PRETORIA, July 22 (ANA) – The South African National Parks (SANParks) on Friday received six 40 millimeter non-lethal under barrel grenade launchers (UBGL) from specialist South African grenade launcher company Milkor at an event held in Pretoria.
"We all know that since 2007 we have been fighting one thing in our national parks, especially in the Kruger National Park. That thing is rhino poaching," SANParks spokesperson William Mabasa said at the handover of the grenade launchers.
"Each year the statistics of the rhino that were killed continued to grow, except last year when we started seeing a little bit of stabilisation. We will only begin to talk in that language once we see that the statistics at the end of this year giving us the same result as last year."
Mabasa said despite the heightened anti-poaching interventions, the poachers continue to make their attempted raids into SANParks territory each day.
"So we cannot stop trying to bring in whatever that can help us to deal with the problem because at the end of the day this is a problem that we, eventually, must win. We cannot allow criminals to win this war and wipe out our rhino," said Mabasa.
"This is the natural heritage of this country, which belongs to all of us. That is why we would like to thank Milkor for this gesture of assisting in our fight against rhino poaching."
Mabasa challenged other corporate institutions across South Africa to partner with SANParks and invest in the ongoing wide ranging efforts to stamp out the poaching scourge.
"The amount of resources that we are using to fight this war are huge. We cannot, on our own as SANParks, be able to afford everything that we need. We really appreciate this gesture by Milkor. We will put it to good use," said Mabasa.
Retired Major General Johan Jooste, commanding officer for special projects at SANParks, said the donation of the grenade launchers was not "a militarisation of the rangers".
"We are not suggesting as SANParks that we must put force on force, that anti-poaching units and counter poaching measures alone will solve the problem. That is only part of the problem. The incursions continue, we have seen a 30 percent increase this year. We have got to have rangers that protect our resources," said Jooste.
He said SANParks rangers strictly operated within the parameters of the law and their set rules of engagement.
"We are not ignorant at all about the law. We are not ignoring any legislation that guides our mandate in the park. We must arrest poachers and on that process we have armed incursions and often the poachers resist physically," said Jooste.
He said the rocket launchers would only be used not to attack poachers, but to make rangers more effective during confrontations with poachers, as it will enable them to launch teargas canisters as well as stun grenades.
"This 40mm grenade launcher, as aggressive as it looks, comes with only non-lethal. We don’t have any lethal ammunition that we will shoot and later explode. It comes with teargas, it comes as a stun grenade … and it will avoid poachers from hiding in the bushes and it will prevent the necessity of the rangers to exposing themselves," said Jooste.
"It also fires a smoke grenade and that is helpful when you must bring in your helicopters. That is why we will be deploying this system in the park (Kruger National Park).
The 40mm UBGL is a lightweight single shot grenade launcher that can be attached to most modern assault weapons. This gives the user a grenade launch capability, together with an assault rifle.
Milkor chief executive Marius Roos said the UBGL would be an additional weapon to the assault rifles already used by rangers.
The UBGL is attached to the barrel of the R1 rifle used by the rangers.
"The UBGL is a very simple device. It takes 40mm ammunition which is less lethal. The less lethal ammunition is shot to help the specific operation. In the trained hands of rangers, this is very helpful. A lot of different situations can be handled with different types of ammunition. If you want someone out of the bushes, you use a specific type of ammunition, if you want to call in helicopters – all of that can be done with this UBGL," said Roos.
"This means you do not lose your main capability. You will still have your live ammunition on your weapon, but also the less lethal part attached to it."
Milkor, a South African company, is a world leader in design, development and manufacturing of 37, 38 and 40mm weapon systems and is famous for its 40mm multiple grenade launcher range of products. It is a supplier to the South African National Defence Force and over 50 countries across the world.
– African News Agency (ANA)
