For a while, it seemed that the tide had turned, and individual elephants were being treated with respect. The current widespread slaughter of thousands of great apes and other forest dwellers, along with destruction of the forests themselves, as well as a return to killing of elephants, has failed to provoke anything like the same outcry. In Cameroon, some government officials accuse the army and police of being heavily involved in the illegal bushmeat trade, while they themselves rent out guns to commercial hunters. Ministers eat bushmeat at official functions. Loggers continue to move in, and the forests are being lost at a frightening rate.
Few loggers try to control the bushmeat trade, and many actively assist it.
There is local goodwill and a desire to protect and preserve, but without large-scale outside help there is little that can be done.