African Wildlife and Environment Issue 65

CONSERVATION

CONSERVATION

Failure of the EIA process SANI PASS EXPERIENCE

would soon be commencing, and so arranged a series of meetings between us (WESSA) and the consultants (ArcusGibb), design engineers and proposed contractors. We felt these meetings were most useful. They gave us a chance to air our views and concerns, to allow the powers that be to hear from local people (many such as Mike Clark, long time users of the road), and also allowed us to hear what they proposed. This process also concluded with a two vehicle expedition up the Pass, during which we could stop and chat about many various special places along the route. We would like to think that our early action helped positively to shape to some extent the thinking and subsequent design which was developed. Once the EIA started in earnest, we involved ourselves in the ‘Scoping’ process. This culminated in the ‘Draft Scoping Report’, which came out in late 2009. We felt that by and large, the consultants, under the leadership of Russell Stow, had put together a pretty good report. The main feature of the scoping process was the identification of six potential future scenarios for the Sani Pass. These ranged from Alternative 1: Do nothing and let the road deteriorate to the point it would be closed permanently to Alternative 6: A tunnel from the base of the zig-zags to a point about 1km into Lesotho. The Department of Transport KZN, under whose auspices this project was being proposed, favoured Alternative 5: a hard surface all the way with state of the art drainage features. In our lengthy and detailed submission, WESSA Sani Branch contended that Alternative 3: a good quality gravel road with state of the art drainage features was the win-win scenario. We challenged a number of assumptions made in the Scoping Report, the major one being that the In 2004, the Ministers of Transport from Lesotho and South Africa signed a memorandum of Understanding at Sani Top, agreeing to upgrade the road between the two countries via Sani Pass to ‘bitumen standard’. In 2005, an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)process started for phase 1 of this project, the uncontroversial section from the junction near Himeville for 14km to the Good Hope ruins, site of the proposed new South African border post.

Russel Suchet

The top of the Sani Pass zig-zags, from the north

Department insisted that under Alternative 3, only 4x4 vehicles would be able to use the road. We knew from experience that this is not the case, and that when the Lesotho Roads Department upgraded the road surface in the late 1990s, even small sedans were able to use the road for a number of years until lack of maintenance caused the surface to deteriorate again. We warned the consultants of this mistake but they told us the Department was adamant on this point. We warned that this incorrect assumption would jeopardize the accuracy of the results of any specialist studies undertaken, which would thus be based on a false assumption. We registered this concern with the Department of Environment Affairs (DEA) at the time. Our words fell on deaf ears. The Environmental Impact part of the study then commenced, with a number of specialist studies being conducted. The water study concluded that the Mkomazana River, at whose headwaters Sani Pass is found, was somewhat degraded and that the proposed project would improve the situation. The Floral and Avifaunal studies both found that the project would be bad for the environment in terms of plants and birds. The Social study found that there would be a negative impact on the area in terms of tourism on both sides of the border, but that trade and other cultural links may benefit. The Economic study found that Alternative 5 would be detrimental to the economy of the whole region – and that the tourism industry would be badly affected as ‘The Sani Pass Experience’, as currently marketed, was a major factor in the local tourism economy. Tour operators would be badly affected, but so would tourist operators in all areas on both sides of the border. They further concluded that trade benefits would be shallow, especially since over 60%

of traders in the Mokhotlong area were of Chinese extraction, and had very close ties with their fellow countrymen in the West of Lesotho, and were thus unlikely to make any use of the new road. Having completed these studies in great haste, we then eagerly awaited the Draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR). Time passed and nothing happened. Almost two years later, we were approached by a new consultant, claiming to be conducting an economic study of the Sani Pass. Again we co-operated. In late 2011, the draft Environmental Impact Report came out. It was followed by a public meeting held in the Himeville Hall and attended, among others, by the writer of the new economic report. It quickly became apparent that when the Department realized that the initial economic study facts were against their plan, they held up the process while deciding what to do. Eventually, they decided to commission a second study, use it to denigrate the initial study by terming it the ‘Broader’ study, and then give it terms of reference so narrow that it could not but produce the required recommendation. Working on the premise that ‘Bullshit Baffles Brains’, they concocted figures based on pure speculation at best, and plugged wild estimates into complex models to get the answers they desired. They underestimated the locals, however, as the stormy public meeting literally tore this ridiculous report to shreds. WESSA Sani Branch compiled a detailed rebuttal to the Draft EIR, and recommended strongly that Alternative 3 was the best solution as it provided the objectives of the project as stated, namely to provide improved access to the population, (at the last minute, the Department finally conceded that a good gravel surface would allow access to the same range of vehicles as the hard surface would), to improve the ecological situation, as the state

This project was rapidly approved and work began in 2006. This relatively simple section of road was planned to take one year to complete, but eventually took six years, and at a massive cost overrun. In 2008, the local Sani Branch of WESSA decided that the EIA process for the project to tar the main part of the Pass to the top (phase 2) was likely to commence soon, and we thus called a meeting with ‘head office’. This meeting was attended by our local branch members, plus Di Dold, Bryan Havemann and Cobus Theron from the parent body. We explained why we felt the Sani Pass was worth saving, and followed up with a trip up the pass to let everyone have that unique experience. Head Office agreed that the Sani Pass was something really special and agreed to assist us in our fight. Di Dold heard that the public phase of the process

Who, if anyone, will help clear the new, more slippery tarred road in snow conditions?

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15 | African Wildlife & Environment | 65 (2017)