Fight against poaching and corruption will continue at whatever cost - says Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Tina Joemat-Pettersson

1 Aug 2012

Today I want to commend officials from my department and the community members who have assisted us to expose a network of poaching and other legal activities. We encourage patriotic South African citizens to come forward if they have information. This information will be treated with the greatest respect and confidentiality. All whistle-blowers will be given the necessary protection.

Illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing is done in a highly sophisticated way by organised criminal syndicates, some of which are linked internationally to drug, human and counterfeit goods trafficking. Large scale poaching of abalone threatens to wipe out South Africa's stocks of the highly prized shellfish. A huge demand for abalone products from the Far East has led to the collapse of the abalone fisheries around the world and now our fishery is threatened.

The past few weeks have seen the results months of hard work by dedicated officials that led to the arrest of a number of nine poachers in six different incidents.

This month, the second leg of an anti-racketeering court case involving abalone will be heard in the Western Cape High Court. 14 accused will stand trial after the first leg resulted in seven convictions.

Last week over 30 436 unit of abalone were confiscated, leading to seven arrests in five different incidents of illegal poaching by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, the South African Police Services and the Fisheries Control Officers (FCOs).

This last week with our increased surveillance and integrated actions, as part of the Integrated Security Surveillance, we made significant arrests. However, our biggest goal is not only to arrest criminals but to prevent them from taking the resources out of the ocean, threatening the livelihoods of our people.

• In the morning of July 26, a Chinese national was arrested in a house in Milnerton in possession of 4 8 24 units of wet shucked abalone (around 424kg) and 328 units of dry abalone (around 100kg).
• Daniel Niewoudt has already appeared at the Hermanus Magistrate's Court after police noticed a car hidden amongst trees  and bushes on the R43 near Gaansbaai. Investigation found 3 346 units of wet shucked abalone (337kg) was found in various bags. 
• On the Tuesday last week, two men ran away when they crashed their car into a house in Mount Pleasant in Hermanus after members of the SAPS' Tactical Response Team and FCOs gave chase. The team found 3 410 units (530kg) of wet shucked abalone in the vehicle.
• A father and son were arrested in the biggest raid when five FCOs confiscated 10 480 units of wet abalone (1 743.31 kg) last Thursday. The men have already appeared in court.
• Members of the Western Cape Crime Intelligence and Flying Squad also arrested three men at Canal Walk in Milnerton when they were found to be in possession of 4 315 units of wet shucked abalone (596.61 kg). The car they were travelling in was impounded.
• Two arrests were made in Riviersonderend last Friday. A total of 3 806 abalone were confiscated.

To achieve this, we are working with officials and the community. We are also working closely with our national and international law enforcement agencies including the South African Police Services and the Fisheries Control Officers (FCOs).

A preliminary investigation reveals that there is corruption within our Fisheries Branch in the department and that some officials may be implicated. This corruption is in the allocation of quotas, permits, transfer of rights and preferential treatment given to certain businesses. We had asked an international auditing firm to do a forensic investigation and a lifestyle audit and they are advanced in this.

Fisheries is a very important component of food security and economic development of this country and the functioning of this branch to its optimum levels cannot and should not be compromised by any misdeeds, if any, by individuals inside or outside the branch.

My role is to uplift, protect and to develop the poor communities in the sector. I shall persevere to do so whatever the risk. Despite an orchestrated, vicious and baseless campaign to discredit me. I shall not be deterred from my commitment to combat corruption in my department.

I am going to clean up the department no matter what cost. We will not be threatened, we will not be harassed nor will be intimidated.

We are determined to root out corruption. We will not hesitate to act against any officials who are implicated in anyway whatsoever in any corrupt practices.

Statement issued by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, August 1 2012

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