Patrick's purrfect love

Patrick Lupuzi was always a dog person, but when his wife brought a cat home from work one day, he opened his heart to felines too. This inspired him so much that he now works for an organisation that cares for feral cats at the University of the Western Cape.

- FEROZA MILLER-ISAACS 

Mahatma Gandhi said, “The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” If they could verbalise, the feral cats who have made the University of the Western Cape (UWC) campus their home for several decades would attribute only greatness to the TUFCAT team.

Marking 22 years of dedicated love, care and service to animals, TUFCAT’s UWC Feral Cat Project has good reason to celebrate. The journey has not been easy, given the countless challenges surrounding animal welfare in our country. Heading up the TUFCAT team is animal lover Dr Sharyn Spicer. A Sociology lecturer at UWC, she started TUFCAT “way back in 1997” when she began working at the university.

“I noticed literally hundreds of unhealthy, sick and starving cats everywhere,” says Sharyn. “The cats have reportedly been on campus since the 1970s and are the offspring of those left behind when people were removed from Unibell and Modderdam informal settlements (where the nature reserve is now).”

CATNAPPED