Sarangani Shark Slaughter

[chip104]

The children mostly go to school but wuth education or not, the same as in many countries now, there simply are no jobs for the unskilled and even college graduates here might get a job in a mall on the check outs of Jollibee if they are lucky! Population is the problem, the poorer the person then usually the more children they have!
They have been promissed the world but have not recieved a thing and probably will not get anything in the future!
As for the people who kill dolphins in order to catch sharks, there are maybe just a couple of boats doing this so they are in a minority!

And round and round this thread goes...

 

[jr.dm]

The police and their guns can go tell the jerks to stop. They know where the jerks live. As for the coal fired power plant, we will just keep fighting them with all legal means possible. There seems to be enough arsh kissers down here to join "monitoring comitees". Just go on the Sarangani Province web site. "Try saranganiprovincebs.com"

Some of us down here have come to think that if nobody funds the coal fired power plant, then they can not build it. Thats where getting the word out will put pressure on any interested investers.

 

[World Wide Diver]

The police and their guns can go tell the jerks to stop. They know where the jerks live. As for the coal fired power plant, we will just keep fighting them with all legal means possible.

If the Provincial Government is aware and really cared about this, then this is what ought to happen, especially if dolphin are targetted for bait (maybe more diplomatically though).

I guess that the shark caught will not be protected by CITES, but will probably be on the IUCN list. It's worth trying to ID them from the photos regardless.

The Governor - who is a diver himself and professes to care for the environment, especially the marine environment (loads of stuff said/written on this in support of the 'clean' coal power plant at Tampuan) really ought to investigate this matter for himself, and try to prevent sharks being targetted by people from his area - morally.

This is especially important because the people targetting shark are from the exact same area where the coal plant will be built, and where the protection of the marine environment is said to be a priority and this has used in many public arguments to support its location beside Kamanga MPA (plus used to get an Environmental Compliance Certificate from the DENR).

That said, I will not be surprised if the Governor/Provincial Goverment are unwilling to take any action, as this could cause some bad feelings towards them around Tampuan with the locals and they (the ones behind the plant) need to keep the peace in the area.

At the same time, taking no action will send a message that there is little/no moral conviction behind many statements that have already been made regarding marine protection in the area (all intrinsically linked to the Kamanga 'clean' coal plant).

Finally, I want to raise an important issue here. Many peoples in this area of southern Mindanao all come from a common root - Malay. The fishing grounds have a political boundary which is still crossed today and shared by people who have unofficial recognised historical rights to do this. Traditional handliners of tuna/subsitence fishermen are not an issue here, but larger commercial operations are.

But, the targetted poaching of any species within their territorial waters is a big issue which the Indonesians take very seriously.

IF there is evidence shark are been targetted as a species in Indonesian waters (using dolphin as bait) then this matter must/can easily be raised with the Indonesian Navy who patrol this area.

We have very good contacts within the Sangihe area - with the navy (many are divers and keen enviromentalists) and to the Sangihe Provincial Government. If this matter is brought to their attention then this can potentially cause a problem for the good guys in the area who are causing no harm and are more tolerated.

I am sure that the Provincial Government can clearly understand this.

Better that these people just stop doing this asap for all the above reasons.

@jr.dm - let's wait and see what happens first, but I can raise this informally with a good guy across the border for his advice if they are indeed poaching shark over there. We can at least ask them to keep an eye open for these people. Happy to follow your lead.