It is 9:15 on a warm Tuesday night in Singapore, as Uncle Taufik Aziz walks out of his apartment complex carrying a blue plastic bag. He’s wearing light blue washed denim jeans, a grey t-shirt, and a pair of slides. He turns his head left and right, scanning for signs of movement. He strolls through the courtyard and calls out softly into the wind. After a few seconds of silence, a ginger and white cat emerges swiftly out of the darkness. Aziz smiles and strokes the cat’s back, to which it purrs in response. He places the bag on the ground and starts removing its contents. He sets one bowl down and fills it with fresh bottled water, before filling a second with a portion of wet food. The soft four-legged creature meows appreciatively and immediately begins work on his meal. When Aziz is satisfied, he walks on into the adjacent carpark, where two other cats spring into sight from beneath the parked cars. One fluffy cat with a dark brown coat, and a thin cat zooms towards him excitedly. Once again Aziz reaches into his bag and carefully lays out their food and water.

Aziz feeds the cats every night at 9:15pm. Photos: Ezra Kaye.

This is a regular night for Aziz. He has been feeding the community cats in his neighbourhood for the past two years. Singapore is home to approximately 50,000-60,000 stray cats, which are called community cats. They are cared for by volunteers throughout the country.  According to the Society of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals’ 2023 annual report, pet abandonment is on the rise in Singapore. The government is rolling out new legislation in September to try and resolve the problem, but in the meantime, deserted cats depend on people like Aziz to survive.

“I just can’t see them hungry, you know. Every time you get to see those cats and they come near you, you give them some water and they start to drink. I know that they are hungry,” says Aziz.

Like many other volunteers, Aziz pays for the cat food from his own pocket. He buys in bulk during the mid-year and annual sales to try and save money.

Aziz says his biggest challenge is when he can’t find the cats in his neighbourhood.

“At times, you don’t get to see them. They just disappear and you keep wondering where they have gone to. I think you have that emotional kind of feeling with the cat. So, if you don’t get to see them, it kind of strikes you.”

There are generally three or four cats which come out for Aziz. Photos: Ezra Kaye and Beth Mackiewicz.

Why so many cats?

The SPCA attended to 285 cases of pet abandonment in 2023, compared to 96 in 2022, almost three times as many. Cats made up 45 per cent of that total. Pet abandonment is illegal in Singapore, but the law doesn’t seem to bite.

Ferdyna Tan runs a cat shelter in Singapore called Ferdycatsits. She also offers grooming and cat sitting services which fund her rescue work.

“Singapore has a lot of abandonment of cats. I really can’t understand it, it’s very very sad,” she says.

She believes people often abandon their cats because they are reluctant to fork out money if they become sick or injured. She says it is also common for people to abandon their cats once they grow older, because they prefer kittens.

A lot of these cats have not been sterilised, which means they continue to breed out in the neighbourhood.

Tan specialises in looking after pregnant cats. She has a team of six people who rescue pregnant female cats and house them until they give birth. They foster the cats for around three months before sterilising and trying to rehome them.  

“I love cats. I feel satisfied and happy whenever I can find a good home for them,” she says.”

“Especially those cats which got abandoned from their owners just because of one small medical condition. It makes me feel like I’ve done something good for the community.”

When they are ready, the kittens and their mother are put up for adoption. Photos: Supplied.

Shelby Doshi is a cat behavioural consultant and a community cat care giver. She quit her banking day job in 2010 to set up her business, Lucky’s Pet Haven, and has been working with cats ever since. During her childhood she was afraid of cats due to her mother. She still remembers hearing her mum scream whenever a cat came anywhere near them. One evening when Doshi was a teenager, she stayed at home instead of going out to a club with her cousin, because an orange, black, and white cat was waiting outside. The cat had been regularly coming to the house and staring at them through the window. That night, Doshi and her cousin couldn’t muster the courage to face it, so they decided to have the night in.  Years later, when Doshi had overcome her fear, that orange cat, which she named Tigerella, turned out to be her first rescue cat.

It is commonplace for people to be wary of cats in Singapore.  Doshi says despite the goodwill of some carers, Singapore is not an animal friendly country.

“In Singapore, the culture is if I don’t like something, all I have to do is to pick up the phone, call the authorities and make a complaint. Singapore is a complaint society. So, everybody complains about everything,” she says.

In Singapore, residents are encouraged to be keep their cats inside to avoid neighbourly disputes. About 80 per cent of Singaporeans live in Housing Development Board flats. Ironically, cats have been banned in HDB flats since 1989, as they were believed to be difficult to contain and were an inconvenience to neighbours. But this is set to change. New legislation, which kicks into action on the September 1, will make it legal to keep up to two cats per HDB flat.  It also enforces mandatory licensing and microchipping.

Doshi says the authorities have always turned a blind eye to cat ownership in HDB flats despite the ban. She says it’s common for people to have cats in their apartments, and issues only arise when neighbours complain about cats misbehaving.

Doshi believes a lot of people are unaware that sterilisation helps resolve their cat’s behavioural issues.

“When I do behavioural consults, and they tell me that, for example, my cat is not using the litter box, or my cat is very aggressive, the first question I always ask is, is your cat sterilised? If the cat is not, 90 per cent of the time sterilisation fixes the issue.”

She has seen owners grow frustrated by their cat’s misbehaviour and resort to abusing or abandoning them.

