Elephant Activists Seek Out Ivory Kingpin of Mombasa & Demand Justice

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Hoping to enact a bit of change in the Kenyan plains to mark the observance of the Aug. 12 World Elephant Day, one conservationist waited out the clock, as she urged the nation's top police officials to take action against someone she claims is the "Ivory Kingpin" of Kenya.

Waiting for nearly eight hours until she was permitted to meet with police officials, chief executive of Kenyan conservation group Wildlife Direct, Paula Kahumbu handed over 400 signatures this past Tuesday afternoon that all urged for the arrest of Mombasa businessman Feizal Ali Mohamed. Alleging that Mohamed is evading arrest warrants in relation to a massive ivory seizure in June, Wildlife Direct is spreading awareness of the lethal threat poachers pose to Elephant populations and is eager to see police officials take action on a crime they believe should not go unpunished.

"Unless we take ivory trafficking business seriously, by arresting and prosecuting Feizal Ali Mohamed, we will lose" Kahumbu says. "No matter how many poachers we arrest, he will always be able to hire more. We are sacrificing elephants, rangers' lives and our economy so that a few individuals can enrich themselves."

According to a report entitled "Elephants in the Dust-The African Elephant Crisis" written by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), data collected since 2009 indicates that poaching of elephants in the African savannahs has more than doubled within the last decade, while illegal ivory trade in Africa and Asia has more than tripled. UN directors say that local governments must intervene and mitigate this long-term threat to the elephant species' survival.

"The surge in the killing of elephants in Africa and the illegal taking of other listed species globally threatens not only wildlife populations, but also the livelihoods of millions who depend on tourism for a living and the lives of those wardens and wildlife staff who are attempting to stem the illegal tide" Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme, Achim Steiner said.

In spite of the fact that Kenyan laws against poaching can have severe punishments, up to life in prison, an unwillingness to prosecute has allowed the crimes against wildlife to persist. In an independent study conducted by Wildlife Direct, only seven percent of all offenders convicted of wildlife crimes against elephants and rhinos served prison time. But Kahumbu hopes that will not continue to be the case, starting with the arrest of Feizal Ali Mohamed.

Currently there is an arrest warrant issued for Mohamed for possession of hundreds of ivory tusks, and Kenya's office of the Director of Public Prosecutions is conducting an internal audit to investigate why this criminal kingpin has been allowed to persist his crimes. In spite of recent actions, Mohamed continues to remain at large, threatening the dwindling species of elephants in Kenya.