46 cats rescued from being neglected in cage in Sentul

Forty-six cats were on Wednesday rescued by a police team from being locked and neglected in an apartment in Bandar Baru Sentul here, following a complaint lodged by a cat caring club which suspected that a man had exploited the cats to make money.

The chairman of Sahabat Kucing Jalanan, Mohd Rosli Mohd Ariffin said he and a group of people suspected that the unemployed man had used his Facebook website to solicit for financial contributions purportedly to buy cat food and the treatment of his sick cats.

Subsequently, Mohd Rosli lodged a police report at the Sentul Police Station.

On Wednesday, he and his friends together with a police team went to the 41-year-old man's house at about 11.45am and found all the neglected cats in cages in several rooms.

"It was very sad to see the cats being locked in small cages in the kitchen of the house and the cats were not looked after and were smelly. Almost all the cats were infected with 'Sporo' and were sick," he told reporters here.

The sickness Sporotrichosis or known as Sporo, he said, was caused by fungus from the surrounding area, plants and animal species.

According to Mohd Rosli, the owner of the cats uploaded the status and videos of his cats for the past several months in the Facebook website concerning cats and appealed for financial help.

A netizen who had also suspected the man's activities had stated in a Facebook column that the man was a 'fraud' for having 23 Facebook accounts and was using them to 'sell' stories about his cats.

Bernama together with other media representatives who had also gone to the man's house found that the areas outside and inside the second-floor unit of the four-storey apartment were littered with rubbish, while electrical wires and a heap of Astro cables were found scattered in the lounge of the apartment unit.

Police took about 15 minutes to persuade the man to surrender the cats.

Meanwhile, the man claimed to love all his cats and had no time to clean the house since his mother died last April.

He said he had been looking after the cats for the past several years and the number of cats, which had been keeping him company since his mother died, had increased.

"My house is small...I have no other place to keep the cats. I did not abuse them, it's just that I could not afford to provide treatment for the sick cats as I had no money," he said, adding that this made him depend on public contributions to maintain the cats.

Another male neighbour told reporters that previously there were neighbours who had complained to the Kuala Lumpur City Hall on the condition of the apartment because he could not stand the stench coming from the apartment.

A member of Kelab Pencinta Kucing Malaysia, Datuk Leen Mustafa, 38, when met while accompanying the police at the scene, said some of the cats that were rescued were now being placed temporarily at a shop that provided 'cat hotel' services.

Kelab Sahabat Kucing Jalanan had sought assistance to treat the cats that were sickly, she said.

"We are collecting funds to pay for the cost of treatment for the cats,"she added.

Members of the public wishing to make financial contributions could contact Kelab Pencinta Kuching via Leen at telephone number 019-3999962.

-- BERNAMA