A dog killing program is set to resume
By Sharon St Joan, Best Friends NetworkIn April of this year, an emergency room physician at a Houston hospital in the U.S. made a trip back to his native country of Ethiopia to make a wildlife video and to see what could be done to help Ethiopian wildlife.
Having completed the video, and having left the heights of the Bale Mountains, back again in the city of Addis Ababa, Dr. Anteneh Roba found himself right in the midst of an animal emergency of a different sort.
Oddly enough, the immediate origins of this emergency related to the calendar. A large part of the Ethiopian people are Christian; their faith goes back to the earliest days of Christianity. Their calendar is the Coptic calendar, and when most of the world adopted the calendar we now use, Ethiopia didn't. They stuck with their traditional calendar, which is seven years behind the western calendar.
In April of 2007, they were just getting ready to celebrate the arrival of the Millennium, still a few months away in September. To witness the celebration, thousands of tourists from around the world could be expected to flock to Addis Ababa. Who would suffer from this expected influx of tourists? If you are guessing the street dogs, that is correct.
For Addis Ababa to make a good impression, there were many calls for the city streets to be emptied of both street dogs and poor people. A very inhumane program of killing dogs with strychnine was initiated. The dogs were killed during the night and taken away in trucks. Yet, before the Millennium Celebration had begun, after perhaps fewer than one hundred dogs had been killed, the program was abruptly halted. There are an estimated 750,000 dogs in the capitol city.
Two reasons have been given for the dog killing program being halted. The first reason, given by the city, is that there was not enough money in the budget to cover the overtime pay of the workers who were carrying out the project at night.
The second reason, given by animal advocates, is that there was an outcry against the dog killing policy, both from Ethiopian people and also internationally.
HAPS, the Homeless Animal Protection Society, located in Addis Ababa, had swung into action as soon as they became aware of the danger to the dogs. HAPS alerted the media, and their appeals were soon joined by Dr. Roba, with the Amsale Gessesse Foundation, who wrote along with HAPS, letters to the mayor and the deputy prime minister of the country requesting they immediately stop the killing and advising them on the negative impact it would have on the image of the country.
HAPS was created a few years ago with the help of Animal People. They are the only companion animal sanctuary in Ethiopia with a spay/neuter/vaccination program for dogs, and they are able to cover one area of the catitol city. The Amsale Gessesse Foundation, the charity started by Dr. Roba, provides support for HAPS.
Heeding the call for international attention sent out by HAPS and the Amsale Gessesse Foundation, a letter-writing campaign had been launched by several groups, including HSUS. It seems to have had the effect of postponing the massive dog killing for the moment.
The Amsale Gessesse Foundation is working hard to get international animal protection organizations interested in assisting HAPS and the government to come up with a viable plan that will solve the problem. The current situation is not good for either the dogs or the people, and there is pressure to do something.
No one wants to kill the dogs. A workable spay/neuter program is the desired route, but in order for that to be a realistic possibility, resources are much needed.
Dr. Roba has written, "In April of 2007 I went back to Ethiopia to find out about the wildlife situation in my native country, while there I was confronted with an overwhelming crisis namely the huge numbers of homeless dogs who are, among other nonhuman animals, the most mistreated, abused, neglected sentient beings in Ethiopia. Their suffering so bothered me, a day does not go by that I don't think of them. I saw so many hungry, sick, neglected dogs, it was stupefying.
"There is one organization….called the Homeless Animal Protection Society. The only one I know in Ethiopia that deals with dogs among other nonhuman animals. They are under funded, understaffed and in their current situation they will not be able to bring relief to the suffering of a fraction of the 750,000 dogs found in the capital city of Addis Ababa alone.
HAPS, who run on a shoestring and who may soon be forced to close due to lack of funds, have been a bright light in the animal scene of Addis Ababa.
Not long ago, this Best Friends Network Community, "International Friends" posted the amazing story of the rescue from a horrible, deep cave, of four dogs, who had been left there to die. The cave was later closed for good, following the intervention by HAPS.
The wonderful outcome of this story is that, thanks to the Amsale Gessesse Foundation these four dogs will soon arrive in Houston, Texas, where they'll be available to be adopted by a very special home.
A sad story--not yet endedThe four dogs rescued from the cave have been saved.
Sadly, however, the hundreds of thousands of dogs in Addis Ababa are now perhaps in greater danger than ever. The city intends to resume the killing of dogs by strychnine in the near future--not because they wish to do this--in fact some governmental officials have expressed the wish that there were alternatives--but because they see no other option.
Efrem Legese, President of HAPS, has written a letter stating that a government program of killing dogs--by any means, including lethal injection--would represent a huge step backwards in their long struggle to bring to Ethiopia, and to the rest of Africa, a new era of kindness and compassion towards animals. HAPS has always pursued an un-compromising no-kill policy.
Dr. Anteneh Roba is working hard to bring together the support and backing--both in terms of funds and in terms of technical know-how--so that the only real humane alternative, which is a spay/neuter program, can become a viable option.
Dr. Roba says that he was shocked by his last visit to Addia Ababa--by the huge growth in the human population and by the huge increase in the numbers of dogs.
Unable any longer to make a living by farming or cattle raising, in recent years, rural people have been leaving the countryside and streaming into the cities to look for city jobs--which are few and far between. Many bring their dogs with them, and the inevitable happens. The unchecked population of dogs grows and grows! Dogs form into bands. There is a real threat of rabies and dog attacks, and then people call for eliminating the dogs.
A vision of possibility!If one were expecting Dr. Roba to feel discouraged by this immense problem, that would be a mistake. He is a visionary, and far from feeling discouraged, he looks towards a brighter future--towards working on finding the support and the technical help needed to start a good spay/neuter program in Ethiopia--before the killing can resume.
There are four existing government animal clinics in Addis Ababa. Perhaps they can be incorporated into a spay/neuter program--to save the lives of so many thousands of innocent animals. Perhaps the organization HAPS can receive the help it so urgently needs to continue the excellent work that they do.
And, beyond setting up a spay/neuter program, Dr. Roba is looking down the road towards establishing educational programs to transform, not only the treatment of dogs in Ethiopia, but to bring about a transformation extending across all of Africa.
One of his goals is to put on an African Animal Conference in December of 2008, along the model of the Asia for Animals Conferences--or the Middle East Conference to be held in Cairo this December. This African Animal Conference may set the stage for all of Africa to become an example to follow of kindness towards animals!
How you can helpThe Amsale Gessesse Foundation's website is a goldmine of information about the animals, the people and the country of Ethiopia:
http://www.amsalefoundation.orgHAPS is doing a magnificent job of helping the dogs of Addis Ababa, with very few resources:
http://www.haps-eth.org.etThe British singer Maria Daines has written and recorded a beautiful song, "One Small Dog" to highlight the situation of the Ethiopian dogs: To donate $2 and listen to this song,
(caution - the song is beautiful, but very sad), please go to:
http://www.amsalefoundation.org/paypal%20donations.htmPlease check back soon for updates on the situation of the Ethiopian dogs.
Thank you!
Photos: Courtesy of the Amsale Gessesse Foundation and HAPS