New fur-riends: At his adopted home, Nori (right) is bonding with Goma, a tabby living there. — The Straits Times/ANN
THIS year painted a bleak picture for animals in the country, with cruelty and welfare cases at an 11-year high.
However, there were also incredible acts of kindness by good samaritans as well as programmes and initiatives from both animal welfare groups and the authorities for 2024 and beyond.But first, the bad news.
The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) revealed in October that it had investigated 862 cases of cruelty and welfare concerns between July 2022 and June 2023 – the highest since the same period between 2011 and 2012.
In that same period, it helped 266 abandoned animals – a sharp increase from a yearly average of up to 70 cases in previous years.
But the organisation acknowledged that the surge in cases could have been due to greater awareness and willingness on the public’s part to make reports.
In the first half of 2023, there were more than 400 cats found in cases of pet hoarding, with rescuers pleading burnout – the first few months alone saw a “disproportionately high number” of abuse cases.
A number of shocking cases emerged, drawing ire from animal lovers in Singapore – among them, the arrest of a teenage boy caught on video trying to perform obscene acts on a cat outside a Housing Board flat and a case of two emaciated cats found locked in a cage with the skeletal remains of three others in a rental flat in Jalan Minyak for over a month.
Pets of all shapes and sizes were involved in other cases – at least 20 hamsters were abandoned under a shrub and drenched in heavy rain, while more than a dozen guinea pigs were found abandoned in thermal food bags at the side of a road.
A parrot was also rescued by an animal welfare society after a video of a woman abusing it circulated, while a director at dog trai–ning and daycare centre was charged with animal cruelty after being caught on video hitting a dog multiple times and shouting profanities. He can be heard telling it: “Welcome to hell, my friend. Four weeks of hell, stupid idiot dog. Tonight, you make a single noise, see what happens to you.”It’s not just pets that have had it hard. Trading illegal wildlife and animal parts in Singapore is “thriving” in physical and online marketplaces, with black markets hawking live exotic animals to the thousands of people who subscribe to such messaging groups.
Hot water, insecticide or glue traps have been used to abuse and kill snakes in several cases despite their use without approval being an offence. Speaking of glue traps, the Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (Acres) revealed in March that nearly a thousand birds and other wildlife have been accidentally caught by these cruel contraptions since 2020.
Local animal shelters and welfare organisations here saw adoption numbers halved in recent years, with some attributing the drop to the rising cost of living and more people returning to the office after the Covid-19 pandemic, among other reasons.
In fact, more pets were abandoned after the pandemic, with the trend possibly worsening as animal groups reported a spike in the number of pets being abandoned and surrendered.
Experts told The Straits Times that boredom and exposure to domestic violence are among the reasons people abuse animals.
Despite the dismal year, 2023 also saw displays of incredible kindness, such as three heroes who rescued a kitten from a storm drain during heavy rain. Motorists banded together to herd a spooked dog to safety on a busy expressway and a worker was lauded for helping a lost mother hen and her chicks to safety across a traffic junction. — The Straits Times/ANN
