Letter: Rescuing orangutans

Concerning the BOS Foundation’s press release “BOSF to the Rescue — Three Orphaned Baby Orangutans Now Have a Future” issued on Oct. 14, we would like to clarify several issues as follows:
The Center for Orangutan Protection (COP) doesn’t have three orangutans in East Kalimantan or in any place elsewhere. We are questioning the BOS Foundation’s objective of the publication, which says that BOS will rescue three orangutans from us and provide them with a future.

We would like to remind the BOS Foundation that orangutans belong to Indonesia. The Forestry Ministry (BKSDA) is the authorized party, which  is responsible for the orangutans’ protection. Therefore, orangutans will never become the property of a company or an organization such as COP or BOSF.

As far as we are concerned, there are three orangutans residing in BKSDA’s Tenggarong office now. One was confiscated by a BKSDA team along with COP in Sebuluh village of Muara Kaman District on Oct. 9.
The confiscating operation has served as a preliminary effort for the law enforcement against corporations, which have been threatening orangutans’ sustainability. So far we have reported six illegal captivations in East Kalimantan to the BKSDA.

On June 8 we found a baby orangutan with a cut on his back in a house of a pest buster. Soon afterward we contacted the BKSDA and received an answer from them shortly, that they couldn’t undertake the confiscating operation with us because the BOS Foundation would not receive another confiscated orangutan.

However, COP continued rescuing the baby, which was only accompanied by a police officer assigned in Sebuluh village of Muara Kaman District. COP prioritizes orangutans’ safety above anything else. That’s one of our principles.

On our part, rescuing orangutans is not supposed to be canceled just because of a managerial problem, like a shortage of facilities available in the rehabilitation or reintroduction center due to having too many orangutans rehabilitated in the center — because there are always solutions for that. Technical matters such as caging and health caring are a challenge as well as responsibility of those who work for the Forestry Ministry or NGOs such as the BOS Foundation and COP.

We are very happy because the BKSDA sent its staff with full logistic support to the camp finally and committed the law enforcement there. Furthermore, we are also happy that the CEO and other BOSF senior officers finally used their conscience to accept the poor orangutans. We appreciate them very much.

COP is a tiny organization. We are no more than a dozen young people, who are aged between 20 to 35 years old, and none of us have political or government official backgrounds. We are proud to work with passion and solid courage to stop crime and atrocities against orangutans.

Hardi Baktiantoro
The Center for Orangutan Protection
East Kalimantan