Serengeti has just grown larger; the world-famous National Park is now extending right into the deep blue Victoria, the largest Lake in Africa.
By Marc Nkwame
While both the Serengeti and Lake Victoria have been famous iconic names in their own, few people knew that the two destinations were in very close proximity.
For many years there has been a narrow strip, measuring close to three kilometers wide, which was separating Lake Victoria from the Serengeti National Park.
The Western Corridor of the Serengeti features a mushy and wildlife rich precinct mapped between the great Mbalangeti and Grumeti rivers.
The two water bodies form a bayou which drains into the Speke Bay area of the massive lake, creating a delta similar to Botswana’s Okavango but which was yet to be discovered by the many tourists visiting Serengeti.
However, the passage linking Serengeti and Victoria was previously populated with farmers, fishermen that formed three sizable and officially gazetted villages, with four residential areas of Tamau, Nyatwali, Kariakoo and Serengeti.
Tanzania has dished out 45.9 billion/- equivalent to USD 18.5 Million to compensate the residents who have now moved out to pave way for conservation efforts.
Conservators say moving about 8,000 people out of the Speke Game Controlled Area in Bunda district of Musoma, was essential to conserve the Serengeti’s ecosystem as it faces worsening drought.
The Serengeti national park will now extend to include all the dry land between the lake shore and its current boundary which flanks the highway North from Mwanza, between where it crosses the Mbalangeti River at its Southern end and the Grumeti River some 12 kilometers north.
Serengeti, which initially measured 14,763 square kilometers, has now become bigger with additional 54.67 square kilometers, boosting its size to 14,818 square kilometers but Serengeti will remain the third largest National Park in Tanzania after Nyerere and Ruaha.
The Park will also stretch its size extending by a full kilometre out into the lake waters at Speke Bay.
Opening up the entire lake shoreline between the Mbalangeti and Grumeti rivers will allow wildlife of the Serengeti to take advantage of the permanent water at the shores of Victoria.
Ecologists see the possibility of the annual Migration of nearly 2 million ungulates to also find their way onto Lake Victoria as they circulate within the Serengeti ecosystem, encompassing the National Park, Ngorongoro Conservation, Maswa Game Reserve and the Maasai Mara of Kenya.
The other herds of wildebeests and Zebras making up the sedentary population nearest to Lake Victoria may even be swallowed up into the annual migration of Gnus and be transformed into nomads.
Whether the inclusion of Lake Victoria into Serengeti National Park will create new tourism activities in the popular National Park is something which may be divulged later.