Frida

Frida

On 11 of June 2005 a lion cub was born in a zoo in Romania.

First Question: Why are Zoos still allowed to breed in captivity for captivity, thereby creating all sorts of animal welfare problems. The blame for what happened to Frida starts right here.

Radio Total, a broadcast radio station from Romania, bought the new born lion cub from the zoo, not for any commercial purpose, but out of kindness, in the hope of providing the baby lion with a life in the wild, free, instead of one in a cage not much bigger than her. For six months Frida was lovingly cared for by Gabriela Savu, the girlfriend of Bogdan Popescu, General Manager of Radio Total in Bucharest. Romanians, like most nations in Europe, are overwhelmingly opposed to canned hunting and captive breeding to produce living targets for the hunters. They knew nothing about bringing up lions or the complexities of re-locating them back to the wild, in Africa. But they were concerned for Frida's welfare and looked for a way to give her a better life in Africa.

To find Frida the right place, they got in touch with Vier Pfoten, an animal welfare group in Europe, who assured them that it had done this before, and that it could make all the arrangements to re-locate Frida back to the wild in Africa. The Popescus were pleased to hear that their cub was going to be set free and cared for in a suitable sanctuary.

On Monday 5th December 2005 Frida was flown out to South Africa to Camorhi Game Lodge in Free State province. All the considerable expenses were born by Radio Total and Bogdan Popescu.

Question Two: How on earth could Vier Pfoten have betrayed Frida like this? Vier Pfoten had previously been advised by several reputable animal welfarists in South Africa about the poor record of animal welfare of Nature Conservation in South Africa, about the unsuitability of this country for such rescues because of the hostility of the hunter-dominated conservation officials to animal welfare, and the fact that Camorhi and its owners were linked to the canned lion hunting industry. Either this organisation had not done its homework, or it was reckless about the fate of the lion cub.

Imagine the shock and horror of the Popescus when they found out via the Internet that their cub was not going to be lovingly cared for, but had been delivered to a captive breeding facility for one of the cruellest industries in the world, the South African Canned Lion Industry. All their hard work, expense and good intentions had been perverted, and they had been misled into contributing large sums for the benefit ultimately of canned lion hunting. Frida had not been spayed.

Question Three: Why was Frida not sterlised? She is now a perfect candidate for captive breeding. New blood will help the breeder (Camorhi, or whoever Camorhi sells her to) to combat captivity depression which, not surprisingly, affects many lions imprisoned for life until a brutal, early death.

The Popescus quickly investigated the facility Frida had been sent to and were horrified. They demanded that Four Paws relocate Frida to Drakenstein Lion Park as soon as possible. Four Paws arrogantly and adamantly refused to to so. Instead, Four Paws eventually paid out millions to purchase the Camorhi facility, changed the name to Lions Rock, and are now spending large sums to develop Lions Rock as a sanctuary. Eighteen months on Frida appears to be safe at Lions Rock. For how long, time will tell.