Foreign witchdoctors banned in Malawi

The Malawi government has banned foreign witchdoctors from plying their trade in the Southern African nation in a bid to curb a rising wave of abductions and killings of albinos.

In a statement, President Peter Mutharika’s chief political adviser Dr Hetherwick Ntaba said that only herbalists who adhere to a code of practice would be allowed to operate in Malawi.

“Foreign witchdoctors should immediately stop plying their trade in Malawi. We have just learnt that some witchdoctors who were banned in Tanzania and others from Mozambique fled to Malawi and are fuelling attacks on people with albinism. They must be deported,” said Ntaba.

He said the traditional doctors are convincing superstitious Malawians that albino body parts when mixed with other charms bring good luck and wealth.

Traditional Healers Association of Malawi president Frank Manyowa has welcomed the ban.

“We, the traditional healers, simply heal various ailments using plants with medicinal nutrients. It’s the foreign witch-doctors and soothsayers who are perpetrating the killings because of their belief in black magic,” he said.

He added that local magicians must be arrested and jailed while foreign magicians should deported back to their countries.

Manyowa said the only way to success is through innovation and hard work and not through the use of rituals, satanism and witchcraft.

Ntaba who is also Chairperson of the National Technical Committee on Abuse of Persons with Albinism said the government has pledged to send children with albinism to boarding schools as one way of offering them protection while guaranteeing them their right to education.

“The Ministry of Education will place children who are failing to go to school for fear of being attacked in boarding schools with appropriate security arrangements made for them,” added Ntaba.

According to Ntaba, government is concerned to learn that some children with albinism have dropped out of school for the fear of being abducted.

Government recently disclosed that it is looking for at least $500,000 to be used immediately in the crackdown of abductions and killings of people with albinism.

So far 18 albinos have been gruesomely murdered in Malawi in the past three years, according to authorities. The 18th victim is 38 year-old Fletcher Masina who was murdered in his garden in central Malawi’s district of Ntcheu on Tuesday.