Advertisement
Father Franco Zocca: When you say sorcery-related killings, people—95 percent—think other people were killed by sorcerers. The mentality is always that nobody dies for nothing. There is always a who—either a spirit of somebody or a magician—behind the death.The problem of this physical killing of the sorcerers is most prominent in the highlands, especially in Simbu among the Kuman speakers . In the other highlands [this violent torture killing wasn't as practiced], but this pattern now is spreading because the Simbu people… because of the poverty of their region, they are spreading around and they are bringing that pattern of accusation, torture, and killing that they did for centuries in their own places.
Advertisement
Yes. Also in our research into the cases that appeared over those last six years, we found that even if accusations happened in, say, Port Moresby [the capital], Simbu people were very important [in them]. The accused have to leave and now they're living in settlements there.One former bishop who was for 50 years a Catholic bishop in Simbu—he reckoned that one-third of the population of Simbu is displaced because of accusations or fears of sorcery. So you find those people in the settlements everywhere and they still keep that kind of mindset.Some people think the increased violence in the murders has more to do with the spread of drugs and home brew [moonshine] than economic displacement. Do you think there's any truth to that?
The accusation comes from elders usually, but the violence is always done by young people—sometimes under the influence of alcohol or marijuana or something like that. There is no work for them. Every year tens of thousands of people are kicked out of the system because it is very selective. Many people, they don't go to school, and even those who finish don't find a job. So there is a lot of frustration. These people are using something that wasn't around in the past—marijuana or alcohol were not around in the past, you know.
Advertisement
It could be, but in my research I didn't really find gangs going out and killing the sorcerers, because they're always people from the home of the accused. For the police, a part of [the problem] is they are afraid to deal with sorcery. But apart form that there are no witnesses. Nobody wants to talk. It's very much the locals who are doing it with the collusion of the whole community.You say this is displacing a lot of people. What will happen to these communities when a third of the population is running from sorcery accusations?
There are consequences. In the villages we really suffer now from the lack of leaders. The leaders in the highlands in the past, they were warriors. Tribal fighters have diminished during the years. But there is also a lack of leaders because the ones who are clever, they used to move to town… [in part] because they are afraid to be struck [by sorcery]. They always say this sorcery is triggered by jealousy—envy. So if you become too successful, you're in danger to be struck by the sorcerer. In the highlands, this fear is paralyzing the economy. The government has tried to deter witch-hunts by repealing the 1976 Sorcery Act, which witch hunters used to defend their actions in court, and by reinstating capital punishment [out of use since 1954]. But it doesn't seem to be having a great effect…
The government, yeah, they repealed the law under the pressure of the international media, but without much conviction. You cannot change a cultural mentality like that just by repealing a law. To change the mentality—to accept natural causes of death over spiritual ones—would stop this. It happened also in Europe. We killed lots of witches in the Middle Ages, and then finally we accepted the natural causes of sickness and death. Then witch hunting stopped.
Advertisement
Exactly, and that's why the churches have to stop giving credit to this kind of thing, because that's part of the problem. They are people possessed by evil spirits. They say things like that. The people possessed in the time of Jesus, they were sick people. That was a way of explaining sickness, but we still find a lot of churches today that enforce those kinds of beliefs.For me, it's more a matter of education than other things.What do you think is the best hope for bringing education like that out to remote regions?
Increase the education and bring a good health system. Our health is terrible here, especially in the villages. A lot of med centers are closed down. No doctors want to serve in the rural areas. The government is happy, because instead of accusing the system, [people] are accusing each other.What would make it easier for police to intervene, or for people to report witch hunts to help solve this in the short-term?
We don't have many policemen. We only have 7,000 for the whole country. In my research, in [one area] in Simbu, there was only one policeman for those cases of sorcery. They don't have cars. They don't have fuel. Often they are people from the same region. They are themselves very, very afraid of sorcery.My team here, the local research team, they always refuse to interview the sorcerers—the old ladies who survive—because they are afraid too.Follow Mark on Twitter.