Activist calls for stiffer penalties for animal smugglers

Fishermen and Friends of the Sea (FFOS) has called on the authorities to implement stiffer penalties for the illegal possession of vulnerable, rare and endangered South American birds and other animals.

The plea came after baskets of caiques (miniature parrots), Hahn's macaws and Orange-winged parrots, were pulled out dead from the Gulf of Paria last week.

Reports said the smugglers who were coming from Venezuela to Cedros, threw the animals overboard in an attempt to evade capture by local authorities.

FFOS corporate secretary Gary Aboud said the current maximum penalty of $10,000 is not enough to deter people from committing such crimes.

He said, “With high profits and low detection rates for smugglers, these penalties may not be enough of a deterrent. These smugglers will be back on the sea immediately.”

In addition, Aboud said the low detection rate of such acts has contributed to the callous, recurrent, deliberate criminality of capturing, transporting, smuggling, trading, profiteering and murdering protected creatures.

“If our border security is under-equipped, no amount of penalties will stop the broad daylight smugglers. The law is failing us. Here at home, weak law enforcement encourages thriving contraband.

“Unmasked lawlessness and cruelty to animals is symptomatic of our moral and spiritual decay and must be addressed by enlightened parliamentarians,” he said.

Aboud noted that not only does animal poaching lead to enslavement, torture, and murder of protected creatures but it also has an impact on the health system.”

He said, “This underground importation has far-reaching health impacts such as zoonotic disease transmission, such as , tuberculosis, yellow fever or shigellosis and parasite transmission.

Further, he said there are also ecological impacts such as the destruction of ecosystems by invasive species.

Aboud also chastised citizens who engaged the smugglers and called on them to desist from such actions. He pleaded that people with exoctic animals in captivity be turned in to the Forestry Division, Wildlife Section or the Wildlife and Environment Protection of TT.

Aboud, who applauded the Ministry of Agriculture, Land and Fisheries for increasing the fine to $100,000 for animal cruelty, said government should consider life imprisonment or 20 years hard labour for people held for animal smuggling.