Namibia: Canadian MPs Support Local Seal Clubbing, SPCA Asks to Stop It

August 29, 2009

Brigitte Weidlich

21 August 2009

A visiting delegation of parliamentarians from Canada say they support Namibia's annual seal harvest. They also hold the view that a recent European Union (EU) ban on all seal product imports, exports and transits through its 27 member states is wrong.

This was revealed at a meeting between five Canadian MPs with the local media yesterday.

On the local front, the Namibian SPCA has asked Government to stop the cull or find a more humane method to kill the seal pups.

Mauril Belanger (MP) said "the EU ban is wrong as countries with sound seal populations have a right to harvest these natural resources."

Another Canadian MP, Raynell Andreychuck, added that indigenous people in Canada, the Inuit, have for centuries been hunting seals, eating their meat and using their skins.

"The indigenous people (of Canada) have a right to continue with this tradition," Andreychuck said.

The five MPs are members of the Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association and they visited Angola and Namibia this week.

Meanwhile, the local Society for the Protection of Animals (SPCA) has called on the Fisheries Ministry to find a more 'humane' method of clubbing baby seals to death during the annual sealing season, otherwise the harvesting should be discontinued.

The SPCA held a meeting with the Minister of Fisheries, Dr Abraham Iyambo, to discuss the seal culling after this year's start of the cull on July 1 had made waves internationally.

A South African animal rights organisation, Seal Alert, launched an Internet campaign to raise global awareness.

Two foreign journalists were arrested recently for filming and photographing the cull. They were fined N$5 000 each.

Their footage, posted on the You Tube website, showed that the seals are clubbed to death but are not stabbed in the heart afterwards, as should be done.

Often the pups are not yet dead from the clubbing.

Seal Alert challenged the Namibian SPCA to become active and to help stop the culling altogether, as the SPCA had never before raised concern in the public domain.

In a joint statement yesterday, the SPCA and the Ministry said that the meeting took place last week Thursday to "discuss the highly publicised Namibian seal harvest as well as the recent negative media reports that have brought the international spotlight on Namibia's sealing industry".

The SPCA requested the meeting and was represented by Executive Committee member Dr Debbie Gibson and Andrew Corbett as legal expert. One of the two seal quota holders was also present.

The SPCA had received numerous reports from international organisations that the seal culling in Namibia was allegedly carried out in contravention of regulations of the Marine Resources Act, which stipulates how the culling should be executed. Namibia also has an Animal Protection Act.

But the officials of Fisheries Ministry who were also present told the SPCA that "there was no incontrovertible evidence that any such breaches have taken place", and that "clubbing is not inhumane when the laid down standards are applied and instances of cruelty are isolated," according to the press release.

"In the absence of a mandate to comment on ecological and economic matters and not having the relevant facts to review, the SPCA presently takes no specific position on the desirability of the seal utilisation."

The animal rights organisation further acknowledged the right of the Ministry to manage the offshore seal population and to use it sustainably, but in view of an international consensus that clubbing seal pups could be inhumane, the SPCA delegation told the Minister "that a more humane method should be used or the harvesting of pups should be discontinued".

The SPCA further requested to observe the culling with its veterinarians, but the Ministry declined, saying the 2009 cull had almost come to an end.

The SPCA will be allowed to observe next year's cull.

This year the licence holders may cull 85 000 seal pups and shoot 6 000 seal bulls.

The fur of the pups is used for fashion items while the skins of pups and bulls are used for leather belts, waistcoats, jackets and shoes. The genitals of the bulls are dried and sold to Asian markets for aphrodisiac purposes

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