Arsenal midfielder adds voice to Dar anti-poaching drive

PARADISE BLOG

The 25-year old Ramsey feels particularly strongly about the danger faced by elephants and made the most of a rare free week by visiting Colchester Zoo to promote his passion for animal conservation.
The 25-year-old Wales international made the visit after learning about the death of British pilot Roger Gower, who was murdered
last month in Tanzania when elephant poachers shot his helicopter out of the sky.
‘Roger was obviously tragically shot down and he was killed,’ Ramsey said in a video posted on his Twitter page. ‘He was doing something he really believed in and was fighting for.
Hopefully we can turn things around. It is people like him who are going to have the impact on trying to do that.’ Ramsey has raised money for the World Wildlife Foundation and looks to actively play a role in their preservation of elephants and rhinos. ‘There’s 100 elephants dying every day in Africa due to poaching,’ Ramsey said.
“This (holding a tusk) is one of the reasons why.
Is it really worth it, for the life of an elephant?” ‘I don’t think so. I’ve become a father recently and I would hate for my child to grow up and not see these lovely creatures in the wild, roaming freely. ‘There are many people doing there bit out there to help these animals.’
Ramsey also posted a video on his Instagram account to promote the message from his trip to the zoo.
‘I keep reading about elephant and rhino poaching and it makes me angry,’ added Ramsey, who also posed for pictures with rhinos and lemurs during his visit. Just recently, Tanzanian sensational singer and songwriter, Ali Kiba, who is the country’s ambassador for the elephants, released his long-awaited song, ‘Lupela’.
The song is part of the “Poaching Steals from Us All” campaign, launched last year by WildAid and the African Wildlife Foundation, who work together in Africa and Asia to reduce consumer demand for wildlife products and to raise awareness of Africa’s poaching crisis.
Under the slogan ‘Ujangili Unatuumiza Sote’, Ali Kiba has worked alongside WildAid to raise awareness in Tanzania about the plight of the nation’s elephants, which have been slaughtered in their thousands for their ivory.