Samba: the tragedy has lasted long enough!

How far must an animal have to be persecuted for humans to admit that it’s suffering? How far can trainers go without curbing their violence? It’s been 32 years since Samba was born, almost as long as she has had to endure this hell. For 17 years since we met this elephant kidnapped by a French circus, we have been fighting to save it.

Investigations, expert reports, reports, petitions, demonstrations, legal action, creation of a support committee, raising awareness to the public and to the authorities denouncing this daily mistreatment. The infamous conditions of detention that do not respect this elephant’s most basic needs… We are carrying out this fight relentlessly, but the exploitation of Samba continues to be tolerated, applauded even during the shows she performs under the threat of the ankus hook. Her drama drags on and on and will eventually kill her.

Repeated torture

The latest images reported by our investigators speak for themselves. Samba is at the end. Looking thinner than ever, lying on the tarmac in a tiny enclosure and devoid of any enrichment, she shows only her back, alone in the face of misfortune, motionless. You would think she was dead. However, no, not yet. When she straightens up, she resumes her all most robotic stereotypical movements on the verge of madness. And one wonders how she has withstood this incessant trauma, which has been her existence for so long.

The memories of her first months of life have never left her. Perhaps it is to them the reason she manages to hang on? These short 12 months when she tasted the flavour of happiness, just after her birth in Kenya, when she was still free and surrounded by her family ... Nothing and no one can make her forget the gestures of love from her mother, the unwavering attachment of her family, games with younger elephants of her own age, the pleasure of long walks in the African bush, the joy of swimming together. However, this happiness was snatched from her very early in life. One day, hunters came to massacre her herd, her mother was murdered before her eyes. Samba was only one year old. And that day, she was the only one not to have been killed, her capture provoked to be the slowest and heart-breaking agony of all... A plunge into nothingness, absurdity and cruelty, which still continues, right to this day !

Let’s not continue to endorse this horror!

Shall we leave the last word to this image of a traumatized and mistreated elephant? Do we want to abandon Samba to her torturers until her last breath? Since 2002, One Voice has been mobilizing so that her cage does not become her tomb. In 2019, we are not abandoning the fight! We demand that Samba's suffering is finally recognized and that loving and caring hands can take care of her!

Even if the prefecture of Bouches-du-Rhône, where the circus is registered, still turns a deaf ear to our calls after all these years, we will have initiated legal proceedings against them. This administration has the duty to impose on those who claim to be the "owners" of Samba, her immediate transfer to a sanctuary. The charges against them, the evidence we hold, is heavy enough to keep us hoping for a success. Unless you want to hide your face and continue to protect her torturers.

Please sign and share the petition #UnSanctuairePourSamba !