CAPE TOWN, (Reuter) - South Africa, a sanctuary for the Southern Right whale, wants to ease its ban on whaling off its shores by reviewing its membership of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) which administers a worldwide moratorium on whale hunting.
A confidential document sent to government departments and some conservationists ahead of the IWC's June meeting in Scotland proposes that South Africa should keep a low profile and should decide by the 1997 meeting whether to downgrade its membership to observer status. The document, of which Reuters has a copy, seems set to reopen the emotional debate about the bloody business of hunting the world's biggest mammals.
"It is proposed that South Africa should retain its independent spirit in order to protect South Africa's interests and should use its influence to combat extremism in favour of non-whaling," South African IWC commissioner and Department of Sea Fisheries director Guillaume de Villiers said in the paper.
De Villiers confirmed the authenticity of the document, but told Reuters it was a proposal and not yet official policy. He said there was no immediate threat to the estimated 2,000 Southern Right whales that visit the coast mainly between June and November to mate and calve. The whales, which frolic within metres of the shore, draw thousands of tourists every year, many from abroad.
"At the moment, in South African waters, all whales are protected. I would be extremely surprised if the government were to open up whaling on our coast," de Villiers said.
But veteran 'Save the Whales' campaigner Nan Rice, who condemned the document outright, said South Africa had been a premier whaling nation for 184 years till the late 1970s and owed it to the world to fight for the survival of the whales.
"Taking into consideration South Africa's role in bringing some of the great whale species to thebrink of extinction...it should be the moral duty of our country to remain an active member of the IWC. I'm very, very disturbed about this," she said.
Deputy Minister of Environment Affairs Bantu Holomisa said he had not been informed officially about the proposal and that it had not been discussed by the government.
"At this time you can take it as a non-starter," he said.
But Peter Mokaba, chairman of the parliamentary committee on environment affairs, told Reuters South Africa should leave the door open for a return to commercial whaling.
"We should not allow a situation where anything is not possible. We must stay with the IWC to see what other countries are thinking, but keep our own options open," he said.
The document drafted by de Villiers points to anomalies in policies on mammal conservation and proposes that a clear position should be adopted before the IWC's 1997 meeting.
"The approach and policy towards whales should be compatible with general policies towards the utilization of...other mammals such as seals and elephants," he said.
Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) director Ian Macdonald welcomed de Villiers' call for a clear division between scientific and emotional arguments about the sustainable utilisation of vulnerable species.
"There is a lot of confusion in the minds of government and the public about why we adopt certain policies and we should be clear about these things," he said.
South Africa supported the creation of a southern ocean whale sanctuary below the 55th parallel in 1994 and bans all whaling off its own shores, but also supports the harvesting of white rhinos, seals and elephants to finance conservation.