CERCOPAN

Category: CERCOPAN battles illegal loggers, CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, Cercopan, Communities, Conservation, Nigeria | Date: Oct 09 2009 | By: cercopan

By Richard Carroll - Rhoko Manager

“It’s a good idea” said the chief, “I like it, but this idea of an election..it can’t work. No, better we just make an appointment of good people.” “But Chief,” I replied despairingly, seeing the previous night’s 3 hours of negotiation over this point slipping swiftly away with each nod of his advisor’s head, “we discussed this, we need to have a democratic election. Appointments have been tried before and they don’t work; these people represent the community’s voice- they need to be chosen by the community.” So began another round of debating on this point. It was a topic of alarming regularity over the next two weeks with apparently nobody in the village believing it was possible to hold a trouble free election. “It has never happened here; it’s not possible” was the consensus. “Trust me, it can be done.” Was my reply through gritted teeth, as I then settled down to once again explain my plan.

CCDC elections -  Richard distributing voting tokens

To be fair I understood the concerns, the election we were planning to hold was to re-inaugurate the village Community Conservation & Development Committee (CCDC). This body initially conceived by CERCOPAN has the responsibility of deciding how the substantial funds from tourism royalties and other CERCOPAN related payments are spent. They should be used to finance any community development project that the CCDC and Chiefs’ Council agree upon, providing it does not detract from concepts of sustainability and conservation. The chiefs were worried that certain timber dealers and others hungry for influence in the area would try to hijack this committee and disrupt the peace in the village. There had been similar attempts recently as those involved in illegal timber exploitation are gradually being squeezed out by the community’s collaboration with state forestry departments; and they were looking for a way to stem the tide.

  At the polling booths

I had already held a series of meetings with people I felt were key individuals in the community. These were young, literate people with a passionate desire to see their community make the most of its opportunities. We had been sitting on the floor around the bedside of one of my staff- Matthew, who was recovering from a motorbike accident, discussing village politics. As we spoke these people not only bemoaned the lack of influence they felt they had but also put forward a vision of how they believed things could be better. It struck me, this was the core of what the CCDC should be and within a few days I asked them to gather themselves and any like-minded individuals they could find for a strategic meeting. Within a few weeks this group had helped to pass out information leaflets, discussed relevant issues and encouraged other people to nominate candidates they would trust to represent their needs in the decision making process. General assembly meetings and manifesto nights for the proposed candidates all helped to add to the buzz being generated in the village.

Iko Esai residents waiting to vote

The morning of the election came around; I set off from Calabar at 6am, having been up all night constructing ballot boxes, and promptly ran into trouble. Heavy rains the night before had rendered one section of the dirt road impassable and I found myself axle deep in a quagmire of sticky orange mud. With no small help from a group of friends from the nearest village, who had happened upon my predicament, as they ferried colossal mounds of bananas to the highway on motorbikes, I was finally freed; arriving tired, filthy and apprehensive to the village. Rapidly organising ourselves, the election team swung into action. Registration and voting stations were manned, security employed at the door and the village bell rung to announce the start of proceedings.

Women Registering for the election

I am told that there was an element of the village connected to the timber extractors grumbling amongst themselves that they were going to disrupt the day; that no election would hold unless they said so. However, they failed to leave their corner of discontent and so missed the atmosphere of celebration 5 hours after polls opened and the successful candidates were announced to the massed crowd. It was extremely gratifying to hear the talk outside the classroom which served as a polling station; “free and fair” could commonly be discerned amongst the other incoherent jumble of triumphant conversations in the local Iko dialect. So happy were the participants with the days events, that I may have made a rod for my own back as it has been suggested we assist with the re-election of several other bodies in the village! I couldn’t be happier with the group of men and women that the community chose to represent them over the next 3 years and despite their initial misgivings, neither it seems could the chiefs. I’m not entirely sure, however, how I feel about the new nickname they bestowed on me; ‘The Bulldozer’- though it does have a certain ring to it.

