There is a large garage in John Borg Street, Birkirkara, where a female boxer, a so-called pet, has been tethered to one of its walls for the last eight years or so.

Animal Welfare Officers assert they made visits to this garage and brought about changes for the better within the limits that the law allows them.

And there is the rub, “within the limits”.

The garage is connected to the house where the family lived up to a few years ago. Since then, the family has retained both properties, i.e. the house as well as the garage, and have moved into another property a kilometre or so away in Triq il-Fuħħarin, also with an adjacent garage.

But the boxer has spent more than 98% of its existence tethered to that wall in this garage in John Borg Street.

While the family lived in the house that connects to the garage, the owner would untie the dog which would dart out onto the street, in a frenzy of release almost at a loss at what was happening to, and around, her, bounding from one side of the street to the other frantically picking up scent, totally oblivious to oncoming traffic. Half an hour or so later she would hear her master’s whistle and in no time at all she’d be by that wall, tether and all.

When the family moved house, some three years ago, this routine would continue and for the remaining twenty-three-and-a-half hours of the day, every day, this unfortunate creature would remain tethered to that wall until next day’s half-hour taste of liberty.

But for the past month or so, even that daily half-hour release has been denied her. The owner has had to resort to a walking aid and is thus unable to go himself so a member of the family goes along to clean up after the dog as well as to feed and water her. Yet, all the while, the dog remains tethered to the wall.

So for the past month or so that dog has been tethered to that wall 24/7 in a dark, damp garage denied the glorious light of day, it once enjoyed, along with some freedom, for 30 minutes every 24 hours.

The howling and whining, the forlorn noises, the plaintive cries emanating from this poor creature are broken only with intervals of silence brought on by her being worn down and out, through her effort and hopelessness, and her apparently falling asleep.

One cannot fathom why the owner doesn’t at least install the wretched creature in the garage adjacent to his new home. There at least he can be at hand at a moment’s notice and provide some form of solace to his “pet”, a pet that is totally starved of her owner’s company.

If this isn’t cruelty it is much, much more than insensitivity. We became aware of the plight of this boxer some five years ago and duly informed by phone the Animal Welfare Department. At the time the dog’s tether was no more than a metre long. The voice on the other end of the line told us that as long as the animal is on private property, provided with food and water and not physically abused, there are no grounds for the department to intervene. Two years later, i.e. last year, through a radio programme, we learnt that the minimum length of the tether had to be three metres. So we rang again and Department Officers paid a call on this garage and forced the owner to make changes, for it wasn’t only the tether that wasn’t acceptable by the standards laid down by law.

Through misinformation given by the person who took calls from the public that dog went through two more years of unnecessary suffering. To repeat, for eight or so years, until a month ago, 98% of this dog’s existence has been spent tethered to that wall in that garage. It at least had a reprieve of that daily half-an-hour of freedom. For the last month or so even those 30 minutes of frenzied freedom have been denied her.

The present misery of this hapless creature has been brought again to the attention of the Animal Welfare Department by email. We also informed them that in all likelihood the dog isn’t microchipped. Weeks have passed and as no reply has been received we can arrive to no other conclusion than our information has been ignored. We were also ignored when more than a year ago we informed Ms Chetcuti of the cramped space (in a small garage) sectioned off by a brick wall where a horse in Triq Camenzuli, L-Imrabat, St Julian’s, has to pine away most of his life. Our heart goes out to this boxer. It is now a broken dog, left to rot away in damp and dank surroundings the remaining days of its most wretched existence. The Animal Welfare Department has done nothing and continues to do nothing. We will no longer resort to them.

■ Joe Micallef & Friends

Birkirkara