Tanja wessels with contributions by Sílvia Gonçalves
In July this year, a group of renowned international personalities sent a letter to Macau’s Chief Executive Fernando Chui Sai On, calling for the closure of the Yat Yuen Canidrome greyhound racing track when its operating license ends at the end of this year.
The Macau Society for the Protection of Animals (Anima) and ten other foreign counterparts held an International Roundtable on Greyhounds on July 23 and 24 at the Grand Coloane Resort, gathering representatives from Anima along with CAWA-China Animal Welfare Association from Beijing, SPCA (Taiwan), SPCA (HK), Kirsten (HK), Animals Asia (HK), Animals Asia (China), Animals Australia, RSPCA (Australia), RSPCA (UK) and GREY2K USA Worldwide.
In a statement to the press at the time, President of Anima, Albano Martins defined the meeting as “the establishment of an international platform, against the advances of the greyhound industry, along with the planning of a working scheme.”
“All the organizations signed the petition addressed to the Chief Executive, asking for the non-renewal of the concession and the return of the venue to the community”.
The petition was submitted to the president of the Official Provisional Municipal Council of Macau, Alex Vong, but was addressed to the Chief Executive. The petition, which was made available online between March and July of this year, gathered more than 270,000 signatures.
This was not the first time international names have pushed for the closure of the only greyhound racetrack in Asia. In February last year, English actor and comedian, Ricky Gervais publicly announced his disdain for the treatment of greyhounds at the Canidrome. Using strong language, Gervais took to Twitter to tell his 15.8K followers to sign a petition to close the Canidrome. The petition was set up by Grey2K USA, a non-profit organization that works to pass greyhound protection laws, end dog racing and promote greyhound adoption. It received 72,053 signatures.
Macau’s Yat Yuen Canidrome has been operating greyhound races since 1963 and is part of the gaming empire controlled by gaming tycoon Stanley Ho Hung Sun and his family.
The international attention directed at the racetrack has been driven by one man in Macau in particular – Albano Martins has been working non-stop to address the issue, campaining and raising awarness of the conditions at the race track since 2012, speaking to media outlets, sending letters to the Chief Executive and trying to set up an adoption programme.
The controversy surrounding the racetrack revolves around a number of issues, including the use of lethal injections to put down young dogs, mostly healthy, who fail to achieve competitive results, rather than putting them up for adoption. A letter sent to the Chief Executive in July from the roundtable participants describes this practice as “an affront to Macau’s proud history”. The communication culminated with the appeal: “You have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to end this suffering, and set a positive example for the entire world. Please give the greyhounds a voice, and end the Canidrome concession.”
Martins introduced an adoption programme in 2012 on orders from the Macau Government following an investigation by the South China Morning Post in 2011, which exposed that in 2010, 383 underperforming dogs were destroyed.
The dogs being raced at Yat Yuen are imported from Australia and then sold at public auctions for six times the original price. That money is not taxable and from January to June this year alone, MOP3,134,000 has been pocketed from these sales. Where casinos pay around 40 percent tax on their gross income, the Canidrome only pays 25 percent. It is this combination of lower taxes and dog sales that has allowed Yat Yuen to remain profitable.
Yet the numbers still don’t add up favourably. Despite regular government tax breaks – 50 percent in 1985, 35 percent in 1988 and 25 percent in 2005 – the Canidrome’s gross annual revenue for 2014 was MOP145 million – a decrease of 18.54 percent from 2013. In 2013 the gross income was MOP178 million, according to the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau (DICJ), the government body overseeing gaming activities in Macau. Martins says the same amount is “made in just four hours in the casino industry.”
This is despite the extrodinay demands made on the animals. The Government only obliges the Canidrome to run 12 races per day, yet at Yat Yuen 18 races a day take place. The Canidrome is required to arrange 160 days of races per year, yet around 264 days of racing take place annually. The track is old with no investment in maintenance, resulting in an increasing number of accidents. The greyhounds often break their legs when taking the corners, in addition to a host of other factors that contribute to the injuries suffered.
Speaking to the South China Morning Post, Martins explained how dogs as young as two or three years old are killed if they not “profitable”. This could be because they are ill, injured or they fail to place in the top three in five consecutive races. When not racing, the dogs live in small cages onsite.
To date, he knows of just one dog that was adopted by a vet who works for the Canidrome and two others adopted by Macau residents.
“The Canidrome doesn’t allow anybody to go inside their kennels. The three dogs that were adopted were sent to the municipal kennel for people to adopt there.”
“Because of this adoption scam we have changed our position – it’s no longer about the adoption programme, we want the track closed.”
According to Christine Dorchak, president of Grey2K USA Worldwide, there is “no other track in the world that does not offer greyhounds for adoption post-racing.”
Dorchak, who has helped close 28 dog tracks in the US since 2001, says Yat Yuen Canidrome is the worst dog track in the world.
“Hundreds of dogs are transported to the track each year from Australia – and not one gets out alive,” she says, adding: “This is because there is no actual adoption program.”
The continued existence of an operation of this nature has rasied questions in numerous circles in Macau and suspicions of dodgy financial activities have been voiced. In April, Anima sent a letter to Leong Vai-tac, Macau’s Secretary for the Economy and Finance Affairs, in which Martins claimed the track is engaging in illegal betting created through its broadcasting of races, aiding tax evasion.
“I suspect illegal betting … something is wrong to keep the track open when it is making very little money,” he said in an interview with the South China Morning Post.
Anima’s president adds that the track has been an “economic disaster” for the government who owns the land, and he thinks it would be better used for community projects. On numerous occasions the activist has described how the racetrack is “in one of the most densely populated areas of the world, in an area where there are schools, where residents are protesting about the noise the animals make, so it makes sense to return the land to the government.”
On September 30 this year, a two-hour vigil was held in front of the Government Palace. Orgnised by Anima and Grey2K USA, eight countries – Australia, Belgium, Italy, France, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United States of America and Macau – took part. Two days earlier Chief Executive Chiu Sai On had announced that the government had commissioned a study by the The Institute for the Study of Commercial Gaming (ISCG), of the University of Macau, to investigate the feasibility of the Canidrome.
An indignant Martins spoke to reporters at the vigil about the announcement: “The last [concession] contract was for 10 years. We’ve been talking about this since 2012. So, over the past three years, why couldn’t the government have ordered a report from the University? Why order it now, three months before the concession expires?”
A look at the Anima website shows all the letters sent to the government since 2012. They are accessible to everyone and all have gone unanswered.
“Three years ago we protested because no animal gets out of there alive. And they are asking for a study from an institute connected to the gaming world? And it must be so complex that will take a year,” Martins laments.
The study by ISCG will take into account aspects such as the development of the surrounding region, the continued activity of greyhound racing and the eventual joining of the Canidrome with the Macau Jockey Club. The latter possibility, in particular, perplexes Martins.
“If the Chief Executive knows that the Jockey Club concession needs more land for the development of a hotel and housing, where does he want to put the Canidrome, in an area already so densely populated?”