Tags: Cercopan, Community Conservation, Iko Esai, Rainforest protection, Sustainable development

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Category: CERCOPAN battles illegal loggers, CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Communities, Conservation, Education, Environmental education saving endangered primates, Monkeys, Nigeria, Orphaned baby monkeys, Rain Forests, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Oct 01 2009 | By: cercopan

 The October edition of the CERCOPAN monthly newsletter can be dowloaded from the link below

cerconews-october-2009-edition.pdf

Hope you enjoy it! Look out for the next issue on the 5th November.

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, Community Conservation, Conservation, Endangered monkeys, environmental education, Guenons, Mangabeys, Newletter, rehabilitation

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Category: CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, Cercopan, Communities, Conservation, Education, Environmental education saving endangered primates, Nigeria, Rain Forests | Date: Aug 07 2009 | By: cercopan

Hi, I’m Carrie and I am just coming to the end of a six week stay as a short term volunteer at CERCOPAN. I am currently working on my PhD at the University of Florida focusing on Environmental Education and Primate Conservation and hope to come back for a much longer period next year as part of my studies. I have thoroughly enjoyed my stay at Rhoko camp, but the definite highlight of my trip was working with the Rhoko education officer, Mike, and organizing an overnight stay for 12 members of the Iko Esai Conservation Club.

Conservation Club group

CERCOPAN has initiated the formation of over 20 conservation clubs in rural and urban schools; encouraging the youth of Nigeria to actively promote and participate in environmental campaigns and events such as the annual June 5th World Environment Day celebrations and tree planting programmes. This rainforest adventure however, gave the children a chance to experience the sights and sounds of the rainforest first hand and to gain a solid background to conservation and primate ecology…using the forest as their classroom!

Conservation club members learning about monkeys

The students were amazing and I was extremely impressed with their knowledge and their desire to learn more. Everyone was sad when the activities were over and it was time to leave, but all agreed they had a wonderful time and that we definitely do it again soon. CERCOPAN hopes to run such trips for conservation clubs from urban schools in the future, as some of these children have never seen the rainforest before.

It took a long time to persuade the children that this snake was plastic!

Special thanks to Jan Valkenberg (a former CERCOPAN volunteer) who raised the funds for this and other education activities. I would also like to thank the principle of Iko Esai secondary school for allowing the students to attend, Mr. Hans the science teacher, and the students themselves: Nkoyo, John, Promise, Patricia, Peace, Regard, Gabriel, Oboon, Uso, Redual, Erong, and Akima.

Hope you enjoy the photos!

Tags: African Wildlife, Cercopan, children, Communities, Conservation, Conservation clubs, Education, environmental education

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Category: CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, Cercopan, Communities, Monkeys, Nigeria | Date: Mar 30 2009 | By: cercopan

CERCOPAN has recently undertaken to build a community centre for our host community Iko Esai, thanks to the funding support from Esso (Exxonmobil). Over the last two months CERCOPAN staff and volunteers have been working very hard with the help of some contractors and local labourers to get this project off the ground. Last week we finished phase 1, the preliminaries including clearing the land, pegging the site, building a storage shed, and moulding the first hundred and fifty bags of cement into blocks for the foundation. Amazing how much work goes into constructing a building!

Completed Storage Shed

Just to mould one bag of cement into blocks requires a lot more effort than one might think! First we had to visit a number of dealers to purchase cement, sand and related tools and to bargain with truck owners to transport the goods to site (not easy when trying to stick to a budget and prices are increasing weekly). Negotiations broke down three times, dates were changed, we were even forced to carry 600 bags of cement into the volunteer house to save money when we discovered prices were about to go up and it was too early to transport them to site (if stored too long in the humid conditions at site the cement becomes hard). Then the Rhoko Manager needed to garner community support to help carry local sand, gravel and water to the site and to coordinate accommodation and transportation for the few non-local workers. This involved writing an article for the noticeboard, attending a chiefs meeting and enlisting the services of the Iko Esai town crier. Finally there was the actual hiring of block moulders and then the moulding, drying, stacking and watering of the blocks!  

