Environmental affairs minister Edna Molewa has died

Minister of environmental affairs Edna Molewa has passed away at 61 years of age on Saturday.

The presidency is expected to issue a statement on the late minister soon.

Molewa was premier of the North West and minister of social development before her current position.

The fact that today is World Rhino day is significant, as Molewa was the minister tasked with stemming the tide of rhino poaching.

The Citizen reported in August that despite stating that she was “committed to providing timely and comprehensive reports on the state of rhino poaching in South Africa”, Molewa released no poaching figures for 2018.

The last known numbers put forward by Molewa were 1 028 rhinos poached in 2017, a decrease of 26 animals over 2016.

“As a result of our antipoaching strategy in the KNP, we are now seeing a decrease in the number of poacher activities in the park with a total of 2 662 recorded in 2017 compared with 2 883 in 2016. This represents a decrease of 7.6%,” Molewa said at her last briefing in January.

In Plane Sight found the “lack of large-scale seizures in South Africa, the most prominent origin country for rhino horn, may suggest South African customs and enforcement officials are missing or not reporting large rhino horn shipments.”