After more than 40 years in the circus and of inaction from public powers, Dumba the elephant has died
Dumba the elephant, exploited by circuses for her whole life, has died in Germany.
It is with profound sadness and great anger that we have just learned of the death of Dumba from an intermediary from European Elephant Group. Exploited for her whole life, the elephant had been living in a small enclosure at a settled circus in Germany for a year when she died in March 2022. We had been to see her in October 2021. Subjected to harmful living conditions from the age of two, she had not yet reached her fiftieth birthday.
Her lengthy exploitation in circuses, travelling endlessly in a lorry, and the cowardice of public powers, not to mention the rest, got the better of Dumba, despite the relentless campaign that we led for her.
A life on the road, hired out to the highest bidder…
Alongside our Spanish partner, FAADA, we never stopped following her movements, sometimes in Spain, sometimes in France. On our side of the border, she had been “hired out” by her trainer at the Cirque de Paris for a long time. Under their big top, she had been forced to participate in appalling cynical shows.
At the very start of 2021, after several months of looking for her, we found her shut up in a trailer in Gard in freezing temperatures. Everything about her posture indicated that her legs were hurting her, as confirmed to us by an elephant expert. We immediately filed a complaint and requested Dumba be seized so that she could finally be placed in a sanctuary.
…until the point of exhaustion
Hoping to escape the lawsuits initiated by us, the trainer Kludsky abandoned Dumba in Germany. Placed in a settled circus, the elephant no longer had to participate in shows. But, cooped up in a small enclosure, she did not escape isolation and discontent. To free her, we sought the help of local associations and the German government.
The elephant had been dead for months when we were finally able to get our hands on the report from the veterinarian who had examined her at the end of January 2021. This document, which confirmed that she was suffering from muscle wastage in her legs and felt that it was “of interest and necessary” to carry out additional examinations, should have been given to us long before! We have known for a long time that Dumba was in danger. We alerted the authorities multiple times about the owners exploiting her. They washed their hands of her: the prefect, prosecutor, and even the Ministry. And Dumba has paid a heavy price.
A law complicit in mistreatment
By allowing these establishments to settle down in order to be able to continue to show animals to the public after 2028, the law against animal mistreatment is complicit in exploitation. And what about the inaction of the Ministry of the Ecological Transition, who still have not banned the reproduction of felines in circuses, which are already so numerous in France, one and a half years after the law being passed by the National Assembly? How many more animals will die, stressed out by training, boredom, and imprisonment, before finally being truly rescued?
In memory of Dumba and for all the others, the fight continues.
Translated from the French by Joely Justice