When bandits slaughtered 650 elephants in just weeks, in one of the most remote national parks in West Africa, it was an atrocity that shook the conservation world. Celine Sissler-Bienvenu, IFAW Country Director France and Francophone Africa was one of the few people with the contacts and the capabilities to expose the outrage. Celine is perhaps unique in modern conservation. The first European student and woman to graduate from the Wildlife Specialists School of Garoua (L’Ecole pour la Formation des Spécialistes de la Faune à Garoua) in Cameroon, her training in a mostly male paramilitary environment gathering 15 African cultures gives her a highly influential network of connections across French-speaking Africa.