Founded on Linda Tucker’s pioneering cultural heritage work with the White Lions dating back to 1991, and Jason A. Turner’s ground-breaking scientific methodology, our entire Team is LionHearted, dedicated, multi-skilled and multi-cultural.
The personnel at the Global White Lion Protection Trust – from upper-management to field staff – are known for their integrity and dedication to protecting the planet, and defined by that essential quality of LionHeartedness: “Fearlessness, inspired by Love and Respect for the Natural World that enables us to transform the human world. It makes us unstoppable.”
Includes Linda Tucker, CEO and Founder and Gavin te Brake, General Manager.
Includes Champion Zvega in the north, and Sibusiso Ngobeni in the south, with Chris Mahlalela heading up Maintenance.
A small but highly competent team of office staff, headed up by Project Manager Lynette Kies.
This dynamic team of community champions is headed up by Rueben Hlangano, who is also our much-beloved nature guide.
Our Unicorn Guest Camp and Hospitality Team have long been wonderfully managed by Agnes Ngomane. Agnes is supported by a fantastic team of housekeeping staff, whilst invited guests are kept inspired and well-nourished by our truly brilliant Chef, Enelani Mathebula and her team.
To the South, at the Mbube territories, the prides are meticulously protected 24/7 by our trained anti-poaching team, both in-house with expert support from ProTrack.
Sibusiso Ngobeni manages our southern territories, after receiving a scholarship to our Academy for LionHearted Leadership™ following a long background with our organisation as Environmental StarLion Officer.
Abroad, our UK Office is managed by Margo Naude, who also heads up the Global White Lion Protection Trust Communications team.
In the USA, Linda Tucker is supported by an Outreach Advisory Board, made up of individuals from varied backgrounds: from event coordination and marketing to animal communication.
In Europe, the Global White Lion Protection Trust has a host of volunteers and allies in various capacities generously offering their expertise in Switzerland, Greece, Italy and France.
The Global White Lion Protection Trust also has a presence in Japan, where both Linda Tucker’s books, Mystery of the White Lions and Saving the White Lions were translated into Japanese, events were staged and several documentaries were made on the project including a full-length scientific documentary on the NHK Scientific Channel.
Our Books are audited by PWC.
Our Trustees and Advisory Board comprise of a broad scope of international authorities, scientific experts, traditional leaders at a local, national and international level, celebrities with a deep philanthropic commitment such as film star Jerome Flynn and Hollywood Director Sheryl Leach (Creator of Barney the Purple Dinosaur); as well as leading parliamentarians and gracious benefactors. Our Advisors include King Holomisa, who is an Advocate, Member of Parliament and long-standing President of CONTRALESA (Council of Traditional Leadership of South Africa, now Honorary President); Princess Kabelo Chiloane of the Moletele Royal House and Jenny Booth (Former CEO of Maitland Financial Services, Cape Town).
Linda Tucker’s inspirational journey since Maria’s initiation in 1991 has culminated not only in the setting up of the non-profit organisation to save the luminous White Lions, but also the creation of a completely unique and empowering LionHearted Leadership™ training, inspired by Maria’s living example of LionHeartedness. In every initiative, strategy, implementation, as well as long term vision, Linda and her team at the Global White Lion Protection Trust live by the vision and application of LionHeartedness: “that quality of fearlessness inspired by Love and Respect for the Natural World that enables us to transform our human world.” Linda Tucker’s Academy for LionHearted Leadership™, StarLion eco-cultural schools programs and recently launched Online Courses for LionHearted Leadership™ have ignited hearts around the world.
Linda Tucker’s ground-breaking work on the profound spiritual as well as ecological importance of the White Lions was deeply informed by ancestral knowledge systems, at the forefront of which was preeminent wisdom keeper, Credo Vusumazulu Mutwa, living library of Old African knowledge and keeper of the ancient records known as the “Great Knowledge”. Introduced to the great African sage by Maria Khosa, as Maria’s successor, Credo Mutwa went on to entrust wisdom of the White Lions meaning and importance into Linda Tucker’s care, as did wisdom keepers of 13 other indigenous African traditions. Her first book, Mystery of the White Lions, honours this great prophet, sharing with his permission, word-for-word, from the old African records. Credo Mutwa’s Plea for the sanctifying of the White Lions through national law has been read out by Linda Tucker in South African Parliament, as she continues to honour desperate plea for their protection in all her conservation efforts and sacred activism.
Conservation Legend famed for saving the White Rhino from extinction, Founder of the international wilderness movement, and advance guard of global conservation strategies based on deep spiritual rootedness in Nature’s sanctity and sovereignty, Dr Ian Player was a dear friend and mentor of Linda Tucker’s pioneering conservation efforts. Their shared love of Jungian theory and dream analysis, together with life-long commitments to indigenous knowledge systems, defined an eternal love of the great outdoors, as Dr Player wrote an impassioned Forward for Linda Tucker’s book, Mystery of the White Lions, and she joined him at speaker events around the globe. In his final years, Dr Ian Player became the Patron of the Global White Lion Protection Trust.
Since the imperilled White Lions have only occurred naturally in the Heart of UNESCO’s Kruger-to-Canyons Biosphere – originating from an ancient Sacred Natural Site, yet unprotected by law from being trophy hunted – the acquisition of their ancestral homelands has been critically urgent. Where local government has failed, this Global White Lion Protection Trust has raised millions in order to purchase large tracks of Protected Area to secure the heritage lands – their endemic range – along the arterial Tsau (“StarLion”) River which aligns with the Nile. Securing and expanding the White Lions’ ancestral pride-lands thereby also safe-guards the arterial river to the entire ecosystem.
The following land benefactors have played a vital role: