Mixed response to elephant cruelty decision

KNYSNA NEWS - Animal rights activists this week slammed a decision by prosecuting authorities not to take action against the Knysna Elephant Park after horrific animal abuse footage surfaced last year.

The NSPCA laid complaints with police against the park, its management and directors in May last year after shocking footage depicting elephant calves and juvenile elephants being chained, roped and stretched, shocked with electric cattle prods and hit with bull hooks – methods the organisation claimed were used to force the animals into submission.

But in August, the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) made a decision not to prosecute stating the “training methods” employed did not constitute “cruel treatment or caused unnecessary suffering” to the elephants involved.

“We are shocked and don’t feel that justice has been served,” senior NSPCA inspector Isabel Wentzel said.

“The facts have been disregarded, despite the factual evidence as well as the supporting evidence of national and international elephant specialists who confirmed the excessive and extensive physiological and psychological injuries suffered by the elephants. The elephants showed signs of severely swollen legs and feet, debilitating abscesses and wounds resulting from the abusive use of ropes, chains and bull hooks – injuries sustained at Elephants of Eden.”

She added that she “grieved for the country’s elephants”.

Owners however have been rubbishing the NSPCA’s claims from the start and said the incidents depicted in the footage had taken place in 2008 and had been at the hands of colleagues of a handler killed by an elephant.

Owner Lisette Withers said the incident happened at Elephants of Eden in Alexandria in the Eastern Cape – before it moved to the Garden Route and became part of its sister organisation the Knysna Elephant Park – while the park’s manager was on leave. She added that workers claimed that their colleague’s spirit told them take revenge. The staff members involved were subsequently fired.

While Withers was very happy about the DPP’s decision, she felt that “the damage had already been done”.

“We are very happy about the DPP’s decision, but unfortunately the damage has been done and our name has been tainted,” Withers said.

Withers added that contrary to what the NSPCA had claimed, she and her team trained the animals based on mutual respect.

“They claim that the animals obey us because they are petrified of us. I find this theory hard to believe. Harry is a massive elephant bull and allows me to stand under his head. If I had beaten him or starved him, he would not allow me to do that.”

She said since the park was established in 1994 she and her team had cared for and raised more than forty elephants, including relocated animals, orphaned calves, elephants rescued from culls and ex-circus animals. Some have become part of the park’s herd, while others have been relocated to other facilities in the Western and Eastern Cape.

She added that the park had an open-door policy and that the NSPCA and anyone with concerns could “come have a look”.

“Our lodge visitors overlook our operations and we have at least 18 volunteers here at any given time, so there is no way for us to hide anything.”

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ARTICLE: YOLANDé STANDER, KNYSNA-PLETT HERALD - CORRESPONDENT

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