TheCable

As a one-time lecturer in Zoology, I cannot fold my hands and watch human beings, who gave to themselves the biological name Homo sapiens (i.e. wise man), soil the image and besmirch the reputation of our innocent cousin Gorilla gorilla, lower its esteem in the eyes of other animals and bring its reputation in the Animal Kingdom to public ridicule, odium and contempt.

Ten days ago, an official of the Kano Zoological Garden, who could not account for N6.8m windfall in gate takings during the Sallah season, planted a rumour in the media that a gorilla swallowed the money. The next day, newspapers reported that Kano State Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje had ordered the state’s Public Complaints and Anti-Corruption Commission to investigate the allegation. Ganduje ordered the commission to look into the immediate and remote causes of the incident and unearth everything surrounding it. Kano State Police Command swallowed the allegation hook, line and sinker. A story in Daily Trust of June 16 quoted the command’s spokesman DSP Abdullahi Haruna as saying thepolice would not hesitate to arrest a gorilla or any other animal linked to the missing money. Arrest a gorilla? Which policeman in Nigeria can handcuff it?

Last year, when JAMB staffer Mrs. Philomena Chishe alleged that a snake swallowed N36m of the board’s money, I rushed to the serpent’s defence. Just like Nigeria is divided into geopolitical zones, states, emirates and local governments, the Animal Kingdom is divided into phyla, classes, orders and families. If I do not rush to the gorilla’s defence, some animals who belong to the same mammalian order could accuse me of not reflecting the federal character of the Animal Kingdom in my defence against libel and defamation.

Simply because animals do not make speech comprehensible to the human ear is not a reason for humans to make unfounded allegations against them and assassinate their character. It is not their fault that the human ear cannot decipher the language of other animals. We hear birds singing, cocks crowing, dogs barking, frogs croaking, cats mewing and sheep bleating, but we do not know what they are saying to one another. We humans are so arrogant that when we allocated Latinised biological names to animal species, we reserved “wise man” for ourselves. Who said humans are wise? What was wise about Kano Zoo collecting a lot of money from visitors during Sallah break but instead of taking it to the bank right away, it was kept there until someone tipped off armed robbers? Which other animal would have acted so foolishly?

Those things we call ‘animals’ surpass us in most respects. A dog’s nose, for example, can smell things 40 times more than our own nose. An eagle’s eye can see things eight times more powerfully than our eye can. A cheetah can run four times faster than Usain Bolt. When a peregrine falcon is diving from cliffs, it is nearly 16 times faster than Usain Bolt. If it is about eating, human jaws are toys compared to those of a hyena or a crocodile. Compared to the canine teeth of a hippo, ours are for decorative purposes. The digestive juices in our stomach are like pure water compared to those in a python’s stomach,so what are we boasting about?

Of all animals, is it the gorilla that we should libel, defame and besmirch? Gorilla is a great ape, our second cousin in evolutionary time. In biological terms, the only animals that are closer to us than gorillas are chimpanzees, our first cousins in the Animal Kingdom. There are solid scientific reasons for this classification. An ape’s brain is quite large; they live in complex social groups; they have a language of their own and they even use tools, a rarity in the Animal Kingdom. A gorilla therefore knows what to eat and what not to eat. Even if it tears apart a wad of naira notes out of sheer mischief, a gorilla is smart enough to determine that a naira note is not food and will not eat it.

N6.8m, even in N1000 notes, is 68 wads of notes. It must be a very stupid animal that will unwrap 68 wads, separate them into single notes and munch at them knowing very well that it is not food. Besides, N1000 notes are made from paper. The paper is made from wood and cotton fibre. Many years ago when I was a student, I sat up for many weeks and studied from a textbook titled Advanced Physiology. The book was divided into long chapters: Digestive, Circulatory, Excretory, Respiratory, Reproductive, Endocrine, Skeletal and Nervous Systems. In the Digestive System chapter, there was a section called Special Digestive Challenges. It listed the things that are most difficult for animals to digest including bone, hooves, horns, nails, claws, hair, cotton and wood.

Wood and cotton are difficult to digest because the enzyme required to digest them, cellulase, is very rare in the Animal Kingdom. If you are to guess which animal can digest wood, you are most certain to say ‘termite’ because we see how it eats up logs of timber. In truth, even termites cannot digest wood because they don’t have the enzymes. Clever brats that they are however, they cultivate in their guts protozoans that possess the enzymes. When a termite eats wood, the protozoans will digest it, feed on some and leave the rest forthe termite.

Trust Oyinbo scientists to go out of their way to prove this. In one biology lab, they experimentally killed the protozoans in the termite’s stomach before it fed on wood. The termite soon died of constipation because it could not digest the meal!Perhaps Kano Zoo officials made the allegation because gorillas have been observed in the Congo jungle licking rotten tree trunks. Well, researchers found out that they were gnawing at it in order to have sodium. I was not surprised by the gorillas’ behavior because when I was living in Kaduna, my ram once fell sick. The Vet doctor at Magajin Gari later found out that it ate a lot of polythene bags in order to get calcium. Since gorillas do not have protozoans in their bellies, they will not eat wood because they cannot digest it.

Last week, officials began to backtrack when they realized that their story did not hold biological or dietary water. The Kano Police PRO told Daily Trust last Sunday that contrary to speculations, the N6.8 million went missing after an alleged robbery incident which occurred on June 9, 2019. He said ten of the Zoo’s staffers were arrested and that none of the suspects linked any animal in the zoo to the missing money.

On Tuesday last week, Governor Ganduje also took a step back, saying a gorilla did not swallow the missing money. Speaking at the State House in Abuja, Ganduje said preliminary investigation revealed that it was an armed robbery case. He said, “The issue of gorilla is junk journalism because there is no gorilla in the zoo.” Oga Ganduje, I don’t think the allegation was totally junk because I have been a visitor to Kano Zoo for 30 years and some years ago it had agorilla, a huge one. Visitors were fond of pushing banana to it through the cage. The zoo even posted a notice on the wire cage, urging people not to push their hands through the wire cage because a gorilla is seven times stronger than an adult human. If by any chance it grabbed a hand, it could easily yank it off.

Anyway, gorillas’ lawyers have filed a suit at the Federal High Court, seeking an ex-parte order of perpetual injunction to restrain Kano Zoological Garden, its managers, supervisors, cleaners, vets, security guards, agents, servants or privies from publishing, broadcasting, texting, emailing, tweeting, pinging or otherwise circulating this allegation that a gorilla swallowed N6.8m.

This article was first published by Daily Trust.