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The head of a hunters’ rights advocacy group is making no apologies for auctioning off an elephant hunt during a fundraiser to be held this weekend in Calgary.

David Little, president of the Calgary Alberta Chapter of Safari Club International, said he’s hopeful there will be a successful bid at this year’s dinner banquet and auction on a licensed elephant hunt in Botswana.

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It’s just one of two dozen hunts available at the club’s annual fundraiser auction, which caps off a two-day hunting expo.

Little said he understood that there could be controversy over this particular hunt.

“It’s an elephant, which is an iconic animal,” he said. “There’s been a lot of levers pulled and buttons pushed — a lot of sensitivities — but it might as well be auctioning off a trip for two to Tahiti. It’s the same genre (of adventure travel).”

He said the legal hunt reopened in Botswana last May after a five-year closure, and he described a problem of “overpopulation” of elephants there.