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ESSENTIAL DESTINATIONS

MONTH: September 2007

Calls for dogfighting crackdown in South Africa

 

CAPE TOWN, S.A.--Stellenbosch Animal Welfare Society chair Julia Evans on August 22, 2007 told a mayoral committee that her organization receives as many as three calls per week about dogfights held in Cloetesville, Stellenbosch, and that children as young as eight are used to move dogs from one fight to the next because they are less likely to be arrested.

Evans' testimony, reported by Anel Powell of the Cape Times, was supported a week later by Cape of Good Hope SPCA chief executive Allan Perrins.

"The SPCA is in possession of explosive information that could lead to a swoop on organized dog fighting rings across the country," wrote Cape Times reporter Natasha Joseph. "Targeted in the SPCA's [proposed] crackdown are lawyers, businessmen, dog breeders, even a veterinarian and a pastor."

Notice of dogfighting in the Cape Town area increased after a late July police raid on a home in Woodstock produced evidence that dogfighters had invaded the home of a blind person, using the home as a never-cleaned kennel and fighting arena until neighbors complained. Eight pit bull terriers and a trained guide dog were impounded, reported Henri du Plessis of the Cape Argus.

The raid came three weeks after three pit bulls belonging to a police officer fatally mauled Austin Pieters, 7, in the Northern Cape district.

The attack caused June Woodman, chair of the 76-year-old Animal Welfare Society of South Africa, to break from the past position of the society in calling for a ban on breeding or keeping pit bulls.

"I'm not saying the dogs are to blame, because they often fall into the wrong hands and are encouraged to be vicious, but something needs to be done," Woodman told Helen Bamford of the Cape Argus.