DIAMONDS OR HUMANS?
DIAMONDS OR PEOPLE? DIAMONDS, OF COURSE!
San Bushmen in Botswana have lost a court case to allow them to re-open a vital waterhole in the center of the Kalahari desert.
Diamonds were found in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, traditional home to the bushmen, in the 1980s – and the government asked them to leave.
In 2006 they won the right to return and hunt without permits, but many of them still live outside the reserve.
Water tankers, which used to serve the community, no longer enter the reserve.
They usually have to travel approximately 40km (25 miles) to fetch water from the nearest available source, and unfortunately it’s too far to go with livestock.
The BBC’s Letlhogile Lucas in Gaborone says the borehole in question was used by De Beers, the world’s largest diamond producer, when it was prospecting for minerals in 1985.
The San bushmen community of Mothomelo had filed an application to be granted permission to equip and use the borehole.
A judge ruled that the bushmen were not entitled to do this, or to drill a new one.
Dr. Pinna says:
We know who runs De Beers. The only humans they like are those who can buy their diamonds. The others can die in the dessert.
