Former Minister Dion George’s decision to drag DA leader John Steenhuisen to the Public Protector, while simultaneously calling for investigations into Minister Willie Aucamp, represents not principled oversight, but a deeply troubling abuse of process driven by personal ideology and animal rights activism masquerading as environmental governance.
At the centre of this saga lies one issue alone, the DA’s 2023 Federal Congress resolution titled “An End to the Captive Predator Breeding, Captive ‘Canned Lion’ Hunts and Lion Bone Export.” This is a resolution adopted on a demonstrably false premise, aggressively advanced by animal rights activists within the party machinery, and cynically weaponised by Dion George to pursue political vendettas after his removal from office.
A Resolution Built on Falsehoods
The resolution in question rests on the persistent and deliberately misleading claim that so-called “canned hunting” is a widespread illegal practice in South Africa. It is not.
“Canned hunting” is not a legally-defined activity under South African law. Where unethical or illegal practices have occurred historically, they have already been addressed through existing legislation, permitting systems, court rulings, and regulatory reforms. To continue invoking the term as justification for blanket prohibitions is intellectually dishonest and legally illiterate.
More damningly, the 2023 resolution entirely ignored a separate DA policy position, also adopted, that explicitly calls for support for sustainable hunting in South Africa. That contradiction alone should have raised red flags for any serious policymaker. Instead, Dion George chose to selectively elevate one resolution that aligned with his personal beliefs while suppressing another that reflected evidence-based conservation and rural economic realities.
This was not policy coherence. It was ideological cherry-picking.
The Traverse Le Goff Factor and the Capture of the DA Conference
It is no secret that George’s personal assistant, Traverse Le Goff, was a central driving force behind the 2023 DA Conference resolutions. Nor is it disputed that Le Goff holds entrenched animal rights views fundamentally opposed to sustainable use conservation.
The result was predictable: an internally-driven policy outcome shaped not by science, economics, or South Africa’s conservation success story, but by the same preservationist animal rights doctrine that has failed wildlife across Africa wherever it has been imposed.
That doctrine found a willing champion in Dion George.
Ignoring DA Policy and South African Law
Even more alarming is George’s complete disregard for the DA’s own formal policy framework, specifically the “DA policy on natural resources: environmental affairs, fisheries, water management and mineral resources” (December 2013).
That policy explicitly recognises:
* The economic and conservation value of wildlife-based land use
* The role of sustainable hunting in habitat protection
* Even the potential conservation benefits of regulated rhino horn trade
Rather than upholding party policy, constitutional mandates, or South Africa’s current conservation framework, George instead attempted to resurrect the failed and unconstitutional animal rights agenda previously pushed by his predecessor, the ANC Minister Barbara Creecy.
Creecy’s tenure was marked by ideological adventurism, policy overreach, and repeated attempts to smuggle animal rights concepts into law under the guise of welfare and ethics, often in direct conflict with the Constitution, existing legislation, and scientific advice. Dion George did not reverse that damage. He entrenched it.
A Total Failure to Engage the Wildlife Sector
Neither Creecy nor George meaningfully engaged with the wildlife sector, even when formal platforms existed to do so.
Both ministers ignored their own Ministerial Wildlife Forum, sidelined scientists, landowners, community representatives, and conservation economists, and instead chose to pander to a narrow group of animal rights NGOs. Creecy went so far as to attempt to insert animal rights organisations into the Wildlife Forum itself, a move that fundamentally undermined its purpose and legitimacy.
George followed the same playbook.
This is not stakeholder consultation. It is ideological capture.
Economic and Conservation Damage Ignored
South Africa’s conservation model is globally respected precisely because it assigns value to wildlife. That value:
* Protects millions of hectares of habitat
* Supports rural livelihoods and community ownership
* Generates billions of rand annually
* Contributes significantly to GDP, tourism, and employment
Hunting alone injects vast sums into the economy and sustains landscapes that would otherwise be converted to agriculture, mining, or development.
Neither Creecy nor George demonstrated any understanding of this reality. Worse, they appeared indifferent to it.
Weaponising Institutions After Removal from Office
George’s post-removal actions, running to the Public Protector and demanding investigations into Minister Willie Aucamp, are not acts of accountability. They are acts of retaliation.
They are grounded not in maladministration or corruption, but in George’s refusal to accept that his personal views, and those of the animal rights lobby he aligned himself with, do not constitute government policy.
The Real Question: Who Should Be Investigated?
If any investigation is warranted, it should focus squarely on Dion George himself.
His documented links, direct and indirect, to organised animal rights organisations, both locally and internationally, raise serious questions about influence, policy capture, and conflicts of interest. The unusually vocal outrage from animal rights groups before his removal when rumours first started circulating, and then following his removal as Minister, speaks volumes.
South Africa’s environmental governance must be grounded in science, constitutional principles, economic reality, and proven conservation outcomes, not imported ideology and activist pressure.
Dion George failed that test.
And South Africa’s wildlife, rural communities, and conservation legacy paid the price.
[Image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Dion_George_2024.jpg]
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.
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