Wildlife Alliance is responding to a recent video by VOD that it considers to be sorely inaccurate and seriously misleading.
VOD released on the VOD Facebook page on December 10 a video that has seriously misled the public and portrayed Wildlife Alliance as complaining that the government is creating a new development inside the Royal Decree Protected Phnom Tamao Forest.
Wildlife Alliance regards this as sorely inaccurate and is asking VOD to remove the video.
Wildlife Alliance considers its manager Nick Marx to have been manipulated by VOD, which mixed his statement with that of a Mr. Ma Chetra that while the previous government had kept this area for protection, it had now been given over for development.
We would like to state that there is in fact no new development, rather it is simply that a cleared corridor was made to stop forest fires from reaching the Phnom Tamao Wildlife Rescue Center.
Wildlife Alliance considers VOD to have used our manager to condone the position of the environmental activist Mr. Ma Chetra. Wildlife Alliance totally disagrees with this, and we have requested that VOD retract the video.
Nick Marx made only a very short general statement saying: “I am not against development, but all forests should be kept protected.”
Wildlife Alliance asserts that such manipulation of a Wildlife Alliance statement by VOD is unacceptable and gives Wildlife Alliance a bad reputation.
We would like to clarify that Wildlife Alliance has worked as a partner with the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries for the past 22 years since 2001 to jointly protect forests, rescue trafficked wildlife and provide professional care and release to seized wild animals.
Wildlife Alliance is proud of our partnership with the Ministry, and we are grateful for last year’s Royal Decree providing official protection to 2,025ha of the Phnom Tamao Rescue Center.
As a result, Wildlife Alliance has helped the Ministry to built 20km of fencing around the protected forest and to build a high debit water station that provides water to 1,500 wild animals.