Chronicle Editor
Lumbidzani Dima, Chronicle Reporter
THE Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (Zimparks) has recruited 10 members of the San community to be part of rangers fighting poaching.
This follows last month’s Cabinet decision that Government departments should integrate the San into their systems as part of an initiative to uplift members of the community.
Last month, the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correction Services (ZPCS) selected 20 San community members to join its force in compliance with the Cabinet decision.
In an interview, Zimparks spokesperson Mr Tinashe Farawo said they were recruiting the San in line with Government’s directive.
“We are a Government department, so everything that we do fits into the 100-day cycle of the Government as was announced recently. We have a lot of initiatives that we are doing in Tsholotsho as part of the programmes to incorporate the San people into mainstream society. It’s part of our corporate social responsibility,” said Mr Farawo.
He said the San community live closer to Hwange National Park and have fallen victims to human animal conflict hence there is need to capacitate them so that they benefit from resources within their communities.
Mr Farawo said so far, they have recruited 10 San members to join Zimparks but as an institution are concerned with the low uptake of the programme among the marginalised community.
“So far we have recruited about 10 people from the San community. Six have started work and three of them are supposed to go for training at the Zimbabwe Institute of Wildlife Management. Unfortunately, we are facing challenges in terms of the uptake of the course, the uptake is just so low, but we are on the ground doing something about that,” said Mr Farawo.
“We go around educating them about that kind of programme. The San are the people we are supposed to help because they are the ones who share a living space with the animals, I mean they have even lost relatives to wildlife, so they need to know about it.”
As part of its inclusive development, Government is set to build a primary and a secondary school for the marginalised San community.
The Government, in line with National Development Strategy NDS-1 which is informed by Vision 2030, has said no citizen will be left behind in its developmental agenda.
In that regard, Government has taken deliberate actions to ensure that the San are also not left behind as the nation forges ahead towards an upper middle-income economy by 2030.
Government has taken a position that no community should be left behind in the development matrix.
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