“Better off slaughtered”???

It came to my attention this weekend that someone from an animal welfare organisation says that the horses are “better off slaughtered”.

I have a number of questions to ask in this regard.

Firstly, why specifically ‘slaughtered’? Why not shoot the horse, a quick and easy death, then give it to organisations like Free Me who need meat for animals that they have rescued? Why not add some value to animal welfare in this process rather than selling them as meat? I’m sure such organisations would be happy to pay the price. Does OBP need the money? I doubt it, looking at their financial reports. This is not a lot of money, and can hardly be justified from a financial income perspective. How is ‘slaughtering’ EVER preferable to a humane death? And why is death preferable to finding homes for them? Surely the people involved have some scientific answers to these questions, rather than ‘wesayso’ answers from ‘authorities’ who should be answerable to the public? Since when did animal welfare organisations become the last word on animal issues? Where did you get that mandate? The public wants to know!

If these horses were all sick with AHS with no hope for recovery, and of course OBP should have documented evidence for this, then in the first instance they should have been put down by gunshot because euthenasing takes so long, and in the second instance should hardly be getting sold to butchers unless the butchers can guarantee that the meat would not be used for consumption by dogs. In principle this should not be a problem.

If the horses were NOT sick with AHS, why did they have to be die at all, and why did they have to be slaughtered?

Why? It’s time OBP started providing real answers…

A comment on this blog from OBP would be welcomed, so that the public can respond.

OBP Lies

I have been on the phone to 2 people today. One shall remain nameless at this stage.

Info from the first person informed me that there was a load of horses that were sent straight to the abattoir still this year. The denial from OBP is an outright lie. I was told that they did not even bother with an auction, the horses were simply sent straight to the abattoir in Randfontein, some guy that slaughters on his plot (I actually have his name and address).

The second person that I spoke to was a person from the Highveld Horse Care Unit (HHCU).

Unnecessary Slaughter

There is an old saying: “If there’s one thing a public servant hates to do, it’s something for the public”. Of course it’s a generalisation and an insult to those public servants who do a good job, and I have been privileged to work with many in my career as a management consultant.

But the events at Onderstepoort Biological Products Ltd, a wholly-owned government subsidiary, which effectively makes them accountable for their actions to the public, give the impression that the personnel believe not only that they are a law unto themselves, but also that the very animals whose interests they serve and by extension the people who have interests in those animals, are merely means to an end which we find a little confusing.

Surely OBP, as a research institution whose aim is to

Horrified…

I received an email today regarding the unacceptable treatment of horses at Onderstepoort Biological Products. I’m also horrified and it makes me very angry, because this company needs serious investigation in many aspects, not only for cruelty to horses in their care. There are lots of questions that need to be answered and we have a right to know the truth, because Onderstepoort Biological Products (OBP) are the one and ONLY supplier of our current African Horse Sickness (AHS) vaccine – which we are legally obliged to use, according to the Animal Diseases Act.

Because AHS is such a deadly disease with no known cure, one that has the capacity to kill thousands of horses, spread beyond our borders and cause huge financial losses (especially in racing and export), the law states that it is a ‘controlled disease’ and the Department of Agriculture are responsible (or supposed to be) for controlling it.

This law states that ‘every equine in the Republic of South Africa

Why do OBP slaughters continue?

These magnificent horses, so many different breeds – ponies, saddlers, miniatures and many more, after unwillingly donating their bodies to “science” at one of our most famous institutions, are thrown out like garbage and trucked off to be slaughtered, a fact that Onderstepoort Biological Products still denies. The sad reality is that the few lucky ones we have been able to save by outbidding the butchers at these slaughter auctions have all been young pregnant mares, too young to be pregnant, in fact. These horses are not old – we have yet to save one over 3.5 years in age, so can somebody tell us why? These horses are not sick either, they are strong and there is no reason for them to be slaughtered. We managed to save 36 horses and two donkeys two years ago, and last year 30. We can keep on doing this, but it is not the solution. The tip-offs started 3 years ago, insiders would call us and warn us of horses being sent to cattle slaughter auctions by Onderstepoort when they were finished testing them for a new African Horse Sickness vaccine. As a result we would go to said auctions and outbid the butchers for the horses. Even at the auction, Onderstepoort staff would deny it was a slaughter auction, pray tell then, why are the horses being sold off the scales, and why are the horses being sold for their price in meat value, and that a pathetic R3.00 a kilo!!! Also at these auctions the butchers would complain and were very angry that we were there and most wanted to know how we found out about the auctions. Well I can tell you it was not the small pathetic advert in the farmers weekly, which, it appears, seems to justify this horrible practice! Why not horse magazines, why not let us know in advance? Last time I called a few days before the auction to buy all the horses professor Zyanda Majokweni told me to go to hell, told me she does not give a damn about what us people think, told me that she has made commitments to these people and slammed the phone down in my ear.

We have been campaigning against this now for three years