HE'S OURS, claim the crew of a Taiwanese vessel in Table Bay Harbour.
Not so, says a Kraaifontein woman who insists a German Shepherd found tethered with a short rope on board the squid fishing vessel Hsiang Chi Chun is in fact her mother's beloved three-year-old pet, Max.
So certain is Stella Fuller about the identity of the 'seagoing' dog that she initiated police action. A policeman armed with a search warrant issued by a magistrate boarded the vessel and removed the animal after the crew had co-operated fully.
Fuller maintains employees of a friend's security company in the harbour area watched Max being bought for R150 by the Chinese crew, who claim he was brought back into the country after a spell at sea.
When she saw what she believed to be Max, he was not in the condition he had been in at the time of his disappearance about six weeks ago.
He was very thin and his feet were swollen but I knew it was him because of the way his hair curls on the side of his neck. It is very unusual.
Max, says Fuller, was bought from an emigrating family shortly after Christmas last year and while there are no independent records to prove ownership she and her mother are convinced the canine 'salt' on Hsiang Chi Chun is the family dog.
Reports of stolen dogs destined for the pot on foreign vessels are hardly new but have never been proven in Cape Town; nevertheless it is common knowledge that dog meat is enjoyed by many in China and other eastern countries.
Even so, such inferences have upset the vessel's crew and himself, says Jerry Yang, first assistant director for the Taipei Liaison Office in the Mother City.
Yang told FTW last week that the vessel's Taiwanese master had purchased the dog from a local breeder last December and presented it to his Nationalist Chinese crew as 'a companion'.
Sean Bodington, the SPCA's chief inspector, says the dog appeared rather confused on arrival at the kennels, possibly because he may have become accustomed to the rolling motion of the ship.
In the meantime, a rather disconsolate German Shepherd remains in quarantine at the SPCA's kennels in Grassy Park outside Cape Town.
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