Packing and transporting sand from the river

Offloading sand at site

Now that the first 4000 blocks are ready, we have begun phase 2: excavation and laying the foundation. Stay tuned for regular updates of our progress!

Stacking the moulded blocks

Tags: africa, animal, Cercocebus torquatus, Cercopan, Cercopithecus erythrotis, Cercopithecus mona, Cercopithecus nictitans, Cercopithecus preussi, Cercopithecus sclateri, Communities, community, Conservation, developing communities, endangered species, mona guenon, mona monkey, monkey, Monkeys, Nigeria, Nigerian wildlife, Preuss’s guenon, Preuss’s money, primates, putty-nosed guenon, putty-nosed monkey, rainforest, rare species, Red-capped mangabey, red-eared guenon, red-eared monkey, Sclater’s guenon, Sclater’s monkey, threatened species, volunteers, wildlife

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Category: CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, Cercopan, Environmental education saving endangered primates, Monkeys, Nigeria, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Mar 09 2009 | By: cercopan

Short term volunteers Sacha, Jan, Richard, Henk,
Rob, Jeanette and Ruud recently departed
Nigeria after three weeks of hard work.
The group arrived from Holland in early
February to assist CERCOPAN in a community
development initiative involving schools in
our host community, Iko Esai. The group
was well received by all and will be sorely
missed.
 
 

Men hard at work!
 
Most notable of their contributions was their work
with Iko Esai’s primary and secondary schools.
Before arriving they raised USD$1200 to be put
 towards the cost of renovating and sprucing up
the schools. In addition to their financial
contribution, they also offered their time
and effort to see the work through themselves.
 As mentioned in a previous blog entry,
part of the group painted the interior
 and exterior of Iko Esai Secondary School.
The other half of the group worked at the
Primary School, cementing the floors,
transforming the previously dirt flooring
into a more modern cement composition.
Thanks to the hard work and caring nature
of this group from Holland, a smoother path
to learning has been paved.
 
 
The completed flooring
 
Do you want to volunteer with CERCOPAN? Visit our website at 
www.cercopan.org or email info@cercopan.org
 
 
Farewell party
 

Tags: africa, animal, Cercocebus torquatus, Cercopan, Cercopithecus erythrotis, Cercopithecus mona, Cercopithecus nictitans, Cercopithecus preussi, Cercopithecus sclateri, community development, Conservation, endangered species, environmental education, mona guenon, mona monkey, monkey, Monkeys, Nigeria, Nigerian wildlife, Preuss’s guenon, Preuss’s money, primates, putty-nosed guenon, putty-nosed monkey, rainforest, rare species, Red-capped mangabey, red-eared guenon, red-eared monkey, Sclater’s guenon, Sclater’s monkey, threatened species, volunteers, wildlife

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Category: CERCOPAN battles illegal loggers, CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, Cercopan, Monkeys, Nigeria, Rain Forests, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Feb 13 2009 | By: cercopan

In a combined effort by the Cross River State illegal Logging Task force, Iko Esai Community and CERCOPAN, Illegal loggers have been expelled from the Iko Esai Community Forest. Sadly illegal logging activity throughout the state has been escalating rapidly over the last year and most of the wood has been exported outside the state (therefore not even benefitting the communities from which it came). In a bold attempt to curb this illegal activity, the Governor of Cross River State, Liyel Imoke recently put in place the new task force and placed a moratorium on logging until such times that the problem can be brought under control and sustainable forest management implemented.

After being alerted to the presence of illegal loggers by witnessing a truck coming from one of the dirt tracks leaving the the forest, Richard (Rhoko Manager) retraced the route of the trucks and found that logging activity had been underway for several weeks deep inside the forest. Richard returned to the village and called Calabar to give me the news, but in the meantime the truck he had seen had been independently apprehended on the highway b(y an illegal logging task force road block) and the driver had informed the police that the wood had come from Iko Esai.