Independent non-for-profit bodies such as the SPCA, and the Cat Welfare Society are collaborating with the Animal and Veterinary Service to reduce the population of community cats in Singapore. The AVS is a government body within the National Parks Board.  In 2014, they started a joint Stray Cat Sterilisation Programme, which offered free sterilisations to cats in HDB estates. The program encouraged a Trap, Neuter, Release approach where stray cats are taken off the streets to be sterilised, and then released back into the community or rehomed. The AVS subsidises 50 per cent of the cost of sterilisations, while the SPCA and Cat Welfare Society fund the rest through community donations. A new Trap-Neuter-Rehome/Release-Manage program will also be rolled out in September which builds on the existing Stray Cat Sterilisation Programme.

Doshi supports the new legislation but doesn’t think it goes far enough.

“The problem I have with the framework is that it’s not mandatory to sterilise,” she says.

Doshi was part of two focus groups which advised the authorities about the legislative changes. She believes there was a reluctance to introduce mandatory sterilisations due to religious reasons. Islam is the third largest religion in Singapore, accounting for over 15 per cent of the population in the 2020 census. While sterilisation is not completely forbidden in the Islam faith, there is differing thought on what animals it is allowed to be performed on.

The Islamic Religious Council of Singapore is a government body which looks after the interests of Singapore’s Muslim community. In 2013 they released a fatwa, a ruling on a point of Islamic law, that the neutering of cats was permitted.

Despite this, Doshi thinks it is still difficult to change the mindset of some people in the Muslim community. As a result, she believes the government was unwilling to enforce mandatory sterilisation.

“It’s great that more people may be adopting the cats. But you’re still not addressing the root cause of abandonment, which is all these unsterilised cats that become community cats later on,” she says.

Singapore is also tackling the problem of backyard breeding.

The SPCA says there has been a rise in the selling of animals via platforms such as Facebook and Telegram which are often listed as “adoptions with a fee.”

Backyard breeding is viewed as unethical as the animals generally are born in unsanitary and inadequate conditions, which can lead to health problems down the line.

Tan says buying from backyard breeders can also contribute to pet abandonment.

“After they breed, breed, breed, then they abandon the parents. They will keep the children. Every batch they will do that. So, we try not to support the backyard. The more people that support it, the more they will keep doing it,” she says.

New legislation which makes it mandatory to license and microchip cats is designed to limit backyard breeding.

Who cares for them?

Singapore has a number of kind-hearted individuals such as Aziz, Tan, and Doshi who look after the community cats.

Diana Zainuren is a volunteer at the Kitten Sanctuary Singapore, a non-for-profit animal welfare group. She takes care of rescued cats and helps find them a new home.

She has been looking after animals at several shelters since she graduated from junior college at 18. 

“I’m an animal lover. My parents can’t understand that. When I first started at the cats and dogs’ shelter, my parents were like, ‘oh my god, why is she doing this?’”

Zainuren loves developing a bond with the cats. It makes her feel happy when each day she comes into the sanctuary, the cats recognise her and show her affection.

The Kitten Sanctuary Singapore offers paid visits where the public can meet the cats and consider adoption. Photos: Ezra Kaye.

“Animals are very, innocent creatures. They don’t mean any harm, unless you do harm to them. They are just very, very pure.”

She says that people don’t realise how big a commitment it can be volunteering at animal shelters. She has seen a lot of people come and go after a month or two because they aren’t willing to compromise their lives to be there for the cats.

“Some of the people there don’t understand that it’s not for fun,” she says.

The Kitten Sanctuary Singapore puts cats up for adoption, but some other shelters have cats which don’t fit the profile people are looking for.

Chan Chow Wah is the owner of the Animal Human Alliance, a pet food business which also does rescue work. The Rahula Felv Sanctuary specialises in palliative care for cats suffering from feline leukemia virus and feline immunodeficiency virus.

FeLV is a serious infectious disease which affects cats worldwide. It can lead to anaemia, cancer, and immune system disorders. While it varies from cat to cat, the condition worsens over time and is usually fatal. Outdoor cats and unsterilised cats have an increased risk of contracting the virus.

FIV is a similar disease that also affects cats’ immune systems. It is generally less transferable and is a slower developing condition. Cats with FIV are still likely to live normal lives.

Chow Wah has been caring for animals for more than 20 years. He takes in cats with extreme medical problems and gives them a home to live out their last remaining years.

“We have had cats with heart issues, kidney failure, asthma, arthritis, etc. All of this requires quite a lot of time and resources to care for. Most of the time people don’t want cats like that. I would say that maybe 90 per cent of the cats would have died if we hadn’t taken them in,” he says.

Sumo (left) has  FIV and FeLV and also has sporotrichosis. Julie (right) had ear cancer, but after surgery is now cancer free. Photos: Supplied.

Despite their illnesses, Chow Wah still believes these cats can still have a good quality life if given the appropriate resources.

“Cats and all animals are sentient beings, so we should treat them with love and respect. As a rescuer, my job is to understand what resource they need to get well.”

Aziz stays for a while to pet the cats after they have eaten. Photos: Ezra Kaye

It’s a sentiment shared by Uncle Aziz. Outside his apartment building, he waits patiently as the community cats eat the remainder of their food. Once the bowls are licked clean, the fluffy brown cat nuzzles up against him appreciatively. Aziz bends over and gently strokes his back and tickles behind his ears. The cat purrs and rolls onto its back, inviting a belly rub. Aziz stays a while petting the cat until it eventually gets up and strolls into the night. Aziz watches it go with a fond smile, before quietly collecting the bowls, and heading back to his apartment.

“You feel a certain kind of satisfaction,” he says.

Photo Gallery

Photos: Ezra Kaye.

This story was produced as part of the Curtin Journalism 2024 Singapore Study Tour and supported by funding from the federal government’s New Colombo Plan.