Judge seeks the end of Witchcraft Curbs

LINK

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- A senior High Court judge urged Zimbabwe's government to ease colonial era restrictions on the practice of witchcraft, state-run radio reported Tuesday.

Many here retain strong beliefs in the healing power of spirit mediums -- known as n'angas, or witch doctors -- along with the role of ancestral rites in the nation's cultural life, Judge Maphios Cheda said Monday at the opening of a new judicial year in the second city of Bulawayo.

"The strongly held conviction of belief in witchcraft and traditional healers ... cannot be wished away," Cheda said in the speech quoted on state radio.

He urged amendments to the century-old Witchcraft Suppression Act "in keeping with the popular thinking and beliefs of the majority in this country."

The Zimbabwe National Traditional Healers Association estimates 80 percent of Zimbabweans visit traditional healers for treatment or consultations, Cheda said.

This story needs a clarification....
Traditional healers often use Herbs to treat people.
Traditional healers often perform ceremonies to cleanse you from curses.
Some do one, some do the other, most do both.

Sickness is attributed to a curse. Maybe you mistreated your mother, so after she died her spirit cursed you. So you go to your local Healer, he knows you mistreated your mother (even we western docs know all the gossip) and holds a ceremony...you are cured, and you start treating your elders better in the future.

But sometimes the illness is from a "curse"...maybe you got someone's job, so they put a curse on you (I treated one of these cases)...you do a ceremony, and fine.

But sometimes the illness is from a "witch"...an evil person that lives in your town or village...
And maybe the witchdoctor will name a person he is angry at as the "witch"...

In the old days, the villagers would go to them and beat them to death, or someone would poison them...

Just like the Salem witch craft trials, lots of innocent people were accused and killed...so the British made it illegal to accuse someone of witchcraft...

(going to a healer for ceremonies or for herbal medicine was NEVER illegal)...

Finally, the dark side of all of this is the belief that you can manipulate the spirits for power...
Every African country has cases where bodies of young people have been found...you see, you kill them and place their hearts or genitals under your business, and the spirits will make you sucessful...

So witches DO exist...
And before any Westerners condemn Africans for their evil killing of innocent children, might I remind you that most western countris allow men and women to kill their unborn children for convenience? Most Africans consider abortionists as witches too...