SOS Bushmen

Tony Weaver thinks that the Botswana Bushmen’s return to their ancestral lands in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve after their recent court victory was “shambolic”, and that for some reason this is Survival’s fault (January 26). This is curious logic, to say the least.

The Bushmen were originally represented in their court case by a Cape Town law firm.

The Bushmen sacked them because they were unhappy with their performance. Survival did not advise them to do this.

Weaver, in common with many of the other supposed “friends” of the Bushmen, does not credit them with enough intelligence to make these kinds of decisions by themselves.

Survival, unlike most of the NGOs in Botswana and South Africa involved in this case, accepts no government money and is funded by the public.

Notwithstanding that, we almost single-handedly funded the Bushmen’s court case (the longest and most expensive in Botswana’s history) as one by one the other NGOs abandoned them.

The Bushmen were forced to ask the court for two adjournments in order to go on fund-raising trips abroad.

Yet the local NGOs have sat on huge sums of money raised from abroad supposedly to help the Bushmen.

Weaver thinks it shameful that the Bushmen are forced to rely on their own resources to return home.

So do we.

Why have none of the local NGOs helped them do so?

Where are the fundraising campaigns in Botswana and South Africa to help the Bushmen?