Mpumalanga Witchcraft Suppression Bill - Background

Background

Despite the ongoing existence of the national Witchcraft Suppression Act of 1957 based on colonial witchcraft legislation, which criminalizes the "pretence of witchcraft" and accusations of witchcraft, violent witch-hunts have persisted in rural areas of South Africa. Various legislative reforms have been proposed to try and address this complex problem.

The principal tenets of the ANC's 1994 National Health Plan with respect to traditional healers include the right of access to traditional practitioners as part of their cultural heritage and belief system and the control of traditional practitioners by a recognised and accepted body so that harmful practices can be eliminated and the profession promoted. This ultimately led to the national Traditional Health Practitioners Act of 2007 which the National Department of Health only started to implement in December 2011 under pressure from frustrated traditional healers.

In 1995 the Minister of Safety and Security of the Northern Province commissioned the Commission of Enquiry into Witchcraft Violence and Ritual Murder in the Northern Province of the Republic of South Africa chaired by Professor Victor Ralushai. The Committee proposed a new national Witchcraft Control Act including penalties for practising, or pretending to practise, witchcraft and also recommended new legislation to regulate traditional healers. Unlike the Witchcraft Suppression Act of 1957, the proposed Witchcraft Control Act would explicitly acknowledge the existence of witchcraft and criminalize it.

The Ralushai Commission defined a witch as follows in their report:

The English word witch is gender specific and confined to women only. The male equivalent is wizard. The Sesotho word moloi (pl. baloi) is derived from the verb loya, which means to bewitch and is attributed to those people who, through sheer malice, either consciously or subconsciously, employ magical means to inflict all manner of evil on their fellow human beings. They destroy property, bring disease or misfortune and cause death, often entirely without provocation to satisfy their inherent craving for evil doing. The Tsivenda word for witchcraft is vhuloi. The Nguni equivalent is ukuthakatha (verb) and umthakathi (noun). African terminology referring to witches or wizards is gender neutral (Minnaar et al 1998.) —Report of the Ralushai Commission of Inquiry into Witchcraft Violence and Ritual Murder in the Northern Province

Testifying before a Truth and Reconciliation Commission amnesty hearing in July 1999 about his knowledge about witchcraft matters and other related issues, Professor Ralushai defined a witch as follows when requested to do so by practising attorney Patrick Ndou:

A witch is supposed to be a person who is endowed with powers of causing illness or ill luck or death to the person that he wants to destroy. —Professor V N Ralushai, Truth and Reconciliation Commission Amnesty Hearing, Thohoyandou 12 July 1999

In 1998 the Commission for Gender Equality issued the Thohoyandou Declaration on Ending Witchcraft Violence, recommending urgent legislative reform to mitigate harmful witchcraft practices and violent witch hunts including new legislation to regulate the practices and conduct of traditional healers.

The draft Mpumalanga Witchcraft Suppression Bill of 2007 expanded on the Witchcraft Suppression Act of 1957, defining witchcraft as harmful magic and attempting to regulate the conduct of traditional healers in Mpumalanga.