The only gorilla family habituated in Mgahinga national park which had migrated to Rwanda since last year is back in Uganda’s most scenic national park – the Mgahinga. It has been confirmed that the group looks very healthy.
Nyakagezi Gorilla group keeps marauding amongst the 3 borders: – Uganda, Rwanda and DR Congo seeking food. Due to these kind of unpredicted migrations, the three countries had to enter a trilateral memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed between Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), Rwanda Development Board (RDB) and ICCN in 2006 on the basis of “the collaborative monitoring of and sharing revenues from transfrontier tourism Gorilla Groups”. A similar situation happened in Rwanda whereby Kwitonda Gorilla group transferred to Volcanoes national park 8 years ago from DR Congo. In this case an MOU signed between DR Congo and Rwanda enabled both countries to share revenues equally accruing from visitors to this group.
Nyakagezi gorilla group presently constitutes of 10 members: with Bugingo as the lead silverback; his silverback sons – Marfia and Mark; and Rukundo and Ndungutse as the 2 blackbacks whose antics while in tree branches leave every one wondering! The 2 daughters – Nyiramwiza and Nshuti, both bear babies – Nkanda and Furaha respectively. Despite gorilla trekking in Mgahinga taking longer it is less strenuous than it is in Bwindi.
With the return of Kwitonda gorilla family in Mgahinga, Kisoro town and the neighboring areas are going to benefit greatly in terms of development. The number of visitors to Mgahinga national park is bound to swell again. Previously the only trails that have been attracting some visitors were the golden monkey tracking and the Batwa trail.
Despite her small geographical size (a conservation area of 434 km²), Mgahinga national park offers the most spectacular landscape including Gahinga (3,474m), Sabinyo (3,645m) and Muhavura (4,127m) volcanic peaks.
