Comments: Bali prepares rabies bylaw

Thu, 04/30/2009 3:13 PM  |  Reader's Forum

The Bali provincial administration held a public hearing Thursday to gain feedback about its plan to introduce a bylaw on rabies that will focus on monitoring and controlling rabies vectors, such as dogs, cats and monkeys. The hearing was attended by the Bali Rabies Forum, a coalition of animal rights NGOs, which will take part in arranging the draft. The draft bylaw reflects the administration's effort to address several crucial obstacles in containing the rabies outbreak, in particular how to deal with stray dogs in a more humane way.

Your comments:
It is good that something is being done. But to force people to leash or cage their pets will turn the life of a lot of animals into a nightmare.

Many animals will end up living in a cage all day and night, not really a life worth living. It will be a constant torture for the poor animals.

All living creatures have the right to a dignified life.

Anna

I do agree that the government needs to fund animal shelters to enable people to bring unwanted pets to such shelters to be cared for and for pet lovers to come and get pets.

I am a pet lover and rescued two dogs. They are like babies to me. It is sad to hear of dogs and cats being killed. When I visit, Bali, I would like to visit animal shelters and make a small donation.

Harti

Brit to report dispute to National Police -- April 25, p. 9

Frustrated by the way the Bali Police have handled his case, a Briton plans to bring his land dispute to the National Police. "My next strategy is to bring the case to the National Police because the Bali Police did nothing to help me get my money back," Nicholas John Hyam told the Post on Thursday. He said he would hire a group of four lawyers but had not yet decided which lawyers, due to financial constraints as a result of the case. The land dispute started in 2005 after Hyam bought 28 are of land in Pererenan village, North Kuta, for Rp 36.6 billion (US$31.1 million).

Your comments:
Foreigners cannot legally buy land in Indonesia. Sometimes, even non-Balinese cannot buy land in Bali.

Usually it is businessmen from Jakarta who are the buyers of commercial and hotel sites. Bali already has enough hotels and tax-avoiding villas.

Its infrastructure cannot really support more. Although a non sequitur, can we have a hotel/villa construction ban in Bali before paradise becomes a concrete jungle?

Tomaso Tettamanti
Lugano Switzerland

It is obvious that the foreigner has been ripped off big time. He was a fool, a dreamer and he met a very smooth-talking local chap. He thought "the law" would protect him.

Jon

Ending Sri Lanka civilian loss -- April 25, Online

The Group of Eight is demanding that the warring factions in Sri Lanka take all necessary action to prevent further civilian deaths. The G-8 foreign ministers say in a statement that they are deeply concerned about the country's deteriorating humanitarian situation and the plight of civilians.

Your comments:
When the only "safety" to which people can flee from the "conflict area" is a military-operated "internment camp", we know something is very wrong.

Sadly, we won't recognize the illness as "genocide" until the patient, the ethnic group, has died. By then, we will have just about enough time for "truth-finding", "reconciliation" and a "war crimes tribunal".

Cambodia, Rwanda. we've seen it all before. Imagine if a doctor refused to diagnose cancer until the patient has died of the disease; that's how "backward" our apex bodies, the likes of the UN, are today.

There is an immediate need for a cessation of hostilities. People must be afforded freedom of movement, not only out of the "conflict area" but also out of the "internment camps". Further, independent media, aid groups and the UN must have unrestricted access to people, wherever they may be.

Peter Ratna

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