Cape Town – “When you live in Hout Bay, it’s hard not to be a poacher. Because that is our main source of income - the sea.”
So said Angelo Joseph, the community liaison officer for a project under the umbrella of the Department of Public Works’ Small Harbours Rescue initiative, where a group of former Hout Bay poachers have changed their lives by becoming trained and accredited commercial divers.
At the group’s site of operation at the harbour yesterday, Joseph, 43, a former poacher, said: “On a good night you would get almost 1 000 people directly or indirectly involved in (poaching).
“A couple of years ago I didn’t see an alternative, I always needed to put food on the table so the kids could eat and go to school.
"I know it’s a bad thing to do, but it was the only option we had until these opportunities arose, and that’s where we saw there’s really more to the sea than poaching and depleting species that our kids won’t see again.”
In 2017, a group of men from Hout Bay and Hangberg received training thanks to the department, local company Guerrini Marine Construction (GMC) and dive school Jack’s Dive Chest to empower them to make a legal living using their existing skills and scuba experience.
Once qualified, they assisted in removing sunken wrecks congesting parts of Hout Bay harbour, with one of the divers later able to open a diving business.
GMC has now secured a contract for the dredging of Hout Bay and Gordon’s Bay over three months, with six of the previous divers involved.
“I know we will never eradicate poaching; it is a global thing, but we can contribute in reducing it. The guys know that you can earn up to $500 (R7 200) a day offshore, so there’s actually more money compared to poaching.”
Joseph said quitting the booming illegal industry was hard as the immediate satisfaction of making money now was gone.
Later that year, the final motivation for Joseph to get out of poaching came when a 14-year-old boy was shot in the face with a rubber bullet by authorities during service delivery protests.
“We were protesting for service delivery and access to the ocean, because once you are a poacher, you will never get a licence to go catch legally because you’ve got a criminal record. Maybe 90% of the people who fish in Hout Bay did not have legal rights,” he said.
“So we go at night, in dangerous conditions, when the water is rough, when the cops are not on the water. I’ve lost a couple of people at sea,” Joseph said.
Stephan Braaf, 33, the lead diver for Dynamic Diving Services, subcontracted by GMC, said he had been involved in poaching since the age of 14.
“For us, we come from a fishing community and we got the resources, so how we’re going to help our families when we are struggling?
The best thing we know is to get in the water to get some abalone and sell it to buy food and electricity for our survival.
“Three years ago, I stopped, when I got into training. I was caught twice at Robben Island. But now I see a different opportunity to focus on.
"The game’s getting tighter, police are clamping down, there are arrests and another guy was killed on the water.”
In 2018, a man had disappeared overboard during a clash with an anti-poaching patrol at sea, sparking community protests.
“I took all that info, I prayed about it. When this opportunity came.. I took it. All the energy and the effort I used to go out at night, I put it in here.”
The men are working towards the realisation of an abalone farm in Hout Bay to uplift the community.
“Maybe we won’t reap the rewards of this farm, but certainly our children and our community will. Eventually we won’t have any poaching in Hout Bay. That is the big plan,” Joseph said.
For now, Braaf said the team pulled out items from the seabed including mattresses, tyres, plastic, planks, ropes, and even drug paraphernalia.
GMC owner Adrian Guerrini said the project pumped money back into the community and provided sustainable work.
“Here we are trying to get down to a certain level for the boats to enter the slipway. At the moment it’s a bit risky because the sand is a bit high, so they can only do it at certain times. We are removing all the refuse and rubble that’s contaminated the harbour.”
Department of Public Works and Infrastructure spokesperson Zara Nicholson said the department was in the process of implementing a R400million revitalisation programme to the 13 proclaimed fishing harbours along the Western Cape coastline.
“The department has completed the removal of sunken vessels activity which took place at seven of the 13 harbours, with a total of 29 sunken vessels being removed.
“The department saw this an ideal opportunity to include a skills development programme where nine informal divers (many former poachers) including one woman, were trained as Class III commercial divers at Hout Bay harbour, which housed 15 of the 29 sunken vessels.
"This activity alone created a total of 110 jobs and empowered 11 SMMEs to the value of over R3.5m.”