Mngwa. Illustration and photo-reconstruction of the shadow leopard Mngwa. Mngwa (strange one) is the Swahili name applied to a ferocious feline predator in the former East African territory of Tanganyika, now Tanzania. An alternate name for the beast is nunda ( fierce animal ). In neighbouring Uganda, to the north of Tanzania, tribesmen call the creature ndalawo (shadow leopard). By any name, it is recognized as a deadly man-eater. Witnesses who have seen the mngwa and lived to tell about it describe a large cat, sometimes as big as a donkey, with grey fur that sometimes shows stripes like a tabby cat's. The first reference to Mngwa appeared in 1938 in the British scientific journal Discovery. William Hichens, a British administrator working in Tanzania, reported that several natives were attacked by this animal.