No to dogs for gambling and entertainment!

Last Sunday evening I watched a replay on ANC Crossroads entitled “Racing: Going to the Dogs?” which featured Sen. Jamby Madrigal, Ms. Anna Hashim Cabrera of the Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) and my good friend, Rep. Ben-Hur Salimbangon (4th District Cebu), the principal author of HB 5291 proposing to have a Greyhound Dog Racing facility in Mandaue City. We’ve already written about this issue and questioned Mandaue City Mayor Jonas Cortes why he apparently approved of the use of animals for entertainment and gambling and he apparently found nothing wrong with it.

Even the Mandaue City Council led by Vice-Mayor Carlo Fortuna thought that this was okay, not realizing that our beloved eminence Ricardo Cardinal Vidal was totally against this move. Obviously the beneficiary of this dog racing scheme had gotten to the local government officials for them not to look at the moral aspect of this scheme. But there’s now a growing opposition against the use of dogs for racing coming from the Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS).

Unfortunately, the ANC show that I saw was already a replay and I even missed the first part of that show. But what Tony Velasquez failed to ask is, “What was a Congressman in the 4th District of Cebu doing with a gambling project in the 6th District? If Greyhound Racing is good, why not put it in his own district?” Let me point out that Rep. Salimbangon is a good friend of mine and I supported him during the last elections… unfortunately we are at odds over this issue.

What is even more unfortunate is that, this was the first time I saw him on nationwide TV and he seemed to have difficulty defending his proposed bill against the arguments of Sen. Madrigal and Anna Cabrera of PAWS, especially when she brought out gruesome photographs of Greyhound dogs that were killed because the racing circuit had no use for them anymore. Rep. Salimbangon tried to convince them that these dogs can be given to foster homes. But Sen. Madrigal immediately pointed out that Greyhound dogs need space to run around and eat expensive meats or dog food.

Now who will give a foster home to a Greyhound that can no longer run… who has the money to feed it with expensive dog food? But Ms. Cabrera was quick to point out that in the United Kingdom, less than 1/10th percent of the dogs that could no longer race found foster homes. Now that’s a country that has a soft heart for animals. So I reckon that if this bill is passed, the Greyhound that can’t race anymore would end up as dog meat… after all, Filipinos have been used to eating local strays or “askals”, this time dog meat lovers will have imported dog meat!

What Tony Velasquez also failed to ask Rep. Salimbangon is, who are the people behind this Fox Millennium Corp. In fact I’m surprised that they are letting poor Rep. Salimbangon defend their proposal when they should be defending this… after all they are the proponents. We’ve written about this issue in The Freeman and no one from Fox Millennium has appeared nor replied to the articles that have been written about them.

Feeling pinned by the questions that he could no longer answer, Rep. Salimbangon pointed out that the people proposing this Greyhound racing business should come up with proper ways to dispose the dog. This alone is a big issue… when you ask, what really is the proper way to dispose of a dog?

I’m sure that this is not the last we shall hear of this issue. But Sen. Jamby correctly pointed out that dog racing is against the Animal Welfare Code. As we wrote before, any form of gambling ought to be brought under the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (Pagcor), but even with that it is still immoral as it is cruelty to animals. Even western nations have already realized that this industry is cruel to animals.

Just as I was finishing this article… I got a little time to read our newspaper and what do you know… there’s a new ally in the fight for animal rights and this was featured only last Monday in The Philippine STAR’s Entertainment section on page F-4 entitled, “McCartney Fights for Animal Rights”… yes that’s former Beatle Paul McCartney who recently joined forces with the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).

From that article, Paul McCartney apparently co-authored a children’s educational book entitled, “High in the Clouds” which is about a squirrel that was forced to leave his overdeveloped woodland home. I’m sure that Paul McCartney will certainly be a great ally to PETA, which is also supporting the advocacy of PAWS to support animal rights.

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