ID takes up fishermen's fight

2003-08-17 10:47

Johannesburg - Independent Democrats (ID) leader Patricia de Lille has welcomed Monday's human rights hearing on the plight of the fishing communities.

The former Pan Africanist Congress MP called on Sunday on authorities to urgently act on the community's concerns.

Thousands of families in and around Cape Town were given welfare coupons last month after they lost their livelihood following Marine and Coastal Management's decision to halve the number of line fishing boats on environmental grounds.

The ID would be present at the hearings and would take up the concerns of the fishermen with the relevant authorities.

"We believe that the way the process has been run to date has not been designed with the traditional fishing communities' best interests at hand.

"Marine and Coastal Management have committed themselves to a policy of co-management, but this process seems to have been run in a very exclusionary manner.

"The Independent Democrats firmly believe that the fishing communities themselves need to be involved at the very outset in designing the process for allocating permit rights," the ID said in a statement.

The party said while they recognised the need to protect fish stocks, the people who had the greatest interest in protecting the stocks were the fishing communities themselves. Their knowledge should have been drawn upon in drafting equitable permit rules.

"The Independent Democrats firmly believe in the principle that those affected by a government action need to participate in its formulation. It is a fundamental tenet of good governance and we believe that it should certainly be practised in this instance.

"It is also the only way to get support from a community that will ultimately be responsible for adhering to its stipulations and providing long-term sustainability for this sector," the ID said.

- SAPA