Hope for Mali springs eternal

I have rescued cats in the hope of, even in a small way, giving a better life to the rescues.

So it saddens me no end when I read stories in the news about how we have failed to keep our rescues alive and well.

On a trip I made to the Philippine Eagle sanctuary in Davao a few years back, I was filled with mixed feelings. I know that the sanctuary is trying to keep our Philippine Eagle from becoming extinct — so they breed them in captivity.

Yet the people behind the sanctuary are also aware of the fact that hereabouts we do not have the forest cover to keep these eagles alive in their natural habitat.  So they are faced with lots of danger when they are released in the wild — either they get caught in electric wires as they scavenge for food below or are caught by villagers in the area.

And then, of course, there is the case of Lolong, the captured crocodile in Agusan, who died recently.  First, the mayor said that they could keep him in captivity — to make a few millions out of him.

When will we ever learn that animals caught in the wild seldom survive captivity in a small pond?

Mali, the elephant in Manila Zoo who has served as our elephant for over 30 years now, is sick, and as far as I am concerned, deserves to spend the rest of his life in a sanctuary where he can be treated like royalty. 

The Philippine Ethical Treatment for Animals (PETA), which has been most active in the move for the release of Mali to a sanctuary, recently reported that more than 40 animal protection organizations from around the globe have added their names to PETA Asia’s call to transfer Mali — a 35-year-old solitary elephant suffering at the Manila Zoo — to a spacious sanctuary where she can enjoy the company of other elephants. The list includes Earth Island Institute, Animals Asia, the Humane Society International, the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA), the International Veterinary Society, and the European Elephant Group. 

Here are some of the comments from the animal welfare groups:

• “Elephants are social animals, and female elephants stay in their herds for their entire lives … The suffering that Mali endures on a daily basis is incomprehensible,” writes the Asia for Animals Coalition on behalf of 10 different organizations.

• “Keeping a single female elephant in limited space in inadequate captive conditions is also severely damaging to the animal’s mental health,” the WSPA writes. “For such social animals to be deprived of social interaction with other elephants clearly causes the animal acute suffering.”

• “In addition to the emotional suffering that Mali endures every single day, the Manila Zoo has also proved that they are unable to care for her health. We have learned that in the entire time she has been at the zoo, Mali has not had adequate foot care or blood work,” writes the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society. “In the wild, elephants roam vast territories over a variety of substrates, but Mali has little room to walk in her concrete pen. This means that her cuticles have become overgrown and the pads of her feet have become cracked, which could lead to infection if they continue to be left untreated.”

In her current environment, Mali is denied everything that’s natural and important to her. But in a sanctuary, she would have acres in which to roam, rivers and ponds to bathe in, and the crucial company of other elephants. The world’s leading elephant experts have been speaking out about Mali’s mental and physical health problems and are calling for her to be transferred to a sanctuary.

Dr. Dame Daphne Sheldrick, so titled after Queen Elizabeth II appointed her a Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, has been involved with elephants for the past 58 years. The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, named for her late husband and which she now heads, has rehabilitated more than 150 orphaned elephants. Currently, more than 40 of them are fully grown and live among the wild herds of Kenya’s Tsavo National Park, and 39 others are in the process of being reintroduced into the wild. Sheldrick is now calling on the Manila Zoo to release Mali — an ailing, solitary Asian elephant who has been confined to a small enclosure for the past 36 years — to a reputable sanctuary in Thailand that has already agreed to accept her.

“The most important thing in an elephant’s life are friends and family, as it is for us humans,” writes Sheldrick, who in 2005 was named by the Smithsonian Institution one of 35 people worldwide who have made a difference in animal husbandry and wildlife conservation. “To separate an elephant from others for life is immeasurably cruel and counter-productive to both the emotional and social well-being of the animal, with possible adverse physical damage as well. I therefore appeal, on behalf of Elephant Mali, who cannot speak for herself, to afford her access to others, and in so doing heal her lonely soul.”

We have one more chance to make it right for an animal in captivity. This is that chance — to all the gods of the animals I pray that Mali be released to the sanctuary.