13/10/2026
Spot on!
The management documents that we had sight of confirms the utter disregard of individual property owners to baboon proof and secure attractants.
Whose waste is it anyway❓️
It is easy to point fingers at the Baboon Management Authorities, and we absolutely must hold them accountable. They have failed the Cape Peninsula baboons, and they have even admitted as much in black and white in their adopted Action Plan.
The provisions in this plan, especially regarding the two Simon's Town troops facing either death or sanctuary, are devastating and deeply upsetting.
HOWEVER, while we are looking for someone to blame in our collective rage, we are ignoring the mirror. The statute of our collective failure is called Kogelfontein, a direct product of both authorities failed management, and our own neighborhood actions.
The buck stops with us, the communities. We cannot complain about baboons being in the urban area if we are the ones attracting them there.
The baseline rule has been clear for 26 years: the onus is on the landowner or occupier of land to take all reasonable measures to reduce attractants.
Yet, decades into formal baboon management, we still see:
• Unsecured waste bins left out for easy access.
• Veggie gardens, compost heaps, chicken coups, and fruit trees buckling under crops left completely unprotected in respect of our backyard farming operations.
• Residents recklessly speeding through designated baboon corridors.
• Community members actively feeding wildlife like porcupines, birds, and even baboons inside the urban edge.
• People resorting to pellet guns and poisining to "teach baboons a lesson."
The baboon management authorities are not the waste generators. They are not the ones leaving properties unsecured or feeding wild animals on the borders of a National Park. It is us, you, I, and our next-door neighbours.
Every single piece of unmanaged waste and every unsecured attractant draws these primates out of their natural habitat and into conflict.
Our convenience and negligence is directly causing the suffering of baboons, and ultimately, their death.
Hold the authorities accountable for their failed management, but clean up your own backyard.
It is time to ask the hard question: Whose waste/attractant is it anyway?
We were the beacon of compliance with "day zero" a few years ago in respect of saving water, why can't we do it again, this time for our wildlife!
PS. Don't be mistaken, the Authorities have the powers in terms of existing Protocols/Guidelines and Section 18 of the Nature Conservation Ordinance to kill baboons without consultation, they have done so in the past!
