A PROTEST organised by animal rights group, Acção Animal, was staged outside a TV recording studio in Mafra, near Lisbon, this week. The demonstrators were protesting against the use of animals in circuses and the promotion of this through the television show Circo das Celebridades, currently being broadcast on Portugal’s TVi channel.
The protest took place between 9.30pm and 11pm last Sunday (the time of the programme’s live broadcast), outside the United Broadcast Facilities studio in Venda do Pinheiro, Mafra.
The activists had their faces painted to symbolise animals and were wearing white T-shirts bearing the slogan “Eu não me divirto” (I’m not enjoying myself).
By staging the protest, Acção Animal hoped to raise awareness among society and the entities involved, for the need to stop the degrading and uneducating practice of using animals in circuses. Animal rights activists say circus animals are maltreated, abused and disrespected, and have proof of this online at http://www.ad-international.org/media_centre/videos/010_elephant_jabbed.wmv, where a video shows circus owner, Victor Hugo Cardinali, jabbing a performing elephant in the face with a metal spike more than 20 times to force it to perform a trick on a pedestal (also read article ‘Worldwide condemnation for Portugal’s Celebrity Circus’ in last week’s edition of The Resident).
Acção Animal vehemently condemns the use of animals for entertainment purposes and, consequently, their exhibition and use in circuses. It also condemns, in equal measure, all companies and entities that associate themselves with this type of behaviour and those seen to support it.
