Mozambique police warn bald men after ritual attack

Superstition, ignorance, lack of education, they’re all part of the explanation for the bizarre ritual killings that shook Mozambique last year. Bald men were targeted!
(webmaster FVDK)

Published on June 7, 2017
Published by BBC

Superstition: some people believe that the heads of bald men contain gold.

Bald men in Mozambique could be targets of ritual attacks, police have warned, after the recent killing of five men for their body parts.

Two suspects have been arrested in the central district of Milange, where the killings occurred.

“The belief is that the head of a bald man contains gold,” said Afonso Dias, a police commander in Mozambique’s central Zambezia province.

Albino people have also been killed in the region for ritual purposes.

Three men have been killed in the past week alone.

The BBC’s Jose Tembe in the capital, Maputo, says police think the notion of a bald head containing gold is a ruse by witchdoctors to get clients to take a person’s head to them.

“Their motive comes from superstition and culture – the local community thinks bald individuals are rich,” Commander Dias is reported as having told a press conference in Maputo.

The suspects are two young Mozambicans aged around 20, the AFP news agency reports.

A regional security spokesman, Miguel Caetano, told AFP that one of the victims had his head cut off and his organs removed.

The organs were to be used in rituals to advance the wealth of clients in Tanzania and Malawi, Mr Caetano said, citing the suspects.

There has been a spate of killings of people with albinism in East Africa in recent years, with their body parts used to make charms and potions by witchdoctors.

Source: BBC, June 7, 2017

Brain harvested from murdered Mozambique albino boy

Published on September 16, 2017
By News24

The 17-year old albino boy was murdered on Wednesday in the Benga area of Tete province, Mozambique (picture not related to case).

Maputo – A 17-year-old albino boy was killed and his brain removed for what is believed to be use in witchcraft in Mozambique, local news reports said.

Albinos in Mozambique are often hunted for their body parts, which are used as charms and magical potions in the belief that they bring wealth and good luck.

“The criminals took the bones out of the arms and legs, the hair and broke the head to remove the brain,” a local official told Mozambican news agency AIM.

The body was found after the boy was killed on Wednesday in the Benga area of Tete province, AIM said.

Lurdes Ferreira, a police spokesman in the Tete province, said police are investigating the teenager’s kidnap and murder. “We have launched a search and arrest operation for those responsible for the macabre crime,” Ferreira said.

The murder comes four months after a failed attempt by two parents to sell their albino child in Moatize.

Tete, which borders Malawi, is believed to have a large market for albino organ trafficking.

There have been more than 100 attacks against albinos in Mozambique since 2014, according to the UN, with hunters persecuting them for everything from their toes to their faeces.

Source: News24, September 16, 2017