What makes Cecil the lion so special??

Cecil's death got many if not all Zimbabweans questioning the importance of their welfare or rather the importance of other matters that directly impact humanity in the nation to the world. This is because the death of the Lion called Cecil made media waves leaving out other issues in the country including the Economical problems and political predicaments. Then again the question standing and being asked by most people is who was Cecil and why was this Lion so important or rather how does an animal make waves putting the country's name on the platter and not other issues…?

For the Zimbabweans and tourists that visit Hwange National Park for recreational sessions and expeditions Cecil the lion was something of a celebrity to them.

The 13-year-old was a star attraction for tourists, known for his laid-back attitude towards humans.

He would often be seen by the side of main roads through the park, unfazed by the snapping of cameras, thus giving holidaymakers some incredible pictures to take home.

His legend is further enhanced by his backstory.(Mirror)

1) What happened to Cecil?

The details of Cecil's killing are disturbing — and they're important for understanding why this has become such a controversy.

Hwange National Park is a "free roam" zone under Zimbabwean law, which means that hunting isn't allowed in the park and killing Cecil inside of it would have been illegal.

When Walter James Palmer, a dentist from Minnesota, went to Zimbabwe in July, he found a way around this law. According to the Zimbabwe Parks & Wildlife Management Authority, two locals are facing charges for assisting in Cecil's killing: a hunter identified as Theo Bronkhorst and a local farmer identified as Honest Trymore Ndlovu.

The three of them strapped an animal carcass to a car they parked outside Hwange, on Ndlovu's farm, as bait to draw out Cecil. Once Cecil left the park, it became theoretically legal to shoot him, which Palmer did, with a crossbow.

The arrow only wounded the lion. Palmer stalked him for 40 hours, and then shot him again, this time with a rifle. Then Palmer, Bronkhorst, and Ndlovu skinned his corpse and cut off his head.

The whole experience allegedly cost Palmer around $50,000.(Vox)

"What happened to Cecil" being answered for the animal fanatics, the question for the other Zimbabweans and people across the world who do not have any interest in Lions or something of that sort is WHY the fuss and what is the big deal about this lion that is perhaps all over my news feeds or all over the media?

2) How did this become such a big deal?

Part of the outrage comes from the sheer brutality of the facts, and the cynical way that Palmer seems to have gotten around Zimbabwean law.

But that's not enough to explain the surge of outrage. Big-game hunting is by definition stalking, killing, and skinning beautiful animals like lions, and it happens all the time. This case was clearly different.

Here's why: Cecil was a particularly high-profile lion. He was something of a mascot for Hwange National Park and beloved around Zimbabwe for his distinctive black mane. The Guardian describes him as "one of Africa's most famous lions and the star attraction at the Hwange national park."

Killing him feels like a violation, and robbing Zimbabweans of this beloved symbol seems particularly ugly — not to mention a disturbing echo of colonial-era practices of robbing sub-Saharan Africans of their heritage and natural resources.

Cecil had an international profile, as well. He was part of an Oxford University study on lion conservation in Zimbabwe, and Oxford's researchers were happy to speak to the press after the news broke.

"It's not many months ago that I watched Cecil with my hand on my heart as he strayed toward a hunting concession," professor David Macdonald, founding director of Oxford's Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, told CNN. "On that occasion he turned back into the protection of the park, but this time he made a fatal mistake and I feel deeply sad, personally."(v0x)

To clarify one of the reasons why the Death of this lion has caused an outrage across several social media platforms and mediums is that, people need to understand that the extinction of  lions is near and killing them will not help.

5) Is Cecil's killing part of a bigger problem?

Yes. "Nearly a century ago an estimated 200,000 lions roamed across Africa," National Geographic‘s Brian Clark Howard reports. "Now there are less than 30,000, and they are considered highly vulnerable."

The biggest problem, according to a 2012 study coordinated by Duke University researchers, is loss of habitat. The more human populations expand, the less space lions have to roam and hunt. Moreover, it brings human and lion populations into contact, making humans more likely to kill them.

"Hunting areas are extensive, so the fate of lions depends on how well user-communities manage them," the 2012 study concluded. In other words, keeping the world's already frail lion populations from getting much smaller will require the world to carefully and responsibly manage those populations. That didn't really happen here.

Cecil's killing is clearly something that Zimbabwe's wildlife conservation policy intended to prevent. That failure here speaks to the larger failures to protect global lion populations.(Vox)

The death of Cecil has put most of the world's eyes on Zimbabwe and not for its Political Intricacies or Economical perplexities. Reasons are really unknown why other matters that occur in Zimbabwe are not attested on a global scale but on the antithesis, Cecil was the Pride of Hwange National park and an important figure of a dying breed . Thus his death is a blow to the world if things such as extinction and Love for animal life are put into consideration.