Jacket Notes | Peter Hain on his book ‘The Lion Conspiracy’
A future without the iconic “King of the Jungle” is no fantasy. A century ago there were 100,000 lions roaming across Africa. Now it’s just 20,000. Already extinct in 30 African countries, and forecast to be extinct right across the continent by 2050. Unless we take serious action. But that is not only about properly resourcing and backing wildlife conservationists.
International criminal syndicates must be blocked. Which means co-ordinated, serious action by governments worldwide, of which there is absolutely no sign, whatever the warm words all sorts of ministers offer.
Almost daily, these syndicates are ruthlessly killing lions for their valuable claws and teeth — also their heads, long the prize for trophy hunters from the days of gun-toting Europeans in colonial times. Along with elephants, rhinos and many other precious species, the illegal trade in wildlife is now big bucks, ranking with global criminal networks for drug and human trafficking. And all protected by corrupt politicians, the fight against this illegal plunder is becoming ever more vicious with safari parks turned into war zones.
In my downtime, I have always enjoyed reading thrillers and decided to try to write one myself in 2015 after visiting Thula Thula in KwaZulu-Natal — the game reserve of The Elephant Whisperer fame. We saw up close a couple of rhinos chomping peacefully in the bush. But protected 24/7 by armed guards.
Around then, visiting my native South Africa regularly after standing down as a UK MP, I became acutely aware of the shocking and debilitating looting under former president Jacob Zuma. So, I had a go at putting the two together — the result was The Rhino Conspiracy, an anti-corruption, pro-wildlife thriller, published by Jonathan Ball in SA in 2020. I was then asked to write another — The Elephant Conspiracy, published in 2022. Followed by a third, The Lion Conspiracy, on sale now.
Having thwarted murderous poachers in these first two thrillers, my characters — former ANC underground chief, the Veteran, young “Born Free” activist Thandi Matjeke, the mysterious Sniper, and game reserve ranger Isaac Mkhize, are back battling to save lion prides and confronting corrupt and ruthless political kingpins.
Alongside is security minister Yasmin Essop, while trying to master her law enforcement empire still riddled with corrupt disrupters from the Zuma-Gupta state capture era. Struggling to defeat the international criminals responsible for poaching, the team find themselves embroiled in mafia-style smuggling, illicit night flights from Pretoria to Kenya, tense shoot-outs, assassinations, and murky encounters with Vladimir Putin cronies.
Readers and reviewers have mostly been generous about my first two thrillers, speaking of gripping page-turners — and I hope you might enjoy this one too — even if it makes you angry about a future without the precious wildlife of our heritage but which humankind is remorselessly destroying.
* Lord Hain, former anti-apartheid leader whose childhood was in SA, served as a UK Labour cabinet minister and has exposed global complicity in SAs state capture. He is author of The Lion Conspiracy, Jonathan Ball Publishers