Man attacked by crocodile after ignoring warnings, provoking animal

Crocodile attack survivor Simson Paulus (41) ignored repeated warnings from the police, a regional councillor and members of the public about a crocodile spotted at Epalela in the Omusati region’s Onesi constituency on Saturday morning.

Paulus, who is employed as a guard near the Omahenene border post, allegedly touched the crocodile with his hands while he was standing between its tail and back leg.

According to Onesi constituency regional councillor Festus Petrus, Paulus was one of a number of onlookers touching and pulling the crocodile’s tail.

“Before he was attacked, he was told that the crocodile is alive and it got where it was by itself so they should stay away from it. People warned him that the crocodile could bite him. He asked ‘why would it attack me if it did not attack others who also touched it?’.

“It was not only him, many people did not want to listen. When the crocodile caught his arm, I just heard people screaming, while others who had been standing near it fell down in the water. The crocodile did not chase him,” Petrus says.

He adds that Paulus tried to assault the reptile before it attacked him.

“I don’t think he can remember how the crocodile attacked him.

“The crocodile bit his left arm. After that, he probably hiked to the Outapi hospital to seek medical attention. Officials from the Ministry of Environment and Tourism also arrived at the scene and the crocodile was killed,” Petrus says.

The councillor says the crocodile was killed because it was struck by a car while it was trying to cross the road near the Etaka Dam earlier on Saturday.

“It would have died if it was not killed,” he says.

Petrus says this was the third crocodile to be removed from the Etaka Dam by officials of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism this year.

He says there might be more crocodiles in the dam.

Crocodile encounters have been reported from Epalela to Okambwili, an area about 18 kilometres away. In January this year, a juvenile crocodile was spotted at the dam

On Saturday, video clips emerged on social media of onlookers touching the reptile’s tail, kicking and beating it, while others took photos and videos of people touching or pulling its tail in their direction.

One of the people can be heard insisting to touch the reptile, saying she wanted to touch the predator as other people had also touched it.

The Namibian could not establish the nature of Paulus’ injury as Omusati director of health Alfons Amoomo did not answer calls to his cellphone. Omusati police regional commander Ismael Basson referred journalists to Amoomo.

The Namibia Press Agency (Nampa) quoted Ministry of Environment and Tourism spokesperson Ndeshipanda Hamunyela as saying it was not acceptable for members of the public to provoke the crocodile as it goes against the policy on human-wildlife conflict management.

She says the ministry urges the public to refrain from approaching or touching wild animals, particularly predators.

“If left undisturbed, the crocodile, even after the vehicle collision, would likely not have posed an immediate threat to the public,” Hamunyela emphasises.

She urges members of the public to contact the relevant authorities for assistance in capturing wild animals instead of approaching them.

Hamunyela stresses that the environment ministry’s human-wildlife conflict policy discourages negligence in handling wildlife incidents and could deny compensation under the self-reliance scheme if it is found that affected parties were negligent in handling wild animals.

This was the third crocodile to be removed from Etaka Dam this year by the ministry’s officials, raising concerns about more crocodiles possibly inhabiting the dam.

Petrus notes that the Etaka Dam, which stores water from Angola’s Calueque Dam on the Kunene River, has become a hotspot for crocodile sightings.

In January this year, Petrus said that between August and September last year there were reports that there was a crocodile in the Etaka Dam.

“I made an announcement on the radio to caution people, but some did not believe it,” Petrus said.

He said a fisherman claimed he saw two large crocodiles at a different spot last year in the same dam, but did not report it immediately.