Lonely chimpanzee starts anew in Brazil
He lost his last friend, Chita, in 2023 when she escaped from the zoo with Pancho – Yoko's rival – and the pair was shot dead by soldiers out of human safety concerns.
On Sunday, 38-year-old Yoko was flown to Brazil to finally join others of his kind at a sanctuary there. But will he make friends?
Yoko is in many ways more human than chimp, his caregivers say. He uses a knife and fork, plays ball, watches television and makes artwork with crayons on paper and canvas.
Fed junk food by his captor – a narco trafficker whose name has not been divulged – Yoko has only four of his teeth left. Chimps, like humans, are meant to have 32. Yoko was taught to smoke and dress up in human clothes – causing him to develop a skin disease and lose part of his fur.
"Yoko... is a highly humanised chimpanzee, the degree of tameness is very high... He basically behaves like a child," said veterinarian Javier Guerrero.
The vet accompanied Yoko on the first part of his journey, dubbed "Operation Noah's Ark," from Ukumari Biopark, a zoo in the Colombian city of Pereira.
Experts fear Yoko may find it hard to adapt to life with other chimpanzees at Sorocaba in the Brazilian state of Sao Paolo – the largest great ape sanctuary in Latin America.
"Yoko... is not a chimpanzee in the strict sense... he is an animal that identifies much more with human beings," said Cesar Gomez, Ukumari's animal training coordinator.
"To give you an example, a smile is something positive" for humans, "but for chimpanzees, it is something negative and Yoko does not understand these types of communication," he said. AFP
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