Wilderness Safaris, Kalahari Plains Camp

Controversial tour operator Wilderness Safaris has won a 'World Savers Award', despite erecting a luxury tourist lodge with swimming pool on the land of Kalahari Bushmen who are struggling for water. Wilderness Safaris opened the Kalahari Plains Camp inside the Central Kalahari Game Reserve in 2009, having failed to consult the Bushmen on whose ancestral lands the lodge sits. The lodge sports a bar and swimming pool for tourists, while Bushmen in the reserve are banned from accessing a well which they rely on for water. Responding to Survival's allegations, Wilderness Safaris says it cannot provide water to Bushmen in the reserve, claiming 'it is not a water utility and its business model is not robust enough to carry this responsibility'. However, it recently constructed windmills on a concession in Zimbabwe to pump water for wildlife, adding, 'it is gratifying to see them slake their thirst on the new water'.

My time in Botswana was quite extraordinary. Nobody can deny its exquisite beauty. Chobe River was excellent. I also made it to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, but what I learnt there was one of the most important parts of my entire holiday. The Botswana government has, for many years, been in the process of seriously abusing the Kalahari Bushmen with the end of extracting them from what it sees as a safari park and diamond mine site. But the Reserve is the Bushmen's ancestral home. And the places they are evicted to have introduced alcoholism, HIV and other ills to their communities. They are even being denied water from a watering hole by the government, whilst Wilderness Safaris has a swimming pool and bar.

My review of this resort is that any prospective visitor should consider the sort of tourist firms and governments they're supporting when going there. That lodge, on that land, is totally unjustified and contributing to a terrible human rights abuse. There's a boycott about this actually:

http://www.survivalinternational.org/wilderness