Businesswoman hits out at red tape after two-year battle to transfer greyhounds from Macau to Hong Kong
Sportswear company executive Kathleen Trainor tells of ‘tortuous’ process to adopt dogs from now defunct Macau canidrome
A businesswoman who has waged a two-year battle against red tape to secure the adoption of four greyhound racing dogs from the now defunct Macau canidrome and resettle them in Hong Kong has hit out at Byzantine government bureaucracy in both cities.
Hong Kong sportswear company executive Kathleen Trainor – who has lived and worked in Hong Kong for 25 years – also called on the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD) to extend an August 31 deadline for submitting adoption documentation so that good homes can be secured for more of the hundreds of dogs that still face an uncertain future.
The latest twist in a bitter years-long struggle by animal welfare campaigners, who have consistently accused those who ran the now closed facility of keeping the dogs in “inhumane” conditions and showing scant regard for their future, saw officials in the world’s richest casino hub announce that the company which ran the canidrome would be fined under animal protection laws for abandoning 533 greyhounds on the premises.
Officials rejected an argument by lawyers for Macau (Yat Yuen) Canidrome – which is owned by one of Macau’s most powerful women, Angela Leong On-kei – that they were not liable under the law. Leong, who is a prominent lawmaker in the city’s Legislative Assembly and the fourth wife of casino tycoon Stanley Ho Hung-sun, has yet to comment on the legal action.
