His escape led to global fame after the entire country was placed on high alert.<\/a><\/p>\nPeople pulled together and demanded that Panjo be darted rather than shot, and he was found a few days later close to Verena, and reunited with his minders.<\/p>\n
After Panjo was found, tourists flocked to Jugomaro which was at that stage merely classified as game farm.<\/p>\n
The farm has since evolved from a private game farm, to a sanctuary for a wide range of animals in distress.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe costs involved in caring for the animals as well as for erecting new encampments, is astronomically high,\u201d Justin says, adding that no animal is ever turned away from Jugomaro.<\/p>\n
Expenses have been cut to the bone, resulting in the Fernandes family overseeing the entire park, including its restaurant.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe spend R50 000 each month to feed the cats,\u201d Justin tallies the costs.<\/p>\n
Last year, a number of thefts also led to Jugomaro losing a substantial amount in replacing lost transformers and copper cables.<\/p>\n
An emergency fund has now been established to help save the park and its animals.<\/p>\n
Apart from the fund, Jugomaro has approached cattle and game farmers to supply meat, to keep the animals fed and healthy.<\/p>\n
The deadline for Jugomaro is fast running out, and any contributions are welcome.<\/p>\n
An amount of R250 000 has already been collected but much more is needed to sustain the sanctuary and avoid liquidation.<\/p>\n
In an effort to help, three youngsters, Dominique da Silva (10), and Daniela (11) and Catia (15) Infante, started their own project dubbed \u201cTiger Awareness\u201d to do their bit.<\/p>\n
The project is centered around the sales of Loomband bracelets, of which the profits are donated to Jugomaro.<\/p>\n
For more information on how to get involved, contact Justin at 082 558 0703.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jugomaro Predator Park, home to Panjo the tiger, his 11 striped brothers and sisters, five lions, twelve wolves, three lynxes and a leopard; is on the verge of closing after Absa applied for a liquidation order against the embattled sanctuary.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1848,"featured_media":20166,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"hasGravity":false,"cxt_article_byline":"","cxt_disable_google_ads":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2],"tags":[2539,21972,2538,2540],"class_list":["post-20164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news-headlines","tag-absa","tag-animals","tag-jugomaro-predator-park","tag-panjo-the-tiger"],"category_labels":{"Category":"News","SubCategory":"Local news"},"tag_labels":["Absa","animals","Jugomaro Predator Park","Panjo the tiger"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1848"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20164\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}