Tutu slates bushmen eviction

2006-11-07 17:46

Pretoria - Archbishop Desmond Tutu has slammed the eviction of the Kalahari bushmen and has appealed to the Botswana government not to destroy them, said a human rights organisation on Tuesday.

Survival International said the Gana and Gwi bushmen's organisation released a film of the statement by Tutu on Monday.

"The san bushmen represent a 100 000 year-old culture that we should consider one of the world's treasures.

"And while progress is necessary, it cannot be that the only way to achieve progress is to remove the San from their ancestral lands and drive their traditions away," says Tutu in the film.

"I appeal to (the Botswana government), and the world, to find new ways to help solve these issues in a manner that respects the lovely, spiritual culture of the san bushmen," he pleaded.

The Botswana government removed almost all the bushmen from the Central Kalahari Game Reserve in several evictions. They are now fighting to return to what they call their ancestral land.

"When a culture is destroyed in the name of progress, it is not progress, it is a loss for our world," said Tutu.

- SAPA