HARARE – Zimbabwean officials are unhappy that CITES chief  Willem Wijnstekers will tour a top private game conservancy during his visit to Zimbabwe next week, apparently fearful he will end up learning too much about wanton poaching decimating the country’s wildlife, sources told ZimOnline Thursday.

The CITES secretary general is expected in Harare on Monday for talks with Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, defence minister Emmerson Mnangagwa, Attorney General Johannes Tomana, police chief Augustine Chihuri and commissioner of taxes Geshom Pasi.

Wijnstekers was initially scheduled to meet Mugabe but government officials on Thursday said this was no longer possible.

The CITES boss will discuss with Mnangagwa the alleged involvement of senior military officers in poaching while he seeks to establish from Chihuri and Tomana security measures put in place to curb illegal killing of protected wildlife and measures taken against those caught poaching including the levels of sentencing.

But officials at the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources Management are more worried that Wijnstekers will upon arrival visit the largely white-owned private Save Conservancy that has suffered poaching while some parts of the reserve have been invaded by supporters of Mugabe’s ZANU PF party.

"We are concerned by the undiplomatic conduct of Wijnstekers,'" said a senior official, who spoke on condition he was not named. The visit to the conservancy is private (but) we feel he could have done so some other time. We are concerned he will be only told that which suits whites interests and government will not be able to defend itself."

Wijnstekers only begins meeting government officials on Tuesday after his return from Save.

However while officials fumed about Wijnstekers’ alleged lack of diplomatic etiquette, private conservationists said the real cause of Harare’s anger was the fact that the Save trip will allow them (private conservationists) an opportunity to apprise the CITES boss of rampant poaching in Zimbabwe.

Poaching has been rife in Zimbabwe since landless black villagers began invading – with tacit approval from the government – white-owned farms and game conservancies over the past nine years.

Some of the country’s biggest state-owned nature and game conservancies including Gonarezhou national park that forms part of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier straddling across Zimbabwe, Mozambique and South Africa have large parts occupied by villagers.

There has also been an upsurge in the poaching of endangered species such as the rhino targeted for its horn that is exported mainly to China and Vietnam where it is in huge demand. International syndicates working with local gangs are said to be behind rhino poaching.

While other reports say illegal and uncontrolled trophy hunting on former white-owned conservancies now controlled by powerful government officials and members of Mugabe’s ZANU PF party politicians has been on the rise.

The government however denies politicians are illegally hunting game and insists it still has poaching under control. – ZimOnline