Kickoff (Cape Town)
24 December 2008
A Burmese border guard, a passionate soccer fan, took bribes to smuggle elephants into Thailand so that he could come to South Africa for the 2010 World Cup.
According to an undercover investigation by Traffic, the wildlife trade monitoring network of World Wildlife Fund and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, the official in Myanmar openly shared details of his role in moving live elephants across the border to Thailand.
He charged between R500 - R2000 per elephant and recorded in his logbook that 240 elephants were taken across the border to Thailand over an 18-month period.
He acknowledged this activity was illegal, but said that he had saved money to fly to Germany to watch the 2006 World Cup soccer tournament and now he was saving for his next big holiday, the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
The report details how investigators found 9 000 pieces of ivory and 16 whole tusks for sale - representing the ivory of about 116 male Asian elephants - in 17 markets surveyed in Thailand and China.
The research also found evidence of corruption allowing the illicit smuggling of ivory and elephants to take place.
Females and juvenile elephants are particularly targeted to supply the demand from the tourism industry in Thailand, where they are put to work in elephant trekking centers.
Investigators, posing as potential buyers, found retailers openly displayed ivory and other elephant parts and rarely hesitated in disclosing illegal activities and smuggling techniques.
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