Pets left behind in resettlement process
SPCA says move should have been done in a holistic manner
OVER the weekend about 250 families from the Skandaalkamp informal settlement near the Vissershoek landfill site were packed into trucks and relocated by the City of Cape Town to their new home at Wolwerivier, about 10km away.
But there wasn’t space in the trucks for their pets and many dogs were left behind with no food or water. At least one has since died.
Nikki Pretorius, the manager of SAVE Foundation and founder of Sunshine Educare, which has operated in the informal settlement for six years, said 17 dogs, a cat and chickens had been left behind.
“Some of the goat owners walked them along the highway but a lot of dogs were left behind and people were devastated.”
Yesterday, Pretorius joined a team from the Cape of Good Hope SPCA who spent the day catching the dogs and reuniting them with their owners.
“People were ecstatic. Even one blind dog was reunited with its owner,” she said.
There are still about eight dogs left at the site and the team would try to trap them today.
Moyo Ndukwana, inspectorate manager for the SPCA, said the city had invited the organisation to give advice on the relocation process on June 22.
The SPCA had been unhappy with the lack of planning provided for livestock and dogs and had provided its findings to the city. These had included, among others:
No infrastructure available to accommodate livestock.
No housing or watering hole facilities were available.
The current grazing available for the animals was not adequate to sustain them.
No demarcation or fencing was erected to keep the animals from roaming into the houses or nearby road, posing a threat of vehicle accidents.
Ndukwana advised the city at the time that the project had not taken into consideration any animal welfare aspects and suggested a meeting to ensure that everything was done in a humane manner encompassing a holistic approach to the relocation of people and their animals.
He was shocked to then hear the people had been moved over the weekend.
“We weren’t even given the courtesy of being told animals had been left behind in the bush.”
The minutes of a meeting between the city and the residents on June 23, chaired by Anton Terblanche, state that while the city had made contact with the SPCA the “regulations stipulated were too strict”.
Benedicta van Minnen, the city’s mayoral committee member for Human Settlements said the city had been as accommodating as possible regarding pets and livestock in accordance with the applicable by-laws and legislation.
“The beneficiaries with livestock are being relocated to the northern perimeter of the Wolwerivier development where land is available to continue their farming.”
Van Minnen said the city had transported the pets and livestock which the beneficiaries had requested be relocated.