ZAKAYO LEGACY DAY IN UGANDA

Zakayo Legacy day in Uganda. 

The celebrity chimpanzee; Zakayo who lived at the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre (UWEC) for 42 years will live to be commemorated on the Zakayo legacy day every year.

UWEC is a fun and exciting place to behold and learn more about Uganda’s wildlife and ecosystem. It gives a perfect introduction of the animals that dwell in the remote national parks of Uganda. Founded in the 1950s, UWEC has forever been a home to the orphaned and abandoned animals. It’s a home to lions, giraffes, rhinos, elephants, chimps, jackals, reptiles, cheetahs, leopards and many others.

UWEC was a home for Zakayo too for over 42 years, from 1976 to 2018, Zakayo had become the oldest chimp in captive in Uganda. He was the non-human primate and the conservation icon of not only UWEC, but also Uganda as a whole.

Zakayo was first captured in Semuliki national park, he later landed in the hands of an expatriate who claimed to have confiscated Zakayo from people who illegally held him.

At the age of 13, Zakayo was handed to the then Entebbe zoo in 1976 after becoming so aggressive to be kept as a pet. From then, Zakayo lived at UWEC, he became more popular among the fellow chimps. He was caring and a lover of peace and harmony.

Zakayo lived as a dominant male and started up a chimp family at UWEC. By the time of his death at 54 years, Zakayo left two wives; Amina and Ruth with two sons, Matooke who led the group to 2013 and Alumna who is the current leader.

Zakayo was synonymous to chimps both in the wild and those in captivity. His birthday celebrations had become a colorful event at UWEC every year. Zakayo attracted huge numbers of tourists, both domestic and international.

Last year, Zakayo took his last breath due to old age. He had highly become susceptible to opportunistic infections, and he succumbed to Chronic Gastroenteritis (a chronic inflammation of the stomach linings that causes it to change and lose some of its protective cells).

His body is still kept for conservation purposes. It’s only his intestines that were buried and visitors to the center have opportunities to see Zakayo’s grave.

Note that statistics show that Chimps have a life span of 45 years in the wild, and 60 years in captivity, meaning Zakayo even surpassed the normal life span.

It is all this legacy that UWEC couldn’t just leave to die with him, and it launched the Zakayo legacy day to commemorate the chimp’s life time. The day will henceforth take place every 1^st of November each year.

On the inauguration ceremony of Zakayo day, the Chief Executive officer of UWEC noted that He, Zakayo represented primates, he was social and followed hierarchy. He would only eat after the young ones had eaten. Zakayo brought in a lot of money and tourists to Uganda, and it was only prudent of the people of Uganda to celebrate him.

UWEC plans to construct a museum and a memorial monument in commemoration of Zakayo. The museum is to be rich with information on conservation and biodiversity, playing a very vital role in disseminating such information.

Even if Zakayo died a year ago, UWEC has continuously innovated new and better brands to attract more tourists to the center. UWEC is currently doing aggressive marketing of the remaining species at the center as well as the re-introduction of regional satellite centers to enable easy accessibility to the wildlife education centers to the people in distant rural areas.

You want to see wild animals, but you have phobia for long journeys to the national parks of Uganda, visit UWEC – the one – stop center to see Uganda’s abundant wildlife.