Madiba and Mbeki roam the range with Kenyan elephants

13 August 2017 - 00:00 By JEFF WICKS

If you're lucky you might spot Nelson Mandela roaming the plains of the Amboseli National Park in Kenya. He's usually accompanied by Thabo Mbeki.
The two elephants are among thousands that have been christened by Soila Sayialel, who has spent 27 years tracking and cataloguing 58 elephant families in the park during the longest study of the animal ever conducted.
Baby name books were exhausted quickly and Sayialel and her team turned to pop stars and presidents.
"The people from my village said I was mad because I was herding elephants," she said, thumbing the weather-worn file that holds lists upon lists of elephant names...

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