In a country of remote locations and national parks, Maiko is the DRC’s most inaccessible national park. It is also the only park where you’ll find all three of the country’s endemic species: the Okapi, the Congo peafowl, and the Grauer gorilla. And don’t forget chimpanzees, elephants, leopards, and bongos. Though it’s not well known or well visited, the forest represents an enormous carbon sink and its future protection is globally important to addressing climate change.
Within Maiko’s borders are the Simba Mai Mai people, who fled here in the 1960’s seeking a kind of political asylum. Today, the government is working to resettle the roughly 700 inhabitants in order to protect the forest.
