February 1, 2014. The Jakarta Globe,
A three-year-old komodo dragon has died at an Indonesian zoo infamous for scores of animal deaths, zoo officials said Saturday.
A zookeeper found the dragon dead in its cage on Saturday morning when he came to feed the giant lizard.
“I moved its tail, but it didn’t respond and when I checked, its eyes were already shut,” said zookeeper Suraji, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.
The zoo was conducting an autopsy to find the cause of death, zoo spokesman Agus Supangkat said.
The Surabaya zoo, the biggest in Indonesia, has seen 105 animal deaths since July 2013, Supangkat added.
The komodo dragon is the fifth fatality at the zoo since the start of the year, following the death of a deer a day earlier, he added.
An 18-month-old African lion died earlier in January after getting its head caught in cables in its cage.
The management of the zoo has been taken over by the Surabaya city administration, but the deaths have not stopped and animal welfare groups continue to call for its closure.
The komodo dragons are native to several Indonesian islands, where their habitat is protected, and are considered a vulnerable species, with only a few thousand left in the world.
The world’s largest monitor lizards, they can grow up to three metres and weigh up to 70 kilograms
Surabaya Zoo to Be Finally Handed Over to City
Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hasan says he considers the movement of animals from Surabaya Zoo to other facilities necessary to keep the animals healthy and to prevent inbreeding.
“The transfer of animals from Surabaya is needed to maintain the animal’s wellbeing,” Zulkifli said on the sidelines of a national conference on the conservation of the Javanese leopard at Taman Safari in Cisarua, Bogor, on Wednesday.
Zulkifli said that transfers were also needed to keep the animals comfortable because of overpopulation.
“It’s no wonder that the animals at Surabaya are thin and ill, because they live in crowded conditions. Nevertheless, the Forestry Ministry must be informed about any transfer of animals,” he said.
He added that wild animals in Indonesia belonged to the state and were protected by the state.
With regard to the handover of the zoo’s management to the Surabaya city administration, Zulkifli said it would be done immediately.
“Today I was planning to sign the handover of the management [to the city administration] so that it would have the authority to rotate the employees and hopefully prioritize the animal’s well-being,” the minister said.
Tony Sumampau, the secretary general of the Indonesian Zoo Association (PKSI), who previously headed the caretaker management of Surabaya Zoo, stressed the importance of zoos getting accreditation periodically to ensure the animals’ well-being.
“There are 26 zoos in Indonesia and they should be accredited every year with A for very good, B for good and C for not good,” said Tony, the Taman Safari chief.
“There are only four zoos in Indonesia that have been accredited A: Taman Safari Bogor, Taman Safari Prigen, Taman Safari Bali and Taman Binatang Laut in Ancol in Jakarta. The rest were categorized as good and not good, and most of those zoos were managed by regional governments.”
A zoo can be categorized as good based on its population and its area size. It must also have an animal hospital, vets and animal food shop, Tony said.
“Surabaya Zoo has not been accredited for six years, while zoos should at least get accredited once a year,” he said.
After years of dispute over the management of Surabaya Zoo, the central government said last week it would officially hand full authority of the zoo to Surabaya Mayor Tri Rismaharini, ensuring substantial changes in its operations and its treatment of animals.
The announcement was made at a meeting involving the mayor, Zulkifli and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.
Surabaya Zoo is Indonesia’s oldest and holds the widest collection of animals in Southeast Asia. It is home to approximately 3,000 animals, 420 of which are protected species.
Zulkifli conceded that management problems had long been an issue, with dispute over control of the zoo dating back to the 1980s.
In July last year, the city administration unilaterally took over its running from a temporary management team that had been appointed in 2010 by the Forestry Ministry following the disappearance and suspicious deaths of several animals.
Rismaharini, in justifying the takeover at the time, claimed that the caretaker team had done little to stanch the spate of animal deaths and that its plan to invite private investors to help in managing the zoo was a ruse to demolish it and build a hotel on the city-owned land.
Zulkifli said that under the city’s care, the zoo’s management would be replaced with new individuals with no conflict of interest.
“The management will oversee the maintenance of animal pens and their food, among other things. There will also be an audit in a partnership between the mayor and Airlangga University on the issue of animal overpopulation,” he said.
He added that if audit results concluded that the zoo had more animals than it could adequately care for, the government would transfer some of the animals to other zoos and conservation facilities — a policy that Tony’s caretaker team had put into place since 2010, but which Rismaharini claimed was a guise for selling the animals on the black market.
“The president has called for a solution to avoid more animal deaths,” Zulkifli said.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said he had received reports from the public about the poor conditions in which animals at the zoo were kept.
“They reminded me that the deaths in Surabaya Zoo had become the focus of the international community and feared that such an issue would give outsiders the impression that we don’t care about our zoos,” he said.
“Let’s find the best solution, and when it has been formulated, explain it to the public. Of course we will not forget the events that have occurred. There is always a way out or a solution.”
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za 1 feb 2014 - 7:53