Call to protect elephants on World Elephant Day

“Are we happy to suppose that our grandchildren may never be able to see an elephant, except in a picture book?” – David Attenborough.

Of the five big games, it is not easy to come by an Elephant in Nigeria today – both in the wild and in captive except you find yourself in the Yankari National Park, believed to have the largest and most important Elephants herd of merely 100-150 or the Omu – Shasha Forest, Ogun State.

The other place you can readily come by an Elephant is at the Jos Wildlife Park where an eight-foot, one-tusked, African Savannah Elephant (Loxodonta africana) has been stranded in an isolated block for 38 years.

A report by the United Nations in 2015, asserts that up to 100 Elephants – both Savannah and Forest species are being slaughtered daily in Africa by poachers, primarily for their tusk which the Chinese market constantly demands. As organisations and conservationists intensify efforts to halt illegal ivory trade and wildlife trafficking, recent research posits that the whole of Africa has an estimate of 352,271 Savanna Elephants left, a far cry from between 3-5 million censored by World Wildlife Foundation in the 20th century.

25 years after a ban was placed on ivory trade, emerging markets still makes it more difficult to address this menace.

The efforts of Nigeria-based organisations like Wildlife of Africa Conservation Initiative through her various Wildlife Education programmes and the Nigerian Conservation Foundation through her Forest Elephant Alive Campaign, among others, should not only be commended, they should be better funded to help them explore effective, science-based conservation strategies.

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If we want future generations to live in a world where elephants thrive, the Wildlife Conservation Society advocates increased aerial surveillance in strongholds, training and deployment of more rangers in protected areas, supply of equipment to new rangers, assisting the authorities in tracking and shutting down trafficking networks and growing community development programs to support local communities to co-exist with wildlife.

‘Seyifunmi Adebote,

Abuja, Nigeria