Cecil, king of the news

"This story, although not local, is being owned by SA media. Almost two-thirds of the news last week in SA focused on Cecil the lion," the company's Tonya Khoury said in a statement.

In local news Cecil took up 65% of coverage, with the Springbok rugby team (6%) and Proteas cricket team (5%) a distant second and third.

In South African social media Cecil made up 51% of posts surveyed. In second place was Eskom at 16%, followed by President Jacob Zuma's Nkandla homestead at 10%.

Internationally, Cecil was mentioned in 34% of news media surveyed, followed by US presidential hopeful Donald Trump at 16% and the death and funeral of Bobbi Kristina Brown at 9%.

The research was compiled from 60,000 online newspapers worldwide, and 206 million social networks. Websites like Facebook and Twitter each count as one network. The bulk of the social network figure consists of blogs.

The local data came from thousands of printed publications in South African and Rest of Africa and 76 South African radio and TV stations.

Cecil, 13, was the pride of Zimbabwe's Hwange National Park. Earlier this month, US dentist Walter Palmer shot him with a hunting bow after he was allegedly lured out of the park with bait. Cecil was wounded and killed about 40 hours later.

Theo Bronkhorst, the professional Zimbabwean hunter who organised the hunt, has been charged in Zimbabwe with "failing to prevent an illegal hunt".

He is out on bail.

Source: News24 Source via News24Wire