On behalf of all the donkeys in Bonaire, we would like to thank everyone who signed our petition to stop the immediate shipment of 200 feral donkeys to Haiti - a meeting planned yesterday to discuss this drastic plan was cancelled by the government of Bonaire and we believe this could have been a result of your support.
In five days, 8,015 of you signed our emergency petition and we are truly grateful to you all.
The Donkey Sanctuary sent the 8,015 strong petition to Donkey Sanctuary Bonaire in the early evening of Monday 16th July as a support document for their meeting with the Bonaire Government at which they planned to ask officials to re-consider their plans.
Our Director of International Operations, Stephen Blakeway, also made a direct appeal to individual officials at the Bonaire Government and the Party for Animals (a political party with two MPs in the Dutch parliament) in The Netherlands by sending them each a copy of the petition.
We have now received news that the meeting was cancelled by the Bonaire Government and we are almost certain that the petition and resulting media coverage was the cause of this. We are also led to believe The Party for Animals have become involved in the matter and have raised questions in Dutch parliament for the government to answer.
Stephen Blakeway says: “Well, the news has been an interesting development! Let us hope it is a positive one - any delays to the shipment plans means we have more time to find the best way forward for the feral donkeys of Bonaire. We guess the international interest has taken them by surprise and we’re very glad the Party for Animals has swung into action. Our thoughts are with the staff of Donkey Sanctuary Bonaire and their excellent work. We will be keeping a very close eye on proceedings over the next few days and possibly weeks.”
The Donkey Sanctuary continues to run the petition and will help Donkey Sanctuary Bonaire in its efforts to secure a better future for the feral donkeys on the island.
The Donkey Sanctuary is donating £9,000 to Donkey Sanctuary Bonaire this week towards the urgent need for improved fencing around the Bonaire sanctuary which currently houses the 400 donkeys of the island’s 600 donkey population. Click here to read more.
Please note - the petition we sent only contained first name, surname and country details of individual petitioners. Thank you once again for helping.