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We had just briefly introduced our panelists. I reiterate our ap- 

 preciation for joining us today. As the Congressman points out, we 

 nave the Ambassador of Zimbabwe here with us today. That is the 

 Honorable Amos Bernard Midzi. Is the Ambassador still with us 

 right now? Thank you. Welcome, Mr. Ambassador. [Applause.] 



We will start with the Congressman for his remarks. Thank you. 



STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE RON MARLENEE, FORMER 

 MEMBER OF CONGRESS AND DHIECTOR, LEGISLATIVE AF- 

 FAIRS, SAFARI CLUB INTERNATIONAL 



Mr. Marlenee. ThEink you, Madam Chairman. And the fact that 

 we have the dignitaries in the audience that you have attest to the 

 esteem with which this committee is held. 



Africa is our greatest hope and our greatest despair. One need 

 only to ride a 747 from London to Johannesburg for 12 hours to 

 realize the vastness of this continent. This is a continent with so- 

 phisticated cultures such as South Africa's, and the most primitive 

 that provide only a structure of simple authority. 



The Safari Club has more members who have spent more time 

 over a larger period of years with African people of every level than 

 probably any other organization. Our members understand that the 

 continent, its cultures, and its resources are so vast that it defies 

 a one size fits all solution. 



One thing is clear. If we are to preserve the fountainhead of 

 wildlife, habitat, and biological diversity, we can do so only with 

 the support and participation of each individual group of indige- 

 nous people. It cannot be done with selective trade sanctions or em- 

 bargoes, which are little more than imperialistic intervention. 



This U.S. imperialistic involvement caused the diplomats of four 

 nations, four Ambassadors, four African nations to submit a diplo- 

 matic protest to our State Department, which I submit for the 

 record. 



It cannot be done by creating societies of welfare dependents on 

 foreign aid. It cannot be done by the ecocolonialism, as is succinctly 

 pointed out in an article of that title that I have submitted witn 

 my testimony. In that article, the executive director of the U.N.'s 

 environmental program, Dr. Mostafa Tolda, in his address to 

 CITES stated. 



There are complaints, loud complaints, from a number of developing countries, 

 that the rich are more interested in making the Third World into a natural history 

 museum than they are in filling the bellies of its people. These people use a small 

 fraction of the world's resources. They earn a pitiful fraction of tne world's income. 

 They bear the brunt of famine, and poverty, and disease. They want a better life. 

 They also happen to live mainly in the tropical and sub-tropical belts of our planet. 

 These people cannot be denied the right to use their natural patrimony. 



However, the view of some is that Africans are not competent to 

 establish their own wildlife goals nor implement effective conserva- 

 tion programs. That is a false belief, and it should not be repeated. 

 And mistakes of the past that assume that should not be allowed 

 to continue. • 



If you do not respect the professionalism, the commitment, or the 

 needs of those managers like my guest Henri along side of me, how 

 in Grod's name do we expect to save one species let alone a whole 

 ecosystem or a whole continent. 



