Former UWA boss Moses Mapesa is dead

The former executive director of Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), Moses Mapesa succumbed to acute leukemia on Monday morning. File photo 

The former executive director of Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), Moses Mapesa has died.
Mapesa succumbed to leukemia on Monday morning.
“Moses died today at around 10 am at Nabulola Clinic where he had been admitted. He had myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) that progressed into acute leukemia,” said a relative who preferred to remain anonymous.

In May last year, Daily Monitor published a story of Mapesa seeking Shs299 million to undergo a bone marrow transplant surgery abroad in a bid to save his life.
Dr Henry Ddungu, a consultant in haematology and oncology at the Uganda Cancer Institute, who was attending to Mapesa then, said the former UWA executive director was suffering from myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), a disorder that affects the bone marrow.

“MDS is usually a disease of those aged above 60 years. It is not an easy condition to detect because it doesn’t have symptoms and diagnosis usually takes place when the patient goes for a different medical problem,” Dr Ddungu explained.
Speaking on behalf of Mr Mapesa’s family, Mr Sam Mwandha then told that Mapesa had been diagnosed with the disease in 2008 when he travelled to South Africa for an operation.
“He has lived with the condition for eight years now but the situation got worse last year [2014] in May when he started getting more frequent blood transfusions. Doctors have now advised on a bone marrow operation to help his situation,” Mr Mwandha said then.
Mr Mapesa has for the last nine years been getting regular blood transfusions and intensive medical care to manage the condition.

Dr Ddungu last year said Mr Mapesa’s condition was classified as high risk and has less than a year to have the immature blood cells to develop into leukemia or blood cancer.
Mr Mapesa was the executive director of UWA for five years (from 2005 to 2010) before becoming a tourism consultant.
He started his career as a researcher in 1988 and slowly rose through the ranks working as a warden at Queen Elizabeth National Park and as a chief warden at Kidepo National Park.
His career in administrative positions began in 2000 when he was promoted as the head of planning and as the deputy director, field operations at UWA, before becoming the executive director.