(LK) COURT MAY ALLOW KMC TO KILL DOGS AGAIN

[Guest guest]

The ABC-Programme of Kandy started in 2002 with cooperation of Municipal Council

(KMC). For more details see www.sofakandy.org

When KMC cooperation was discontinued, we went to courts to prevent the killing

of dogs. In spite of a court-order in our favour, the KMC killed 360 dogs in

August 2005 and so we had to go to courts again because in our view this was

clearly contempt of court. However, now the Judge has decided, that the KMC is

not guilty of contempt and he also said, that he agrees with the KMC's

statement, that there are too many dogs on the streets in Kandy and he gave us a

grace-period to reduce the number of dogs on the road, otherwise he would have

to allow the KMC to take charge of the population-control again, which would

definitely mean, that they would start killing again. Of course we appealed

because we have to safeguard the 10 000 dogs, which have been already sterilized

and vaccinated and we have no intention to give up the only sensible way to

stabilize the population and to prevent rabies. Kandy had no human rabies-cases

since 2002 and the dog-bite-cases in the hospitals have drastically decreased,

so we have no reason to return the dog-pound to the KMC and let them start

killing again. Now we are awaiting the acceptance of our appeal by the

appeal-court. In the meantime we try to cope with a huge amount of new dogs

appearing on the streets of Kandy, mostly mothers with puppies. We have no idea

where they come from, from their behaviour however we know, that they are

dumped, they are not familiar with the surroundings as migrating dogs would be,

and they just stay put, where they have been placed. It's not an entirely new

phenomena, but it seems to happen more frequently now than before. However we

have to spay them and try to re-home the puppies, which is becoming increasingly

difficult because people cannot afford nowadays to feed many dogs, however much

they would like to help. Sri Lanka is facing many problems, as you all may be

aware, people are struggling for survival, it's not easy for us to find other

volunteers to join us in this task and it's also not easy to find the funds to

pay for the sterilizations we have to do. We try our best and are grateful for

every little help we receive.

 

Below you can read an article we sent to the press today:

 

KANDY'S DOGS ARE ONCE AGAIN NOT SURE OF THEIR RIGHT TO LIFE

 

Since the President declared a No-Kill policy in May 2006, there is hope for

man's best friend, though the problem of funding an island-wide

sterilization-project is still not solved and that leads to problems for the

dogs, as well as for the people. In Kandy however, where the local authorities

had stopped killing dogs already in 2002, soon again the cyanide-pole may strike

because the Mayor and the council-members do not respect the directive of the

country's first man at all.

A pending court-case has prevented the KMC Veterinary Officer Dr.Jayasinghe from

killing dogs, but now it seems he has been able to convince the Judge of the

District Court, that Kandy has to be cleansed of street-dogs. The Judge has

given us a short span of time (until 5th of October) to reduce the

street-dog-population humanely, otherwise he would have to allow the KMC to take

charge of the dog-population-control again. Obviously we won't be able to create

a big visible difference within the period given, all we can do, is to prevent

the dogs from having puppies; and that we have been doing for the last five

years, not only in Kandy town, but in all surrounding villages too: a total of

ten thousand surgical sterilizations have been conducted by us.

 

Birth-control is a long-term approach, which tackles the problem at the root,

while killing or removing the dogs from the road makes an immediate impact, but

it does not take long until the killed or removed dog is being replaced, often

not only by one dog, but by several others. We have witnessed this during those

years, when the white van was cruising the town, collecting dogs, mostly owned

dogs because strays are not easy to catch, and then transporting them to the

dog-pound in Gohagoda, where they were held for a few days under the most

inhumane conditions and then killed in the most terrible cruel ways one can

imagine. Nobody in Sri Lanka would easily tolerate the scenes, that took place

in Gohagoda those days, but because the killing of dogs has been going on for so

many centuries, many people seem to have come to the idea, that there is no

other way in order to curb the population. But were there really less dogs

around during those bloody days?

 

It was a very wise and courageous step, which our President took, to change this

outdated policy, but the hundred year old rabies-ordinance has not yet been

replaced by a better law and the KMC tries to hold on to that piece of antique

from the British times, when there was no rabies-vaccine.

 

What can we all do now to stop this cruelty returning to Kandy?

Firstly: make sure that the dogs in your own neighbourhood are sterilised,

please call us for assistance (0602-801736, 077-7426229).

Secondly: let your representatives know, that you have not elected them to kill

innocent animals.

 

It's because of the silence of the gentle and kind people, that the cruel and

wicked have their way. Please speak up for the sake of your dog, he will not be

spared when the KMC dog-van takes its rounds again. now we can still prevent it

if we speak up.

 

SAVE OUR FRIENDS ASSOCIATION (SOFA)