Radio Okapi/Ph. Florence Kiza”/>
The Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature (ICCN) in Kindu (Maniema) received, Tuesday, May 16, a chimpanzee held by members of the community. On May 5, he had received another.
For the ICCN/Kindu site manager, Radar Nishuli, this gesture by the community is the result of the environmental awareness campaign that it has been leading for the past month on the protection of biodiversity in the province of Maniema.
Radar Nishuli calls on those who still keep protected animal species to return them to ICCN:
“The inhabitants have started to give back since since I have been there I have launched an awareness campaign to already warn people that keeping chimpanzees is a formal prohibition by the law of our country”.
The two chimpanzees handed over to ICCN came respectively from Sankuru and a village very close to Kindu, revealed Radar Nishuli.
The latter also pointed out that he has spotted the houses where the protected animal species are kept. A one-month ultimatum is given to their holders to return them at the risk of exposing themselves to legal sanctions.
« At the moment I think we still have a margin of one month, whoever hands over we will thank him and let him go. But, after a month, it will be us who will look for everything that will follow “, he said.