Filipino dog-meat bill

Press, 5 March 1982, Page 4

Filipino dog-meat bill

NZPA-Reuter Manila Dog-meat eaters in the Philippines may have to be more careful when slaughtering the animals in future. A parliamentary spokesman said last evening that three members of the Assembly have filed a bill seeking to ban the slaugher of dogs in public to help “correct the country’s soiled image.” British and New Zealand dog lovers raised an uproar after a picture of a dog trussed up in a cage on its

way to a slaughterhouse was printed in a newspaper. More than 6000 people signed a petition organised by the Anti-Vivisection Society in New Zealand protesting at the killing of the dogs. Filipino officials, in turn, angrily countered by saying that eating dog-meat was an accepted practice in the Philippines and those who do not fancy it should mind their own business. The bill recommended a penalty of 10 to 30 days in

jail and a fine ranging from $l3 to $73 for anyone caught killing dogs in public. “We do not believe we would be violating any cultural sensibility by prohibiting the public slaugher of dogs even in those areas where eating dog-meat takes the form of cultural practice,” the authors of the bill said in their explanatory note. A parliamentary official said the bill has been forwarded to a legislative committee for consideration.