27 February 2024
Three cattle farmers from Belfast have won their court case against businessmen with a game farm after their wildebeest caused significant damage due to malignant catarrhal fever, commonly known as “snotsiekte”.
The Gauteng high court has ruled that the respondents must ensure within 60 days that the wildebeest cannot come closer than a kilometre to the adjacent cattle farms. They must also pay the applicants’ legal costs.
The applicants were Sizwe Khoza, Mari van Rooyen and Frans Allers, cattle farmers with farms bordering the game farm. The respondents were Rhys Griffiths, his son Richard, and the enterprises in whose names the game farm is registered.
In the application, the farmers requested that the respondents be prohibited from keeping black or blue wildebeest after several cattle died due to “snotsiekte”.
Van Rooyen said in an affidavit that she suffered losses of about R250 000 due to cattle deaths. Her first case was in 2017, but since she had no experience of the disease she initially did not realise what the problem was.
After Allers also lost cattle with the same symptoms, tests confirmed the contagious disease. Two of his breeding bulls that died were worth about R80 000 each. He also lost five cows and Khoza lost three.
In her statement, Van Rooyen said Griffiths initially farmed with cattle but by 2016 she began to see game, including wildebeest. After the deaths among their cattle, they attempted to arrange a meeting with Griffiths to find a solution, but it failed.
Defence
In his defence, Griffiths said the district of Belfast is an endemic area for wildebeest and blue wildebeest roam freely between farms without game fences. The applicants strongly denied this.
Prof. Moritz van Vuuren, a veterinary microbiologist who testified as an expert witness on behalf of the applicants, said all or most adult wildebeest in a herd are infected. Combating the disease is difficult and it cannot be eradicated.
He said the greater the distance between wildebeest and regular cattle, the smaller the possibility of infection. The risk is more than 90% if the animals move within 200 metres of each other and less than 5% if there is a kilometre between them.
Judge JJ Strijdom said in his ruling that it would be unreasonable to expect the respondents to remove the black wildebeest from the farm since all parties have a right to fair use of their farms. However, to comply with the Animal Diseases Act (Act 35 of 1984), which imposes an obligation on owners and managers to take all reasonable steps to prevent the spread of animal diseases from their property, the wildebeests must be relocated.
Van Rooyen said they are grateful to have won the case. “If it had turned out differently, we would have had to shut down our farming. It’s sad that our good neighbourly relations have now been strained, but it was the last resort. We simply had no other option.
“We also do not rejoice in Griffiths’ defeat and are just very grateful that it has now come to an end. It’s sad that we couldn’t just talk it out before it escalated to a court case. Farmers need each other and good neighbourliness is important. All I have learned from this is that it is much cheaper to talk out a problem and compromise when there is an issue.”