Congo Rangers

Category: Logistics, Rangers | Date: Aug 14 2006 | By: admin

The only place in the Virunga National Park that I thought was suitable for ranger training was a remote and disused tourist site at Ishango on the banks of the River Semliki, in the northern sector of the Virunga National Park. Ishango had been abandoned during the war and was at one point occupied by Ugandan rebels. Now it lay in ruins and begged to be put to good use.

Ishango training centre - the early days!

We set about building the station and imported tents from Pakistan to serve as the rangers’ accommodation, as well as a lecture room and a canteen. One of the old buildings was rehabilitated into an operations office with a good communications system including computers with internet access and short and long wave radios, while two small rooms were converted into the armory and treatment room. Toilets and a kitchen were also built and within a few months we had the whole place looking and feeling like a ranger training school with the support of two vehicles, two pirogues (canoes) and a motorbike. We were ready to start training.

The training centre, just before the course started

Conrad arrived in mid September 2005 and quickly went about carrying out a selection of 480 rangers that came from all over the park. After two months of basic training he had identified the park’s best 50 rangers, and following six weeks of instructor training for 16 rangers from all over Congo, he started training them up to become Virunga’s elite force of park rangers, capable of carrying out anti-poaching and law enforcement activities in an extremely hostile and dangerous environment. Conrad had just left the British Army where he was the Commanding Officer at the Royal Marine Training School. Due to his Kenya upbringing, he had the advantage of speaking fluent Swahili, and the training he provided was based on the British Commando basic training programme which he had adapted for use in the African Bush.

Conrad Thorpe who lead the initial selection and training programme, with the team in the early days

During the latter part of the training at Ishango, the park rangers helped reduce the impact of a number of key problems within the park. The NALU (Ugandan rebel forces residing in the DRC) were initially dislodged from the Rwenzori foothills by the Congolese military with support from the UN, and although some of the insurgents occupied neighbouring villages and terrorised the local population, patrols by the Ishango rangers helped restore calm and confidence to the area. However there have been setbacks. One park ranger in the Hunting Concession was isolated and killed, and his butchered and dismembered body left as a crude warning to the ICCN. This type of action underlines the continuing difficulty of conservation operations in this region.

Officials, from the Congolese military, from the UN peacekeeping forces in Congo and from the humanitarian community, attending the passing out parade.

The rangers passed out on the 19^th March 2006 at a ceremony attended by the Vice-Governor of North Kivu, the Head of MONUC (the UN’s Peace Keeping Mission to DRC), the Head of OCHA (the UN’s Coordination Office for Humanitarian Affairs), the special representative of the 8^th Military Region, the Brigadier General of the 2^nd Indian Battalion, ICCN’s General Direction, and all Park Wardens and local dignitaries. At this occasion, the team was officially recognized by General Director of the ICCN as Virunga’s first rapid reaction anti-poaching unit, and he went on to christen them his Eagles… not in honour of the great American rock band, but after the unofficial symbol of Ishango, the African Fish Eagle.

Conservateur Atama with one troop from the Advance Force during the pass out parade in March 2006