WALVIS BAY – Five dogs last Sunday viciously mauled a nine-year-old boy at Walvis Bay resulting in calls for tougher measures to control pets .
Coastal residents are now calling on the Walvis Bay Council, the police and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) to remove the dogs from a coastal dog breeder.
The boy, John West, is currently being treated in the Welwitschia hospital in Walvis Bay .
His father James West told New Era the boy was bitten more than 20 times by the vicious dogs on Sunday afternoon while he was on his way home in Meersig. The dogs are owned by a Walvis Bay dog breeder and a suspect in an alleged kidnapping case, Logan Pretorius.
Pretorius and three others stand accused of kidnapping and assaulting three minor boys in August at the coastal town.
The dog breeder also faces charges he let his unleashed dogs bite the boys during the alleged kidnapping.
West said yesterday his son was attacked while he was on his way home after he had visited a friend who also stays in Meersig.
“We live about three minutes from Logan (Pretorius) and my son says he was walking on the other side of his house in Nangolo Mbumba Street when he was viciously attacked by the dogs,” West told New Era.
He says he wasn’t home at the time of the incident and rushed to the scene when he was called by a friend who along with other residents managed to rescue his son from the dogs.
“Those dogs could have killed my son. And Pretorius did not even show any remorse when I confronted him about the attack,” said an incensed West.
According to him the dogs that savaged his son were boerbulls and pitbulls.
West has already reported the incident to the police and says he is just awaiting medical reports to take further action.
Commenting on the attack via a social network, Pretorius says he is sorry the boy was attacked by his dogs. He also said his dogs are apparently not aggressive unless they are mocked.
“It’s an unfortunate incident and I was not home when it happened but I wish the boy a speedy recovery. All I can say is people should leave me and my dogs alone. These incidents won’t happen if people don’t open my gates. I don’t know what happened and how my dogs got out of the yard,” he wrote in Afrikaans.