A disappointed Richard upon entering the forest and finding trees felled

A few days later, the task force travelled to Esai with the police. They were assisted by CERCOPAN staff and members of the community and were able to confiscate chainsaws, wood and equipment and to make an arrest.  The Illegal loggers were using falsified documents which claimed that they had community permission to extract wood from the site. To the converse, the community have actually begun court proceedings against the loggers in the past in response to similar attempts to enter and commercially exploit their forest.

Planks deep in the heart of the forest

Although the loggers have gone, we remain vigilant. They were only able to log a limited number of trees before being stopped, but as the potential profits are high, they may be tempted to return if they feel that our attention has been diverted elsewhere. We have already extended the range of our patrol to monitor a much larger area of the community forest. In the future, we hope to be able to hire additional patrol and extend radio range deep into the forest. Iko Esai community forest provides a buffer to the national park, it is home to chimpanzee, drill, elephant, buffalo and countless monkeys and in addition it provides food, medicine and shelter for local people. We must stand firm against each and every commercial logging attempt, if we cannot protect this forest, then the Cross River National Park will be next.  

 A baby Blue duiker, one of many animal species inhabiting the Iko Esai Community Forest

Tags: africa, animal, Cercocebus torquatus, Cercopan, Cercopithecus erythrotis, Cercopithecus mona, Cercopithecus nictitans, Cercopithecus preussi, Cercopithecus sclateri, Conservation, endangered species, illegal logging, mona guenon, mona monkey, monkey, Monkeys, Nigeria, Nigerian wildlife, Preuss’s guenon, Preuss’s money, primates, putty-nosed guenon, putty-nosed monkey, rainforest, rainforest destruction, rare species, Red-capped mangabey, red-eared guenon, red-eared monkey, Sclater’s guenon, Sclater’s monkey, threatened species, volunteers, wildlife

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Category: CERCOPAN helping communities in Nigeria, CERCOPAN staff fighting to save rainforest and endanger, CERCOPAN supporters saving rainforests and orphaned mon, Cercopan, Communities, Monkeys, Nigeria, Rain Forests, Saving endangered monkeys | Date: Feb 10 2009 | By: cercopan

A group of short-term volunteers arrived recently from Holland to provide the children of Iko Esai a brighter future – illuminated in blue, green and yellow to be precise. The group of seven came across our recently introduced “working holiday” program in which anyone interested can visit our forest site as short term paying volunteers to help with the various initiatives CERCOPAN carries out and gain a valuable experience working with a grassroots conservation NGO. As community development was something they were very keen on, the group combined their efforts to raise approximately USD$1200 before coming out, which is being used to fund the renovation and sprucing up of two schools in CERCOPAN’s host community, Iko Esai. So far they have almost completed cementing the floors in the Iko Esai Primary School classrooms, and the painting of the interior and exterior walls of Iko Esai Secondary School.

Their hard work each day does not go unnoticed, especially from the children who regularly gather around in large groups to watch the renovations in action. The floors that were previously composed of packed sand have now been transformed into smooth concrete surfaces, and the bare brick walls transformed from a dull repressive grey to bright and cheerful blues, greens and yellows. Though these and other renovations that are soon to be underway are very important, the most rewarding transformation will surely be the renewed motivation of the village children inspired by the generous donation of time, money and efforts from CERCOPAN’s most recent group of short term volunteers. Panting the school  

Do you want to help? Check out www.cercopan.org for more information about volunteering with CERCOPAN.

Enjoying a relaxing break in the river after all that hard work!

Tags: africa, animal, Cercocebus torquatus, Cercopan, Cercopithecus erythrotis, Cercopithecus mona, Cercopithecus nictitans, Cercopithecus preussi, Cercopithecus sclateri, community development, Conservation, endangered species, environmental education, mona guenon, mona monkey, monkey, Monkeys, Nigeria, Nigerian wildlife, Preuss’s guenon, Preuss’s money, primates, putty-nosed guenon, putty-nosed monkey, rainforest, rare species, Red-capped mangabey, red-eared guenon, red-eared monkey, Sclater’s guenon, Sclater’s monkey, short-term volunteers, threatened species, volunteers, wildlife

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