Johor gives Bigfoot full protection

Johor gives Bigfoot full protection



JOHOR BARU: News of the alleged capture of a baby Bigfoot in Kota Tinggi last month has started an international debate on the need to protect the mythical creature.

Following this, the Johor Government has announced total protection for the Bigfoot, as a State heritage, which cannot be injured, captured, transported out of the State or killed.

This has won the praise of the American based Bigfoot Research Organisation (BFRO), which said: "The proactive step by Johor to declare the Bigfoot totally protected has disproved the assumption that no government would ever declare the species protected until at least one specimen was obtained by a hunter.

"Given the rarity of the species, it would have been a sadly ironic event if the world’s first declaration of protection would have required the death of one of these rare animals."

BFRO in its website said Johor had thus taken another bold, historical step that other countries could only follow.

It added that the governments of Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan, India, China, Russia, America or Canada did not collect information on Bigfoot sightings from their citizens for the purpose of government-sponsored scientific research.

"Sightings in all of those countries do not get documented by any government agency. In the US and Canada, sightings reported to police and forest rangers are ignored and denied, even if the witnesses are the police and rangers themselves," it said.

"Malaysia is the only country that attempts to collect information on sightings from its citizens. Although sightings and track finds are not frequent, the Malaysian Government is still the only government in the world that will not hesitate to disclose any sighting information to the media.

"Laws regarding endangered species are typically set this way to provide for situations where a newly-discovered species with a very limited habitat is in need of immediate legal protection to prevent its extinction."

The only previous ‘law’ enacted that prohibits the killing of the Bigfoot is the 1969 ordinance in Skamania County, Washington.


Bigfoot capture a tall tale
20 Apr 2006

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JOHOR BARU: The story of a baby bigfoot being captured in Kota Tinggi appears to be just that: A tall tale.


Enquiries with the State Government, state wildlife department and national wildlife department drew a blank on the issue.

State Environment and Tourism Committee chairman Freddie Long said he read about the alleged incident in a newspaper yesterday.

"We are not sure if wildlife officers really caught a baby Bigfoot. I only came to know about it from a newspaper report," he said after the weekly State Executive Council meeting here yesterday. State Wildlife director Abdul Razak Majid also denied knowledge.

A Bahasa Malaysia daily reported that a baby Bigfoot had been shot with a tranquiliser gun and transported to Kuala Lumpur.