Sep 14, 1:12 PM EDT


Pets Killed for Food in Zimbabwe

By ANGUS SHAW
Associated Press Writer


HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- Pets are being slaughtered for meat in shortage-stricken Zimbabwe and record numbers of animals have been surrendered to shelters or abandoned by owners no longer able to feed them, animal welfare activists say.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals said it could not feed surrendered animals or find them new homes and was being forced to kill them and destroy the corpses.

Animals, like people, are being hard hit by Zimbabwe's economic meltdown, with official inflation of more than 7,600 percent, the highest in the world. Independent estimates put real inflation closer to 25,000 percent and the International Monetary Fund has forecast it will reach 100,000 percent by the end of the year.

Vets have run out of the drug used to put down the animals and are relying on intermittent donations from neighboring South Africa. One veterinary practice was waiting for supplies to destroy about 20 animals, and on Friday could neither feed them adequately nor fatally inject them.

In its latest bulletin to donors and supporters, the SPCA said it launched an awareness campaign on "the ethical and moral issues regarding the killing and consumption of trusted companion animals."

"But in the face of starvation and the burgeoning number of stray and abandoned animals, the moral issues become far more complex and we should not be too hasty in our condemnations when animals and people are suffering equally," it said.

One animal rights activist, who asked not to be named out of fear of arrest, called the situation "too ghastly for words.

"We are accused of giving the country a bad name," the activist said.

Zimbabwean and international human rights groups accuse the government of intimidating, threatening, harassing and physically attacking critics or those seen as casting the government in a bad light. Sweeping media laws have brought the closure of independent and opposition newspapers, speech and gatherings are tightly controlled, and President Robert Mugabe has applauded police for beating opposition activists.

Animal activists say they have been threatened with arrest for speaking out and SPCA offices were raided by secret police agents of the Central Intelligence Organization on Thursday. SPCA inspectors said they were ordered not to release details of surrendered, abandoned, slain or eaten pets.

No comment was immediately available from the government.

Mugabe's critics say corruption and his stewardship of the economy have led to the crisis. They point to the often-violent, government seizures of thousands of white-owned commercial farms that began in 2000 and disrupted the agriculture-based economy in what was once a regional breadbasket.

Meat, cornmeal, bread and other staples vanished from shops and stores. A government order to slash prices of all goods and services in June worsened acute food shortages and has left stores virtually empty of basic foodstuffs.

Food shortages have also emboldened rats to forage for scraps in homes and far beyond their usual hideaways, pest control specialists said.

Leftover food that would have been discarded has become too precious to throw away, said a rat catcher in western Harare.

"We are getting rat problems where we never saw them before," he said, asking not to be identified in the mounting climate of fear of the authorities. "Please, I don't want any trouble."

Illegally slaughtered meat sells for more than 10 times the government's fixed price on the thriving black market. It comes in plastic bags of 22 pounds and more, containing bone, fat and offal and no indication of types or cuts of meat.

"You're getting brisket, shin, flank, rump and anything else that's available, all lumped together. It's meat, take it or leave it," the animal protection activist said.

"It is not illegal to eat dog meat in this country, but we have laws on how animals must be humanely slaughtered," he said.

A court case is pending in the eastern city of Mutare, where a pet dog was butchered and eaten. Police and SPCA inspectors were called to a shopping center in Harare earlier this month, where a man was offering frozen dog meat for sale from the back of a pickup truck, activists said.

The suspect escaped and the vehicle was not traced.

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What toll will this ultimately take on the PEOPLE of Zimbabwe?

Hunting is our **hobby**. These people are fighting for their very lives.

Watching Zimbabwe is like watching a horse caught in a tangle of barbed wire slowly kick himself to death.

I'm not dismissing the people! They are in a fight for their lives for certain. I know the first thing that must be done by the people. Whether they ever do it remains to be seen. It's not encouraging.

This forum is about African animals not Africans so I stuck to the topic.

This is a great tragedy for all. It may be generations before all of this is worked out and the toll in suffering will be beyond words.

The loss of a great place to hunt is a very unfortunate side effect ... but a side effect nonetheless.

Wow...I thought it was bad a couple weeks ago when I wasn't allowed to use some of one of my buffalo for leopard bait, and then one day some of the Forest Service employees killed a buff and a kudu to butcher and send to the city to some of the higher up gov't officials and we were told it was "over and above" our quota and the regular forest service meat quota - and it was none of our business. It is sad...

quote:

Originally posted by analog_peninsula:
What toll will this ultimately take on the PEOPLE of Zimbabwe?

Hunting is our **hobby**. These people are fighting for their very lives.

Watching Zimbabwe is like watching a horse caught in a tangle of barbed wire slowly kick himself to death.

AMEN, The willdlife in Zimbabwe will be but a memory in he not too distant future.

Mugabe must go! Where's Mad Mike when we need him? Gone, I'm afraid.

