From Glencoe to winning a national film award for exposing the horrors of lion poaching

From having his first story published in the Courier (the Dundee district newspaper) while still in grade 7, to receiving a prestigious kykNET Silwerskermfees film festival award for his winning documentary, Besmet, which is a harrowing exposé on lion poisoning and poaching…

This is the journey of seasoned journalist, Pieter Steyn, who proudly traces his roots back to Glencoe where his parents, Pieter and Elsabé (who works at Eventide Home for the Aged) still live. Speaking to the NN News about his life and winning the award, Pieter recalled the ‘privilege of growing up in Glencoe’.

“It is my childhood that has kept me grounded… the magnificent nature and mountains, the acacia trees, the very rich history of the battlefields etc. formed me to a very large extent. My parents taught my sister, Melinda, and I hard work and impeccable ethics – and that is the biggest gift they could give to someone in journalism, and in life.”

Pieter has fond memories of his mother ‘religiously’ taking him to the Glencoe library where the iconic ‘Tannie’ Margaret Pretorius, allowed him to take up to 20 books at a time, when one was only allowed only three or four – such was the young Pieter’s thirst for knowledge.

“My teachers and parents instilled in me a great love for stories. And as the editor/journalist, Tony Weaver once said: “Journalists are only storytellers”. He matriculated from Sarel Cilliers in 2001 where was involved in debating with the ATKV  (Afrikaanse Taal- en Kultuurvereniging) club.

Pieter knew where his future lay after having his story published in the Courier when has just 15 (an article on the old Glencoe swimming pool), and he went directly into journalism, working for all of the main Afrikaans dailies –  Volksblad, Die Burger, Beeld – and for Rapport and a short stint at Huisgenoot and You magazines.

“I was the editor/director for Prontuit on kykNET for about seven years and currently I am the director/editor for the SABC’s Afrikaans radio station, RSG – the breakfast show, called “Op en Wakker.

“I have been a full time journalist for almost 15 years now, and I just get more and more under the impression of how responsible you must be in reporting, because you are working in such a mighty industry with enormous influence – a huge responsibility I think every journalist understands.”

Having a great respect for nature from his childhood, Pieter spends as much time as he can in the bush – the Kalahari, Botswana, Namibia and in our other neighbouring countries. “My parents loved travelling and we would regularly go on day trips to about anywhere that is in a 600km radius of Glencoe. So my love for travelling and nature I got from them.”

Asked how he came to put together the documentary, Besmet, Pieter told the NN News that he had read reports on the shocking statistics on lion poaching especially in the Kruger National Park.

“I realised that in a decade or five, there might be no lions left in Africa. (The lion population in West Africa is technically extinct already). A few decades ago we had around 100 000 lions in Africa, now about only 22 000.

“With so much media attention on rhino, pangolin and elephant poaching (rightfully so!), I realised that there is about nothing on lion poaching. So I decided to do a doccie on lion poaching – it is the first time ever that a doccie has been done on the topic. When it premiered at the Silwerskermfees in Camps Bay, people were shocked when they saw the poaching scenes. Poachers poison the lion and then mutilate them – chopping off their heads, claws, teeth and slaughtering them to get the fat around their stomach. It is mostly used for traditional medicines and beliefs. (We didn’t even touch on the far eastern market for lion parts – that’s a documentary on its own). The tricky thing is, to get a balance between conservation and the century old traditional use. Barbara Creecy, Minister of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries, should seriously start thinking about this issue.

“If a lion is poisoned, eating a carcass that is laced with poison, everything in a 4 to 6 kilometre radius dies – from the vegetation and plants, to vultures, hyenas, jackal etc. It is a vicious, horrible scene. And we show it in Besmet. Poaching a lion is much less risky than poaching a rhino or elephant, and much easier – because there is no loud bang of a rifle, when shooting a rhino of elephant.”

Asked what winning the kykNET Silwerskermfees award meant to him, Pieter remarked that he ‘seriously did not expect the award’.

“Making the doccie was genuinely the toughest thing I did in my working life. There were so many difficulties. Luckily, I had an incredible team, my girlfriend, Minette van der Walt, is an assistant producer on major doccies like Devilsdorp, Stella murders etc. on Showmax, and she helped me so much. As did Adi van der Walt who did all the editing – without them there would not have been a Besmet. Adi she won the award for best editing at the Silwerskermfees film festival.

“And my producer, Sean O’Neill, and cameraman, Steven Hartman and sound operator, Anna Pankova worked day and night when we were shooting the film in the Kruger National Park (lions sleep in the day, so we were literally working day and night.”

Pieter is hopeful that the film will be screened at international film festivals as the world needs to know about the poaching of lions.

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