This letter is to criticise the Malaysian Rhino Foundation on the deaths of all the rhinos kept in the Sungai Dusun Rhino Conservation Centre.

The adamant attitude of the chairperson of the Malaysian Rhino Foundation, Mohd Khan, should be heavily criticised. It is a tragic that all the seven Sumatran Rhinos died in the conservation centre, yet Mohd Khan insisted that wild rhinos should be brought in to start the breeding programme all over again.

The breeding programme started in 1984, but young rhinos were never produced. As a matter of fact, more and more healthy wild rhinos were killed as a result of poorly managed conservation centre.

Funding agencies wasted a lot of money throughout these years to support this captive breeding programme. The major factor that is driving the Sumatran Rhinos toward extinction should be identified and funding should be allocated in that area to reverse the decline.

Say if the captive breeding is successful, will the rhinos released into the park safeguarded from the prevailing poaching activities? More funding is in fact needed to curtail poaching activities e.g. employing more park rangers and monitoring of the remaining rhino populations.

And of course, the current penalty of one-year jail sentence and a fine of only RM10,000 would not deter poaching activities (poaching of elephant tusk in Africa faces death sentence).