RSC Supporter, Raihana's Story In the NST Today!
Praise the Lord!
Raihana's story is published in the NST. No, not Naomi's story (we are still hoping and praying for that), but on her experience at the zoo. Here is it below. Please get the NST if you can, because it has a photo and I believe it might be the lead letter. Keep up the good work, guys and thank you NST!
SET UP ANIMAL SANCTUARIES INSTEAD
RECENTLY, I visited the National Zoo in Ampang. It is in a deplorable state. The animals are a sad lot, skinny (the lion was, seriously, a bag of bones) and looking depressed.
There was one section, with birds, snakes and ponies, where visitors can touch and play with animals. Sadly, there was no one to monitor the activities of visitors. Children and adults were abusing the animals, pulling them or trying to hold them.
I saw one man pull the feathers of a parrot to make it scream while another tugged hard at the rope attached to a pony to take some photos. Zoo staff should have been there to control the crowd.
The hostility shown by some visitors towards animals is surely the result of a lack of education on animal welfare.
Mahatma Gandhi said that the greatness of a nation is seen in how it treats its animals. In Malaysia, even the authorities entrusted with looking after animals and protecting them seem to lack the most basic knowledge on how to care for them.
Many of the enclosures are cramped and unkempt. Any caring human being can easily see that the enclosures for the giraffes and lions are too small. It is better to put them down then condemn these poor animals to life imprisonment in these places.
A zoo is not a natural environment for animals.
An animal sanctuary is more humane. The animals get to live in surroundings similar to their natural habitats and roam free over a larger territory.
I hope our zoo officials will seriously consider shutting down these animal-torture chambers and set up animal sanctuaries instead. I urge them to train all staff on how to look after the animals.
The Malaysian Nature Society has a better track record in education than government departments such as the Department of Veterinary Services and the Wildlife Departments.
I suggest the Government make it compulsory for all its civil servants dealing with animals to undergo training under the Malaysian Nature Society education programmes.
RAIHANA SOUKET ALI
Petaling Jaya
Raihana's story is published in the NST. No, not Naomi's story (we are still hoping and praying for that), but on her experience at the zoo. Here is it below. Please get the NST if you can, because it has a photo and I believe it might be the lead letter. Keep up the good work, guys and thank you NST!
SET UP ANIMAL SANCTUARIES INSTEAD
RECENTLY, I visited the National Zoo in Ampang. It is in a deplorable state. The animals are a sad lot, skinny (the lion was, seriously, a bag of bones) and looking depressed.
There was one section, with birds, snakes and ponies, where visitors can touch and play with animals. Sadly, there was no one to monitor the activities of visitors. Children and adults were abusing the animals, pulling them or trying to hold them.
I saw one man pull the feathers of a parrot to make it scream while another tugged hard at the rope attached to a pony to take some photos. Zoo staff should have been there to control the crowd.
The hostility shown by some visitors towards animals is surely the result of a lack of education on animal welfare.
Mahatma Gandhi said that the greatness of a nation is seen in how it treats its animals. In Malaysia, even the authorities entrusted with looking after animals and protecting them seem to lack the most basic knowledge on how to care for them.
Many of the enclosures are cramped and unkempt. Any caring human being can easily see that the enclosures for the giraffes and lions are too small. It is better to put them down then condemn these poor animals to life imprisonment in these places.
A zoo is not a natural environment for animals.
An animal sanctuary is more humane. The animals get to live in surroundings similar to their natural habitats and roam free over a larger territory.
I hope our zoo officials will seriously consider shutting down these animal-torture chambers and set up animal sanctuaries instead. I urge them to train all staff on how to look after the animals.
The Malaysian Nature Society has a better track record in education than government departments such as the Department of Veterinary Services and the Wildlife Departments.
I suggest the Government make it compulsory for all its civil servants dealing with animals to undergo training under the Malaysian Nature Society education programmes.
RAIHANA SOUKET ALI
Petaling Jaya
posted by Shoba @ 11:19 AM
1 Comments:
At 5:33 PM,
disco-very said…
WOW!
Congrats Raihana! That's grabbing 'em by the balls. :P
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