I understand and agree with your anger about the amount of attention this lion is getting. But I think the answer to your question is NO, they don’t care who the lion was named after. Why, because its an animal. Why would anyone really care? I am a 30 year old white man named Jesse. Had my parents named me after Jesse Jackson (which they didn’t) would that make any difference to the person I am today? No. How could anyone assume that liberals could be logical enough to make the comparison?
I think what the writer was getting at, is that Zimbabwe used to be called Rhodesia, in honor of Cecil Rhodes.
But when white government rule came to an end, and the black majority took over, they renamed the country Zimbabwe.
So it makes one wonder how anyone in that country could allow the name Cecil to be given to this allegedly famous animal. Since they had taken action to rename the country so as not to honor the colonial settler Cecil Rhodes.