Other than lazy lip service, there is no active media fundraising or request to foreign wildlife donors, no plans to donate lion cubs to overseas zoos to promote Ethiopia, no program to release lions to the wild where they have a fighting chance, and absolutely no interest to privatize the zoo to investors. So for lack of $1,000 a month, $12,000 annual deficit for the whole zoo, scores of rare Abyssinian black-maned lion cubs are poisoned annually and sold to a taxidermist for $170. Yet again, another sad story that epitomizes Ethiopian public institutions.Rare zoo lion cubs poisoned (BBC) November 22, 2006
