I met Maria Diekmann in October 2006 when I set out to meet nature protectors for my first book, “African Encounters.”
Born in Chicago and trained as a lawyer, Maria discovered Namibia during an internship and never left. She became a Namibian at heart and dedicated herself to protecting its biodiversity. She founded the “Rare and Endangered Species Trust” in 2000. Since then, Maria has tirelessly worked to rescue and preserve the most threatened and misunderstood species, such as vultures, for which her efforts have been recognized as pioneering and leading in the field.
Her work later extended to pangolins, those peculiar little mammals that are heavily poached. Unfortunately, the challenges of this new fight led to increasingly difficult local confrontations, leading her to continue her work in Nigeria.
Read the chapter from my book “African Encounters” dedicated to Maria. (Use the keyboard arrows or the sides of the screen to turn the pages)