Photo From Akashinga – Nature Protected by Women / Facebook
The buzz continues to build around Akashinga, meaning “The Brave Ones,” Zimbabwe’s first all-female anti-poaching team that has garnered global support; most recently featured in mainstream media on CBS News.
The team has already arrested 80 armed poachers in the past year.
Damien Mander, a former Australian special forces sniper and the founder of the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF) was inspired to put this remarkable all women’s task force together to help combat the crisis that Africa’s wildlife is currently facing. The selection for the unit was opened purely to disadvantaged women from local communities, including unemployed single mothers, widows, orphans, victims of sexual and physical abuse, and wives of poachers in prison. This approach has helped present more loyal rangers.
WAN had the opportunity to speak with Mander, the “force” behind the powerful group.
Mander, who has trained thousands of men, often explains how he once selected 189 men and at the end of the first intense day of training, there were only three left. When it came to the female recruits, he revealed a quite different story. Out of 36 females training, only three dropped out.
Not only was the training that these women endured vigorous, they also follow a vegan diet. Mander became vegan when he felt the hypocrisy of protecting one group of animals and coming home and eating another.
Mander told WAN, “That despite the press coverage that IAPF’s Akashinga all female ranger program in Zimbabwe has received, no mainstream media has covered the fact that they are all vegan, until now. Watch this segment from CBS News yesterday morning that aired across America, and be inspired by their dedication to all animals.”
