YESTERDAY newspaper headline ‘Croc hunters have gone home’ is such a poignant note. It carries an air of lack of resolve, of defeatism and most of all, abandonment.
COSTLY OPERATION: Hunting team next to the carcass of the crocodile they found floating some 7km downstream of Kpg Empelam recently.
Let me first recap the issue at hand. The villagers of Kampung Emplam by Sungai Seblak, have been living in fear of man-eating crocodiles in their river. They so far have suffered three attacks resulting in two deaths and one serious injury in the last two months. According to the Sarawak Forestry Corporation (SFC) general manager, they have received seven reports of attacks this year and nine last year. So, it is understandable that the villagers feel that they have been terrorised by these reptiles.
The pity is that the Seblak River is regarded as one of the richest fishing grounds for prawns in the state. A local fisherman said a morning’s foray into the river could easily net 6 to 7kg of prawns, which could fetch more than RM20 per kg. It seems the crocodiles have not only taken lives but also the livelihood of the village.
Thus, they appealed to the authorities to help them get rid of the menace. And the authorities responded in full force. Armed with a licence to kill, a 28-men hunting team comprising personnel from the police, Fire and Rescue Department, Rela and District Office was assembled.
Since the advent of nature programmes on television, we have been used to shows of crocodile hunters luring and capturing these reptiles with apparent ease. Well, those are just television shows, albeit reality shows. Real reality, however, is a different story. After four chilling nights patrolling the river, the hunting team called it quits. They reportedly have shot four but only managed to recover one carcass as show of proof. The reason given for the ceasing of the operation was cost.
This is the first of the moves that confounds me. A village has just lost a few good men and also the use of their river as a food source and transportation and we cannot help them to resolve their problem because we do not have the funds.
If the news report is correct the team have incurred a princely sum of RM3,000 for the four-day operation. Now, I seem to have read a report somewhere that a spouse of a VVIP has recently dished out some 20 million bucks for a diamond bangle. Naah, I am sure that must be a false report put up by some mischievous characters on the Net.
But what was true (it must be true because it was reported in the mainstream news media) that the wife of a certain ex-VVIP managed to raise a cool RM1 million for a charity by going bald. I must congratulate her for her caring gesture.
I hope the generous donors can just reach a bit deeper in their pockets and give some loose change to the crocodile-hunting team to continue their operation a while longer. Maybe they’ll have a fighting chance of nailing the giant rogue crocodile that the villagers believe has developed a habit of hunting humans.
However, it seemed that the whole exercise was not entirely pointless. According to an official of the district, “(the) operation is the first of its kind undertaken at Sungai Seblak. Since the start of the operation last Monday, we have learnt a lot. We surely want to have a more effective plan and strategies to catch or kill these saltwater reptiles in future operations.”
He went on to say that a comprehensive report on the operation would be made so that future operations would be better managed and coordinated. ‘Comprehensive report’ is well and good, provided that it is not to be taken in place of action. If I were one of the villagers from Kampung Emplam, I would want the future to be soon, if not now.
His parting remark, which I take to mean to be consoling: “Don’t be too emotional on this matter. Be rational and work closely with the District Office and the police so that they can give ample guidance and supervision.”
Gulp! How can one tell the widow of the fisherman killed by the crocodile, and who has been waiting now for over two months for the financial aid promised by the authorities, not to be too emotional and be ‘rational’. It boggles the mind, at least it does mine.
However, I believe there is a bigger issue involved here and the remark by the general manager of the SFC is telling: “The culling of crocodiles in the river is something that we don’t want to do,” stressing that the operation was carried out after taking into account several considerations and was at the request of the local community. He also said that personally he would not want the operation to be carried out, but other ways to manage the sensitivities of the locals had to be found.
Hmmm, I wonder whether the whole crocodile-hunting episode was just a public relations exercise, to placate the angry and grieving villagers. It is not as silly and cynical as one may think. The general manger of SFC may have a case. If we were to stand back a bit (I admit it is difficult for the villagers of Kampung Emplam to do so), we could look at the bigger picture. It is foolhardy to intervene in the development of things in nature.
As one politician put it: “There is an equilibrium in the ecosystem. If we go on a rampage to kill crocodiles, it is against nature.”
There are precedents where man’s intervention proved to be disastrous. The famous Yellowstone National Park in the US is a case in point. The park spans an area of 3,468.4 square miles comprising lakes, canyons, rivers and mountain ranges.
In the early 1900s visitors to the park could marvel at the sight of thousands of bison and elks grazing in the open fields. At some point the park management noticed that the elk population was declining.
They instituted a programme of culling the predators – the wolves. The park management also prohibited Native Americans from hunting the elks. As a result the elk population exploded.
They overgrazed and drove the bison out of the park. The numerous elks also stripped the park of its aspen and willow stands, which in turn affected the beavers which rely on aspen to build their dams. The beavers’ dams, as it turned out, are nature’s way of regulating the water flow, vital for preserving the wetlands. I spent three days at Yellowstone Park two weeks ago. Each day I did a round trip of four hours driving. I saw a dozen or so bison and scores of elks. I was told that the image of thousands of animals roaming the huge grassland is but a distant memory.
So back home to our crocodile story. “I don’t believe the mounting of a gun-totting posse on a shooting spree is the solution. Just a thought.” why not commission one of those television crocodile hunters to trap the reptiles for relocation
He gets to use Sarawak as his film location. Sarawak can be featured on world television, thereby helping to promote us as a tourism destination. Think of the headline, ‘Sarawak, land of man-eating crocodiles’. I am sure that’s worth a bob or two.
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