Mar 01 2008
A New Initiative
This is Emmanuel in Goma. We are struggling to make progress in the gorilla sector. It is incredibly frustrating, but we just have to keep trying. While massive progress has been made in stopping the charcoal trade coming from the park, we are completely stuck when it comes to getting close to the gorillas to protect them. The rebels are making sure that the rangers can’t get into the gorillas sector. They’ve threatened to kill any rangers who try to get to Bukima or Jomba, and have placed landmines on the road to Bukima. They have said that conservation groups can come, if we bring funding for them, but that’s unacceptable to us.
But we have been working on a few new ideas, that may work. Some of you may know Balemba who set up the Virunga Youth Alliance. He is an extremely dynamic ranger who is really keen on sport, his community, and of course the Mountain Gorillas. He thinks that he can work with the displaced people through the Youth Alliance, to set up a simple monitoring system around the gorilla sector. At the moment local farmers live down in the valley, but walk up to Bukima every day to cultivate their fields. It is accepted by the rebels, and provides us with an opportunity to put some basic monitoring in place.
It won’t be perfect, because they can’t go into the forest, but they can certainly act as our eyes and ears around the gorilla sector. This may even give us some insights into how to make progress through local community members.
It’s a long shot, but certainly worth trying. We will be giving them a small stipend through your donations, and we’ll report on what’s going on at Bukima at least once a week.
Daily news from the conservation frontline by Innocent and Diddy, and other Congolese rangers risking their lives to save mountain gorillas of the Virunga National Park in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo
Great to hear from you Emmanuel and this is a great idea you propose. Balemba is energetic and has a great sense of humor! We want our rangers to stay safe and come home to their families unharmed.
Thanks Theresa. Sorry not to have been in touch for a while, I managed to catch a virus in western Uganda, and that knocked me out for ten days. Also, with Samantha gone, things are an awful lot harder! But there is a lot happening on the ground, and with Diddy and Innocent, we’ll try and let everyone know what’s happening as it unfolds
Glad you are feeling better. We have been keeping Will very busy at the Mara blog! Samantha is one of a kind, she should have been cloned.
Thanks for the update, Emmanuel. Sorry to hear you’ve been ill but glad you’re back online. Some of us are feeing a bit “abandoned” these days now that Samantha (and Will and Virginia) are gone. I hope you find someone to replace Sam very soon - we need to get the word out to the press about the situation in the gorilla sector and the Mara Conservancy fundraising goals.
I think the idea of using local people to help monitor the gorilla sectors is pretty smart - I hope it works out well. Who can we contact about getting the rebels out of Virunga National Park? They’ll stay forever unless they’re forcibly removed, it seems. We can’t let them stay much longer.
s.
Emmanuel, welcome back. DRC’s government authorities of environment was contacted about the problem with rebels into the sector gorilla of the Virunga National Park? What they think about this? What they said that can be done?
Thank you I really hope something works..glad you are feeling better! Take care!
Hi Emmanuel. How frustrating for the rangers. All this time out of the park because of the fighting and now this. I, too, am curious like Lucia as to what can be done.
Emmanual, thanks for the update. Great idea regarding getting the locals involved in monitoring the gorillas. It does sound like a long shot, but still absolutely worth a good try. Good luck and I will look forward to the updates. Glad you are feeling better. Lisa
Dear Emmanual,
What a great idea and no doubt it will work to get you informed with the gorillas again. Working with local farmers is key to saving them even though it will take a while to negotiate with the rebels because they see park rangers as a threat. So please be careful. Hopefully the conservation groups can get in there without threats and get a real assessment of their status. Thank you for your amazing work and please don’t feel pressured to take risks! Be careful!
Judy in CA
A good plan for the moment, but the goal has to be on getting the rebels out of the park for good! It’s unbelievable that these wonderful creatures are being kept hostage and criminals are holding all the strings..
Hi Emmanual. Glad you are better. Your other news is just outrageous. I’m so disappointed that there is such little pressure coming from the outside world. Has anyone from WLD tried to contact Oprah Winfrey or Angeline Jolie? Several of us have tried this approach to no avail. I know that this is a long shot, but I would try. Of course none of the Presidential candidates in the USA have said anything about endangered wilflife. Perhaps those of us who care about the gorillas should jointly pick a 2-3 major newspapers so that they get flooded with calls this week. Any thoughts bloggers?
Hi Cathy,
What about Leonardo Dicaprio? He’s head of Defenders of Wildlife here in the states and cares deeply about wildlife and the environment and has filmed in Africa including sponsoring a child in Sierra Leone - maybe try to contact him? Natalie Portman was in Rwanda recently for Animal Planet. Definitely need more press here in states about this outrage. CNN and Natl Geo are in there but other news outlets need to broadcast this story instead of some of the lame stuff they spend time on! corp news just doesn’t work anymore! this is such an important story still evolving. I want to see it on the six oclock news, get a broader audience.
Judy in CA