This Zimbabwean lawyer is building a new kind of defence—for animals

One sleepy afternoon, Ever Chinoda received a call from the office of the Attorney General. They wanted her to join the prosecution service. 

Although she worked with the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority, she desired to build a school dedicated to animal rights—which would be the first in Africa. 

Her favourite subject being Geography, Ever had taken more interest in weather patterns and the hydrological cycle than in wildlife as a teenager. But her dream to study environmental science at university was thwarted by her parents’ wish. Law, they argued, was “a good profession with a lot of opportunities.”

Ever’s advocacy today draws on her abiding passion for the environment and her legal background. 

In 2015, a wave of global outrage erupted following the brutal killing of a lion by a trophy hunter. Ever was invited to assist with the case, a brief stint that left a mark in her knowledge of animals. 

“I thought it was going to be mostly about dogs, cats and pigs,” she says, laughing at her initial reluctance. “I learned about the intrinsic and the extrinsic value of animals.”

For her master’s thesis, she founded an NGO called Speak Out for Animals, now one of the leading voices for animal rights and legal reform on the continent. 

More often than not, activism for animal rights  in Africa is dismissed as elitist and foreign. It is perceived as far removed from the urgent crises that plague the continent. Ever has spent the past decade correcting these long-held beliefs. 

With annual proceeds of $23 billion, wildlife crime is ranked as the fourth largest illegal trade in the world as organised criminal networks conduct trading along Africa’s trading routes. Zimbabwe—home to the continent’s second-largest elephant population—lost over 2,000 elephants between 2015 and 2020. Only 6% of wildlife crimes in the continent have faced prosecution. 

Across sub-Saharan Africa, less than 1% of conservation officers have any legal training in environmental protection. In Zimbabwe no university offered a course in animal or wildlife law until 2021. 

With fewer than a dozen certified animal inspectors serving over 16 million people, the country has long lacked the institutional infrastructure to protect both wild and domestic animals.

It was precisely this gap in awareness that Ever became poised to fill. 

By founding Speak Out for Animals, she was attempting to bring justice to a place where wildlife crimes were often lost in bureaucratic murk. Few lawyers could even define “animal law,” and, as such, support for animal welfare was few and far between. 

“Everybody would roll their eyes. They would be like, ‘what is that?’,” she says, recalling the general reactions towards animal law. Some wondered what to do with the law, she adds. 

Demystifying this concept became her first mission. She began organising annual legal workshops for prosecutors, police officers and wildlife officials on the domestic and international laws protecting animals. 

Sessions offered insights on how to handle wildlife crime scenes, drafting proper charges, and distinguishing poaching from subsistence hunting, including applying the laws that were now forgotten. 

To date, Ever has trained more than 500 legal officers through her workshops.

Returning to her alma mater in 2019 she started an animal law club that has now expanded beyond the University of Zimbabwe. 

Along with veterinary medicine, the club’s membership spans various disciplines—law, environmental science, veterinary medicine, political science.

Together, these students explore wildlife policy, courtroom defences of endangered species, and global conservation treaties. 

But Ever wanted more than clubs and conferences. 

In 2021, she made a trailblazing step by introducing wildlife law as an official academic module at Great Zimbabwe University. Wildlife law serves as an elective course for many of the school’s undergraduates. 

By 2024, she had raised the advocacy for animal rights a notch, lobbying for the approval of a National Diploma in Wildlife Law and Policy to nurture Zimbabwe’s first certified wildlife law officers.

Later that same year, she launched the Nature Extent Learning Centre, offering rangers and journalists alike instruction in law related to wildlife, animal welfare, climate change and human-wildlife conflict. 

Ever’s far-reaching influence in Zimbabwe is evident in the country’s growing crop of animal lawyers. Thanks to their experiences at Speak Out for Animals, seven of her former interns have launched their own nonprofits, with other pursuing careers in the academics and on the field.

Her work has caught attention from global institutions too. Her work is shaping national frameworks. She served as a consultant on the Zimbabwe Environmental Crime Prosecution Manual, a sweeping legal document that covers animal rights, mining, forestry, and environmental justice. Her work is shaping national framework.

And yet, she remains grounded.

“They need somebody who can speak on their behalf because they cannot go into court and argue and say, we’ve lost our mother through ivory poaching,” she said, “but I’m in a position to go and stand on behalf of the orphaned calves, elephant cows on behalf of those animals to say, this is not right.”

She advocates for all animals, but her focus remains strongly rooted in wildlife protection: a deliberate choice in a country home to over 500 species of birds, 200 species of mammals, and some of the world’s most endangered creatures.

Eight years later, the impact is astonishing.

Through Speak Out for Animals, Ever has trained over 180 law students in wildlife law, conducted 8 annual national training workshops for prosecutors and police, and launched two major university student chapters. 

In another development, she founded the Nature Extent Learning Center, Africa’s first green school dedicated to wildlife law and environmental justice in the same year (2024). It is the only school that offers a nationally accredited wildlife law in Africa so far.

The school emerged as a response to a consistent gap she observed through her NGO work: frontline officers, rangers, and prosecutors often lacked the legal training required to enforce existing wildlife protection laws.

Located in Zimbabwe, the school offers practical, government-recognized programs, including an 18-month National Diploma in Wildlife Law and Policy and a soon-to-be-launched National Certificate in Animal Law and Welfare. The courses are delivered in a hybrid model, blending in-person and online sessions.

The curriculum covers international treaties, animal welfare legislation, wildlife crime prosecution, and human-wildlife conflict mitigation. 

Students have already begun applying their training in the field, some securing new roles while others report improved case handling and legal accuracy.

The school is also preparing to launch new professional certificates in Environmental Law and Climate Change and Human-Wildlife Conflict, positioning itself as a hub for specialized legal education in conservation.

Scholarships and donor partnerships ensure accessibility, while many staff and lecturers are former mentees or students from her university’s outreach work.

Even with its success, the path has presented its share of obstacles.

“Securing funding is not easy. But I have been very fortunate to have had partners that have supported our work,”  she says. “ Sometimes we are turned down.” Sometimes trying to engage certain stakeholders to do certain projects is unfruitful.

 For instance, after applying in various universities for four years now, the National Diploma and Wildlife and Policy only managed to get her breakthrough last year. 

When asked what it feels like to speak for animals, she pauses. “It feels satisfying to be able to speak on behalf of a vulnerable individual, whether it’s a human or a non-human being”

She further explained that animals are “sentient” beings just like humans.They have emotions, they have families, they have feelings, “so they need a voice.” 

Still, for all her success, she finds time to pause. Every year, she takes a sabbatical to the U.S., returning to Lewis & Clark. “I just go and refresh, get energized and play with my family,” she says. It’s also where she still meets her former professor, Russ Mead, a man she calls “a key pillar of strength” and one of the few who believed in her vision from the start.

Currently, she continues working on Zimbabwe’s first Environmental Crime Prosecution Manual: a guide covering mining, forestry, and animal law, she isn’t slowing down. She’s just widening the scope.

Years have passed since that dry afternoon in Hwange, when she stood under a sun-scorched sky and answered a phone call that would reroute her life. At the time, it seemed like a simple career decision. But what stirred inside her that day was clearly something deeper.

She still remembers that moment in Hwange.

The dust. The quiet tension in the air. The lion, perhaps Cecil,or  perhaps another somewhere out there, unaware that his life and death would inspire a woman to build a school, a movement, and a new kind of justice.

Because when the lion roared, the world heard heartbreak but Ever heard a summons.

And she’s still answering it.