Worldwide ad campaign launched for Bushmen

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Survival, the worldwide organisation supporting tribal peoples, launches an international advertising campaign on 2 March. The advertisements highlight the persecution of the Gana and Gwi Bushmen of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve in Botswana. The first advertisement appears today in the Brisbane Courier-Mail, Australia, where Botswana's President is attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM). Further adverts will appear around the world.

Survival has also distributed the advertisement to every government delegation at the CHOGM, together with information on the Bushmen's plight. It exposes the atrocities being committed against the Bushmen, whose water has been cut off to force them off their ancestral land and into resettlement camps.

Survival's Director Stephen Corry said today, 'Today's ad is just the start of a long campaign. The Botswana government's racist oppression of the Bushmen is appalling millions of people around the world, and our adverts will reach many more. Wrecking the Bushmen's lives will wreck Botswana's reputation, and that is exactly what is happening now.'

Note: The respected think-tank the Commonwealth Policy Studies Unit has highlighted the Bushmen's persecution in a memorandum to all CHOGM delegations. They say, 'the Basarwa (San Bushmen) of the Kalahari Desert in Botswana today face a bleak future in relocation camps as the Government forces the remaining 700 members of their tribal group off the land.'

NB The names Gana and Gwi contain sounds not conveyed by this spelling, and can be written as G//ana and G/wi. Survival omits the symbols '//' and '/' as they are not understood by most people internationally.

Click here to donate to Survival's Bushman campaign.