Animal rights activists express discontent with Mijas town hall for allowing donkey taxi service to continue

In collaboration with the animal protection organisation Todos los Caballos del Mundo, a group of protesters returned to Mijas last Thursday to express their discontent with Mijas town hall for allowing the donkey taxi service to continue in the village.

The El Burrito Libre group has been negotiating with the council to work out a way for the working donkeys and horses to be released from their “suffering”. One of their proposals is to replace them with tuk tuk taxis, which would be offered to the current donkey owners so that they can continue tourist rides.

The group also suggests that the local authorities could also buy the donkeys and set up sanctuaries where they could live. However, the group claims that the council has done nothing. It has announced that it is breaking off any line of dialogue with the town hall “because we no longer have any trust,” said French national Anne Blitz, the president of the collective. She explained that they will be taking the matter to court alongside the animal protection organisation “to put an end to this activity”. “In this day and age, animal abuse cannot continue and we cannot accept it,” she said.

This is despite the fact that Mijas town hall confirmed in May that it had begun the preparation of a feasibility study for the Parque Platero, a recreational park for the town's working donkeys. As reported by SUR in English at the time, the town hall stated that the objectives of this action are to improve "global awareness of animal rights and welfare" through the creation of infrastructures, such as an observatory for donkeys in partial freedom, the possibility of a walk with donkeys through shaded paths and the creation of a visitors' centre.

The council also adapted its bylaws last year to prevent the donkeys being used from 12pm to 6pm when a yellow or amber hot weather warning is in place.

The group held a similar demonstration last summer, although this ended with extra police being deployed to the area where they were protesting due to the arrival of a large group of donkey owners and their families. On this occasion, around 100 participants dressed in white and some with ropes around their necks clashed with the angry locals. The tension reached fever pitch in a matter of seconds, and the security cordon made up of mostly Local Police was promptly reinforced with officers from the National Police and Guardia Civil.

Fortunately, this year’s protest ended without incident due to the presence of a large number of Guardia Civil and Local Police officers. However, the expected turnout was far less than Blitz had expected. Annoyed by the fact that after handing out over 400 fliers only 30 people turned up, which she claimed was “shameful”, she took to social media to vent her anger.

“Only 30 people present at [the] demonstration. The majority were members of associations, so 15 people from the public. The positive thing was the absence of donkeys and presence of a large number of Guardia Civil, but finally for nothing. I feel very disgusted after having worked so hard with Tee (Mcol) for more than a month,” she wrote on the group's Facebook page.

The controversy over the Mijas donkey taxis has been going on for several years, although in summer it intensifies due to the increased presence of tourists in Mijas. It is a paradoxical situation because the donkey taxi service was originally created to take tourists around Mijas Pueblo and that is still its purpose, but there are many foreign residents and tourists who see this practice as a form of animal abuse and openly reject it.

In reply to this, the 20 donkey owners themselves say that what the animal rights demonstrators are demanding is not in the best interests of the animals. The owners claim that if these families lose their livelihoods, they will be forced to sell the animals to a dealer, who in turn will slaughter them, because if an animal loses its function, it is useless.