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Meet The Team

Primary Investigators

Field Assistants

Researchers & Students

Interns

Past Researchers

Past Interns

Team May2026

2026

Team	Masunzu Jidayi Project Manager	Veronicca Khosana_edited Research Coordinator
Ivorda Mhakilicha (On leave, 2025-2027)	Rama Mrisho Monkey Project Leader	Shedrack Lukas Phenology Project Leader
Joram Navayo Chimpanzee Project Leader	Mwarabu Ndoriki	Eliasi
Jenipher	Mecktilda Charles Fig Project leader	Mali Lepuket
Hussein Juma Cook	Burcardi Vyampi	Team GMERC (credit: Cosmas Mp[ongo/GMERC)
Boniface James	Mariana Marco

Shedrack Lukas (left) on the history of GMERC, from the very origins in 2008!

When we began, there were only 5 of us, Alex, Fiona, and 2 of my colleagues.

We were a very small team in those days.

Mashaka Alimas (right) on his personal journey and how he ended up with GMERC back in 2011

I began work with chimpanzees on Kalobwe Mountain, near my village. In the early days, we used bananas to habituate chimpanzees. We learned since then that there are dangers to provisioning, and in time they can learn to tolerate researcher presence, like at Issa.

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