The outrage is not because he was a lion, lions are killed legally often in Africa. There are many reasons people are outraged.
One BIG reason the world is outraged is that this was not an every day lion. This Lion was tagged with a radio transmitter collar around his neck and used for research purposes to track movements, range, among other important conservation data and has been tracked since 2008 as part of the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit. Any good hunter knows you do not kill any animal with a collar, the animals have these for a reason. I am not a hunter myself but accidentally killing a collared animal MAY happen, I have no idea myself, but hiding it instead of telling the authorities shows the type of people the hunter/guides are...unethical.
As for Cecil being just another lion, killing a male lion has shown to have grave consequences for the pride, and they are now at the mercy of rival prides, which may very well kill off the entire Cecil pride to eliminate competition/gain territory. Yes,this type of situation may happen in the wild during fights between rival lions or because of legal hunts but this particular case is caused by poaching.
This was not a legal hunt, it was baited out of a nationally protected park. It does not matter if you agree or disagree with trophy hunting. If it is legal it is legal. However; if you bait a grizzly bear out of a national park in Canada there would be severe punishment , possibly imprisonment and major fines, possibly bans from hunting etc.
One of the guides and the landowner are facing charges of poaching.
As for the article referring to "what lion?" claiming zimbabweans don't care, they asked the information minister... usually not very up to date on details involving endangered species or the environment...ask the right people. If Zimbabweans did not care the Environment minister would not be calling for the USA to extradite the dentist to face charges. "We are appealing to the responsible authorities for his extradition to Zimbabwe.” Environment Minister Ms. Muchinguri also said that Dr. Palmer’s use of a crossbow and arrow to shoot the lion before eventually killing him with a gun had breached Zimbabwe’s hunting rules.
The Dentist in question is not an ethical legal hunter, records show In 2006, Palmer received a year’s probation and a $3,000 fine after he pleaded guilty to illegally killing a black bear in Wisconsin.
Like I said, it does not matter if one supports or dissagrees with trophy hunting, the outrage is or at least should be over the issues I stated above. Lions are killed in Africa a lot legally, this one was not and was a vital source of information for conservation as well as a huge tourist draw which brought vital money into the economy.This would not be a big issue if the dentist had been in a legal hunt, and had no previous record for poaching