under the Game Management Area but people have, since he was born 50 years ago, lived side by side with animals, including crocodiles, but that this year is exceptional because of the scarce food resources that have to be shared between animals and humans.
He added that this was currently not the case as his and other villages near the Zambezi River area were facing serious human-animal conflicts because of the drought.
He said irrigation farmers had shifted from their villages to the fields with their families so as to help each other in scaring the hippos whenever they invaded crops.
“We have a serious problem, DNPW are aware of the problem of hippos and crocodiles. They only end at coming to get reports. We beg the government to consider cropping the animals. They can even go with all the carcasses after killing them but what we are interested in is the safety of our crops,”
He added that some people whose water sources had dried upland were facing the same by being attacked by crocodiles such that they had resorted to moving in groups whenever they were going to draw water from the only source, which was the Zambezi River.
“We are aware we are not supposed to kill these animals but government, just as much as they want to realise foreign exchange out of natural resources, should also think of us the common people. We survive on irrigation farming as the only hope against starvation but if animals are given priority over us, then we don’t know what that means,” he said.
Mr Majere said he had been living in Chirundu for more than 25 years but did not ever remember a time when animals were cropped.
Only when a person had been killed would that animal be tracked.
“We live with animals but things this year are not as normal. So, our plea should not be ignored. When a person is killed by a crocodile, they do come to kill that animal but do not having a programme to reduce the population as a measure to protect our crops. Maybe they can make exceptions in special cases like this year when there is a drought. We do not need the meat. They can take it; all we are worried about is starvation,” he said.