Increase penalties for cruelty to animals

IT’S been said that the greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.

If that is truly the case, Malaysia is not very great and hasn’t been making much moral progress of late.

Because reports of animal abuse and neglect in the country have increased disturbingly over the last few years.

The Veterinary Services Department (DVS) received 1,249 reports of abuse and neglect in 2021, and 1,580 were recorded in 2022.

The following year, there was a sharp increase, with 2,622 complaints.

Last year, 2,162 complaints had been received in just the first six months.

Among the cases were four of cats being thrown or dropped from high floors, the department reported.

Could it be a case of social media amplifying the number of cases, helping more people to record instances of abuse and make reports?

Or could it a symptom of an increasing lack of kindness and civility in the world?

Whatever the reason, we have to do something about this sickness in our midst.We were prompted to bring up this issue following the reports made in the last week of December of cats and a dog being killed on Universiti Malaya grounds.

The images of the dead cats – shared on social media – are disturbing, with some severely mutilated and missing limbs.

While the police are still investigating those incidents, there can be no doubt about how Kopi died.

Kopi was a stray dog living on the streets of Besut, Terengganu, that went viral on social media when a video of it playing gently with a kitten was uploaded – followed days later by pictures of it dying after being shot by council staff.

Locals insisted Kopi had been well-looked after despite living on the streets, and was known for its gentle, friendly nature – there was no reason for the council to shoot it, they said.

Ah, but there is no law against shooting dogs, not if they’re strays and it’s council staff doing the shooting as part of an official programme.

Different councils use different methods to manage their town or area’s stray population of cats and dogs, with many opting for the capture and euthanise or simply kill in situ methods.

The killing of a dog with an Internet following raised a hue and cry, naturally, with thousands of posts and lots of letters to newspapers calling for an end to such methods of dealing with strays.

In this situation at least, we can do something quickly, and that is to introduce legislation that standardises humane ways of managing stray animal populations across all states, such as the much advocated capture-nueter-release system.

But how do we change attitudes? Because we can’t legislate compassion.

What do we do with people like the man in the Keningau district of Sabah who beat a dog to death to cook and eat it. And he was recorded doing the heinous deed by someone who can be heard laughing in the video’s background.

Education? Awareness campaigns? Or scare such behaviour out of people with punishment?

For the first half of last year, the DVS had prosecuted 52 individuals, nine of whom were sentenced to prison for animal cruelty.

Thirty offenders were fined a collective RM970,800, and four were placed on good behaviour bonds.

Is any of this going to scare someone into not giving in to a sick impulse to throw cats from high floors or beat dogs with iron rods?

We don’t think so. We think penalties have to reflect just how badly such crimes reflect on our society, and what damage they do overall.