06 Feb 2018

North West District Council has found it fit to engage farmers associations again to solicit their input in order to promote smooth implementation of the bye law regulations.

In 2016, the council implemented the bye-law regulations of impounding stray livestock in the village following an intensive consultation through kgotla meetings.

In an interview, the council secretary, Mr Charles Amos confirmed that they have decided to engage all stakeholders because they have realised that they were not part of the implementation.

He said in the meetings, they would also be able to iron out some issues which they experienced during the implementation citing harassment of people engaged by the council to impound stray animals.  

He cited two incidents in which some employees were beaten up.

 Mr Amos noted that to impound the cattle without the farmers’ input would not be sustainable hence the need to engage them. 

He appreciated that although consultation was done prior to the implementation but stressed that they wanted their ideas to reinforce the approach.

He observed early January, a stakeholder committee comprising some of departments such as Environmental Health, Public Education, Council, Police, Waste Management met and agreed to embark on education drive to sensitize the community about the bye law regulations.

He emphasized the need for the communities to understand that the implementation of the regulations was not meant to punish farmers but to keep the village free of livestock.

He said the committee also agreed to take proper action after six months as they believe that all would have been taken on board, thus means beginning of July this year, the bye law regulations would be implemented.

However, Mr Amos revealed that in all the cattle which were impounded, they managed to trace the owners to collect them while those unclaimed were sold through Matimela programme.

The animals were kept for two weeks after which failure to claim, they were treated as matimela.

Meanwhile, during the implementation, some farmers cried foul and requested the council to consider providing a waiver until the drought situation improves. 

They expressed frustrations that the implementation of the regulation came at the wrong time when the district is experiencing a severe drought arguing that the Thamalakane River is the only source of water for their livestock.

Farmers also complained about lack of proper care at the kraals noting that their cattle are not fed as expected. ENDS