Cultural kinship between humans and apes recorded by research team
Uganda’s most famous alpha male chimpanzee Zakayo, eating a piece of cake on his 44th birthday at Uganda Wildlife Education Centre in Entebbe, in 2008. FILE PHOTO | REUTERS
Chimpanzees, among the Banyoro and the Bakonzo in western Uganda, are either “people who ran away from the community” or “wild people” or “our brothers or sisters” or “relatives who should be respected,” according to a new study.
The report titled “Culture and the conservation of the great apes in Uganda (2018)” released by the Cross-Cultural Foundation of Uganda (CCFU) adds that although many of the large forests have today been gazetted as forest reserves or national parks, neighbouring communities still express their attachment to these natural landscapes.