Turn Executive Outcomes loose on that benighted place...Oops! I forgot. Bill Clinton and the Brits said no-no to them. They could clean that place out in a month. Gone, also.

I wish I were as confident as some here that the result of Mugabe gone would resolve the problem. As long as the remainder of southern Africa put up with the situation there is little hope for a real resolution to the problem. There are a LOT more things wrong with Zimbabwe than the tyranny of one man.

Which nation over there is being governed best?

I heard Botz. Why don't the less successful try
doing what the more successful ARE doing

I think the best quote I have heard is about 58% of Zimbabwes wildlife population has been poached. That said there are still very good secluded places to hunt as of now...

What will happen in Zimbabwe is anybodys guess as the people of that nation live for today with no thought of tomorrow, and that pretty much applies to all of Africas indigenous peoples, it is a tribal instinct that won't go away anytime soon. A way of life does not change overnight.

You cannot predict or even attempt to understand unless you have delt with these people for years, they do not think like we do and their lifestyle goes back a million years. Many of them are good people and would like to see change, but not as we see it.

A typical example is a village in Tanz. loses a women or child at least every week to a croc who has found a honey hole where the ladies fill their water jugs each day. Do they stop or change water holes, no they do not, they continue to get their water each day as the croc deminishes the village population. Tomorrow is another day. They dont' tend to care for one another and most only worry about themselves and their family. I can name many examples of this. Is it wrong? not really, its just a way of survival that has been working for hundreds of years. Does it still work? I doubt it, but will not stand in judgment.

The man you see at the UN in New York in his blue serge suit is the same man you see in Africa setting his firstborn out for the Hyenas to eat because the child was born feet first.

Will it change, I don't have any idea and afraid if it does, the Africa I know will never be the same. I am not all together sure WE are the ones that have it right!

Just some personal random thoughts on the subject, and I don't claim to be an expert on the subject. Just the way I see it based on my personal experiences.

One last comment on the subject..When people get hungry, all hell is getting ready to break loose...

Atkinson's note above is somewhat of a brief paraphrase of Michael Levin's book "Why Race Matters". You may or may not agree with Levin's conclusions but the book is worth reading for the large quantity of quality data from which one can draw one's own conclusions.

Now if someone over there could claim they found what looks like OIL...all of their problems with Mugabe would be solved QUICKLY. Airforce 1 could'nt get there quick enough!

Please don't add anti-American, ignorant statements to the discussion of this awful situation. As a matter of FACT there are more than enough strategic materials in that sad country to garner all kinds of international attention over and above "something that looks like oil", if that's all it took . This is a tragedy unfolding before our eyes.

Don, perhaps you know why the rest of the modern world is standing on the sidelines, just watching the internal destruction of this otherwise fine country. Perhaps I don't know everything...but you would think the G7(G8) would have done something by now to alleviate the suffering and get that asshole out of there. Yes, it is aweful...all the more reason to resolve the issues there.

Yeah, you're right, zimbabwe, but cutting the head off the snake never did the snake any good...

Woodrow,

There is plenty of oil in the Sudan and the G8 has been soooooo effective sorting out their problems.

America has never really had anything to do with Africa, not sure if that's a left over effect from the Civil War ending slavery or why it is this way. Even after WWII, when American military bases were kept everywhere else, both in Europe and Asia; the bases in North Africa were abandoned and we just left.
European powers that had their African colonies didn't do a good job of turning them into countries, actually I think that a LOT of todays world problems were caused by the British never taking the time to understand the local peoples in their colonies. Far too often they grouped together hated enemies or split apart a large cultural group into several different colonies/countries. Wasn't just the British that did this, just that they ended up with so much of the world under their thumb they were often the one in charge when it happened.

Woodrow,
You oughta move to Hollywood, you would have a hell of a lot of support there.

The answer about why the rest of the world doesn't care about Africa is as plain as day. From Liberia to Somalia to Rwanda to Zimbabwe. Watch the movie called Hotel Rwanda and pay attention to what Nick Nolte's character says about why the world doesn't care. That quote sums it up in a nutshell.

Tembo - Could you just post he quote here? I am not much of a movie buff. Thanks

Larry Sellers

quote:

Originally posted by Tembo:
The answer about why the rest of the world doesn't care about Africa is as plain as day. From Liberia to Somalia to Rwanda to Zimbabwe. Watch the movie called Hotel Rwanda and pay attention to what Nick Nolte's character says about why the world doesn't care. That quote sums it up in a nutshell.

Larry, The quote was from Nick Nolte's character to Don Cheadles character "You're black. You're not even a nigger. You're an African." Alot of truth in that.

Very well put, Ray A. They do not think in a Western fashion. One cannot save the Africans from themselves. That croc will always feed at the African honey hole, and oftentimes the croc wears a blue serge suit.

I just returned from Zim. I personally came on 5 snared animals. Some were butchered, some left to rot. I got weary of picking up snare wire. Nuanetsi Ranch. Still had a good hunt however. But the pH I was with said game numbers were definately down.

Jeff