IT has been a momentous week for Sarawak even as the huge crowd who turned up for the ‘722 Sarawak Independence and Freedom’ rally in Kuching took everyone by surprise.
While we were riveted to that demand by Sarawakians for the fulfillment of the Malaysia Agreement, signed in 1963, and the on-going IMDB drama with its twists and turns, a tragedy that unfolded in Limbang made mere ripples among the public.
In the early hours of Friday, 26-year-old Nurfazilah Abdul Rahman, a temporary teacher of Telahak primary school, was dragged into the Limbang River and killed by a crocodile while she was taking water for ablution for her morning prayers.
Her death again brings to a head the often tragic standoff between these man-eating reptiles and the people who live by the river.
According to a source in the Forestry Department, there have been at least five fatal crocodile attacks on humans so far this year.
The number of deaths at the jaws of the crocs and the several attacks where the victims managed to escape with severe injuries, show there has been at least one crocodile attack every month of the year.
Our wildlife authorities seem hard put to deal with this life-threatening menace from the murky waters of our rivers as they have to strike a delicate balance between conserving the endangered reptiles and culling their numbers to a safe level for the well-being of riverine folks.
It is clear that efforts to protect crocodiles in our rivers have been too successful and with the increasing number of attacks, it is time to rethink our conservation policy.
In dealing with the increasing crocodile population in our rivers, we are, perhaps, held back by our association with international conservation bodies that subjects us to the conventions on wildlife perservation to which we are a signatory.
It is interesting to note that our politicians have been rather guarded in their views on dealing with the crocodile menace.
In response to Nurfazilah’s death, a local assemblyman tiptoed round the idea of culling the crocodiles by suggesting they be captured and kept in sanctuaries or enclosures, and avoided coming up with the politically incorrect solution of killing the reptiles.
Capturing these giant beasts and keeping them in sanctuaries is a laughable idea as it is well nigh impossible to catch them alive given the extensive river system of our state.
And where are we to find an area big enough to keep and feed the captured crocs? The few crocodile farms in the state do not have the capacity to keep all the crocodiles captured from the wild.
Moreover, these farms actually breed their own crocodiles to harvest the young croc skins as those from fully grown crocodiles are too coarse to have any value.
With the increasing frequency of crocodile attacks, conserving them has become untenable. It is time to take off the kids’ glove in dealing with these man-eaters and tear up the international conventions on their conservation the state has signed.
Since we have declared war on illegal loggers and illegal immigrants, why can’t we declare war on crocodiles as well, especially when there is now justification to do so.