LAST SPRING, Thokozani Kunene, 25, was out walking with his father near a private game reserve near eastern Eswatini’s Big Bend, an area known for its lush forests teeming with wildlife. His father says they were taking an afternoon stroll to collect firewood when they were confronted by rangers patrolling the Mkhaya Game Reserve. Kunene was shot and killed. The rangers found a firearm in his possession after shooting him and allege that he was there poaching, though his family disputes their claims.

Kunene is one of many Emaswati who have been killed in recent years by park rangers. While exact numbers aren’t available, the Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs estimates that several dozen suspected poachers are slain each year.

Behind each death lies a tragic truth: The people killed were never afforded the chance to defend themselves, never given the benefit of a fair trial. They were killed as suspected poachers, and the rangers who killed them were shielded by a decades’ old law: the 1991 Game Amendment Act.

“This is a devastating trend that has left families broken and communities living in fear,” says Chief Mvimbi Matse of Mambane in the Matsanjeni constituency, in the Lubombo region of Eswatini. Matse says that 17 people in his chiefdom were killed by rangers between October of 2023 and October of 2024. “We must find a way to ensure that conservation efforts do not come at the expense of human lives.”

Journalist Nokukhanya Musi-Aimienoho reports on the high human cost of Eswatini’s war on poaching, and the activists pushing for change.

Photo by Vaiz Ha

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